This is a smart and splendidly decorated rethinking of Anna Leonowens's famous chronicle

Exciting and well-shot.

While there's plenty of Shakespeare, Lawrence and Yeats scattered throughout John Brownlow's screenplay, there's precious little Plath -- no doubt the unfortunate result of the stranglehold the Hughes estate still maintains over her work.

Lighter than helium but irresistible nonetheless.

Negrin's film is a well-deserved tribute to a principled man who dared to act when principles no longer counted for anything.

Raw, uncompromising and surprisingly explicit.

A truly lousy reworking of a Billy Wilder misfire... The story is drearily predictable, the leads are charmless -- Ormond's 15 minutes are probably already behind her -- and the direction, by the usually reliable Sidney Pollack, is strictly by the numbers.

Whip together TV's The Invaders and V. Fold in cult classic Enemy From Space and season with a dash of Species. The yield: an agreeable cocktail of paranoid sci-fi conventions that bubbles along energetically, despite surprisingly low-tech trappings

Regardless of the artistry involved (though the street-level anxiety of post-9/11 New York is far better evoked in Jane Campion's underrated "In the Cut," The Brave One ultimately never really strays from the same moral low road as "Death Wish."

Easily one of the most brutally realistic horror movies since the original "Texas Chain Saw Massacre" (1974).

Aside from the overbearing soundtrack, the film is mercifully unsentimental and Ami himself can be quite droll.

Stone intentionally set out to make a good old-fashioned liberal drama about the evils of unchecked capitalism. This approach results in a film with few shades of gray and lots of moralizing speeches, but Stone nearly pulls it off through his usual visual verve and keen casting instincts.

The film does, however, assemble an amazing array of recorded conversations and vintage newsreel, and offers up enough press conference footage to make one nostalgic for the days when an uncowed, penetrating press really did serve the public interest, and the president was a smart, inspirational and often very funny figure who could think on his feet and fearlessly take on all comers.

The performances of Caan and Richardson are excellent, and the rollerball sequences are fast-paced and interesting.

The story is complex enough to be absorbing, but its pedantic quality makes it -- and its lessons -- all too easy to forget.

The fact that it was shot at the picturesque Utah resort is a huge plus and the film is so unabashedly eager to please.

This is less a movie than a lecture. Perhaps Lee simply should have made a documentary.

A clumsy, calculated attempt at warm-hearted, populist entertainment.

The end result is a film that tries to do too many things at once and does none of them quite right.

The banality of faceless evil isn't actually all that compelling on the hoof; the film's more interesting as a curiosity than as a film.

A triumph of art direction over narrative, but what art direction!

The complications are predictable, as is the resolution; what keeps the film from sinking into its own inconsequentiality is the throaty-voiced Henderson, who can make the most preposterous behavior ring absolutely true.

It's a good thing that Cummings and Leigh have such talented friends: They may overstay their welcome, but it's the entertaining guests who end up saving this poorly planned party.

The payoff doesn't quite equal the intensity of the spectacularly squirm-inducing premise, but Farrell takes his showboating star turn and runs with it.

A leaden, tone-deaf remake of the 1955 Ealing comedy starring Alec Guinness, the Coen brothers' painfully unfunny rehash hinges on the duel of wits between five larcenous oddballs and one sweet but strong-willed old lady.

Even the dramatic heavy hitters, who include Cox, Gleeson, O'Toole and Julie Christie, as Achilles' mother, are powerless in the face of Pitt's yawning hollowness.

The gorgeous Mole Antonelliana is the breakout star of Ferrario's fluffy valentine to the cinema.

The movie's low budget shows, but the competent (many of them also sitcom veterans) cast keeps things moving smoothly.

By the film's big finale, the whole thing has begun to feel distinctly ridiculous.

Charging Albert's film with looking too much like an American chick flick is to give it short shrift: For all the drinking, dancing and group hugs, by the end of their 36-hour trip down memory lane, the women's problems remain unresolved and poisonous secrets are still leaking out.

A surprisingly assured directorial debut that is hampered only by a weak script.

A film that takes such sadistic delight in the thorough humiliation of its heroine.

Ultimately, Schrader pulls us into a mind-over-matter kind of purgatory: Fun and original as his film is, it lacks feeling and heart.

A charming comedy-drama that's surprising true to the events that inspired it.

Director Zelda Barron has a real affection for her characters, enabling them to retain a sweet dignity even under some excessive circumstances dictated by the unimaginative, slight script.

While the script contains trite and unbelievable dialogue, the superbly convincing performances make up for these faults.

This charming tale of a quartet of Australian orphans who share a life-altering holiday in the 1960s should appeal to sentimental adults old enough to wax nostalgic over their own adolescences.

This is Hunt's show, and she delivers a strong performance that captures all the seriousness and absurdity of the avalanche of circumstances that comes crashing down on April's head. To say she's only half the director she is an actress is actually paying her quite a complement.

An intriguing, if flawed mystery set in the shadowy subterranean world of undocumented Mexican immigrants.

Ghostbusters II is such a lazy effort that the formula machinery is laid bare for all to see. It suffers from writing that is obvious, sloppy, and unimaginative.

While no masterpiece, My Girl is a fine example of compassionate and tasteful filmmaking which features a number of charming moments, most of which are provided by Anna Chlumsky and Macaulay Culkin, while Dan Aykroyd (in a mildly eccentric but subdued role reminiscent of his recent turn in Driving Miss Daisy) and Jamie Lee Curtis lend able support.

An old-fashioned dinosaur opera, in the worst sense of the term. An obviously formulaic effort, designed more as a cash machine than a piece of cinema.

Spare, sleek and coolly entertaining, even if there's less to this game of true lies than meets the eye.

The wholly invented character of unattainable love interest Julia Cook (the real Kelly once referred to an enigmatic "Julia" in a letter) is the film's weakest link and smacks of a desperate attempt to shoehorn a pretty woman into a story about grubby men with tangled beards.

In all, about a third of the film (most of it contained in three extended sequences) is audaciously funny and genuinely disturbing. The rest will sorely test the devotion of Carrey's fans.

Director Frank Marshall mounts the story as tastefully as possible, given the subject matter, but it never seems to have much point and is sometimes unintentionally silly.

It's not that this is a bad, blackly comic slice-of-lowlife: It's just that you've just seen it all before.

This flawed but interesting Freudian melodrama spends about 70 minutes making points and the last 30 minutes losing them.

An inconsistent and unsatisfying tale of amour fou and literary ambition.

It's hard to believe this shoddy, dishonest mess is Clark's sixth feature film, and not the unpromising debut of a rank amateur.

Steel Magnolias is an old-fashioned "klatsch" film, a prefeminist relic in which a group of women eschew the public world of men in favor of the community of the coffee table. Their world is shown as inferior to men's in terms of power but superior to it in emotion and insight into the things that "really matter."

Director Ridley Scott's visual gifts are still evident in Black Rain. But with retread plot and characters, Scott's stylistic flourishes become irritating clutter.

This is a lean 90 minutes, packed with laughs and age-appropriate thrills -- not to mention a solid lesson for girls about self-respect.

An excruciating series of gags aimed at kids old enough to think it's funny when a grown-up acts like a small child.

More cheerful misogyny from writer-director Henry Jaglom.

Craven builds an interesting premise, but the ending is lame and unsatisfying. Outstanding cinematography and a good musical score enhance the film's mood greatly.

But it's all done with such high style and whizzes along at such an exhausting pace that you probably won't have enough time to notice how little you care.

Zack & Miri stand out as Kevin Smith's most thoroughly representative film -- both for better and for worse.

In terms of bringing the book to life, Twilight is a complete success, so much so that most of the film's flaws work within the context of the story.

This Australian tear-jerker finds more humor than you'd imagine possible in the story of a dying woman getting to know her adult children.

What does make the film disturbing is the way in which it positions Hitler as a mere mouthpiece for what was already in the air, a role he was convinced to play after suffering one disappointment too many at the hands of Jews like Rothman.

Van Bebber is out to capture the mood of a generation-long bad trip and succeeds with unnerving accuracy by telling the story within the family circle.

This eighth film in the Bond series marks the first appearance of Roger Moore as the superspy. Less macho than Sean Connery's Bond, Moore's fastidiously dressed 007 survives by his wits and injects more humor into the proceedings.

Her heavy-handed montage of war, civil rights demonstrations, revolutions and KKK gatherings, intercut with Shicoff's delivery of the opera's devastating fourth-act aria, is so amateurish it very nearly succeeds in trivializing the power of his performance.

Joan Crawford (Dunaway, in a remarkable makeup job) comes off as a cartoon monster in this over-the-top biopic, which blithely mixes fact, legend, and--especially--elements of Crawford's unique screen persona.

Beatty hired some superb talents to remake Love Affair, but many of them are dragged down by director Glenn Gordon Caron's velvety kitsch style.

This violent film, typical of Peckinpah's slam-bang action movies, relentlessly depicts ruthless robbery and murder, not to mention adultery, kidnaping, bribery, extortion, and general mayhem. The vivid direction and lightning pace, however, make the film completely fascinating.

Alternately grim, playful, and gripping, PACIFIC HEIGHTS breathes new life into what was becoming a moribund genre.

Part of the problem is its length; at two hours and ten minutes it meanders rather than building up a head of steam and barreling straight through logic and plausibility on the way to Hell.

Steve Prefontaine must have been something special -- everyone says so -- but there's no magic on the screen.

Staying with Tie Me Up! demands some patience, but the director's timing never fails him, and he brings things to a close on an upbeat note.

The movie's mimicry of reality TV clichés is eerie, from the use of re-creations and supplemental footage (especially the experimental video Dawn and Jeff made together for a high school art project) to the smarmy commentary.

Despite the inaction, the film culminates in a scene some viewers will no doubt find shocking.

Energetic and ambitious, and its likeable cast marks a welcome return of non-white faces to the center of a gay-themed film.

There's a thin line between fable and twaddle, and this feel-good trifle veers dangerously close to the latter.

It's all beautifully photographed and Schwartzberg tries to capture the country's diversity despite notable omissions, as there always will be in any movie that attempts to "define" America.

Marrying a painterly aesthetic with a defiantly homosexual sensibility, this ironic biopic is probably the most accessible film of avant-garde British director Derek Jarman.

Lavishly costumed and shot largely on location, the film benefits from a phenomenal central performance by Lopez de Ayala.

Earnest, warm, and often very funny, VISION QUEST features a finely etched performance by Matthew Modine.

Hauntingly beautiful documentary.

The story eventually resolves itself a little too neatly, but it never devolves into a freak show or a fable, thanks in large part to Farmiga and Stahl's deft, quirky performances.

Beautifully animated epic is never dull.

The film's real problem is Carpenter's diffuse narrative, which introduces far too many characters--forcing the director consistently to cut away to each story strand, thus destroying much of the suspense. What does work, however, is Carpenter's unmatched visual style and the marvelous photography of Dean Cundey.

While an impressive production, THE MISSION tries to do so much that little is explored fully. Irons's character is really more an icon than a man, as is De Niro's. Perhaps most distressing is the fact that THE MISSION is yet another film made by Europeans or Americans that, while sympathetic to the plight of South American Indians, portrays them as an indistinguishable mass of childlike innocents just waiting to be exploited by outsiders.

Unquestionably formulaic but mercifully free of the flat dialogue and arch one-liners that undermine so many action films. And while it lacks "El Mariachi's" naive charm, it's far funnier.

Christensen simultaneously avoids all the cliches that might have been heaped upon her beautifully rendered characters and roots their travails in everything that makes for a good soap: tragedy, tears, sexual tension, misplaced letters and a slightly sardonic voice-over that teases the plot lines like the old-fashioned, "tune in tomorrow" narrator of yesteryear.

What makes To Sir, With Love such an enjoyable film is the mythic nature of Poitier's character. He manages to come across as a real person, while simultaneously embodying everything there is to know about morality, respect, and integrity.

Like its title, the film is ultimately an affirmation in the face of catastrophic negation, a bit obvious at times but nonetheless welcome.

Women are treated with little respect by director Wilder, while men are portrayed as bad little boys who mean no harm. The so-called farce is just degrading prattle that drags on much longer than it should.

Jane Austen deserves better than to be subordinated to her own creation, the spirited Lizzy Bennet.

Without offering any hard and fast solutions to the essential mystery, this is a thought provoking drama about the nature of belief and devotion that never feels exclusionary.

Neither cheerfully naughty nor suffused with gauzy prurience, it evokes a time of turbulent (and often ugly) emotions with disquieting intensity.

The camerawork is crude and the editing seems almost accidental, but it's really all about the writing, which is strong throughout; Seaton has a sharp ear for convincingly conversational dialogue.

There's nothing much new going on here (we feel compelled to point out the resemblance to one of the worst-ever episodes of The X-Files, "Teso Los Bichos"), but it's all slickly done, with the requisite big jumps, false leads, weird science and scary trips down dark corridors.

Iconoclastic New York-based filmmaker Larry Cohen has always stood apart from the Hollywood crowd, inventing new subgenres of exploitation that are invariably bizarre, unpredictable, and clever, even when they don't quite work. The hugely entertaining God Told Me To, a supernatural psychological thriller that's almost horror, sort of science fiction, is among his very strongest works.

Stoltz turns in a restrained, realistic performance, and Thompson is quite good in what could easily have become a thankless role. But far and away, this is Masterson's film. An amazingly mature young actress, Masterson skillfully brings subtlety, depth, and nuance to her character.

Macchio, for his part, is an obviously intelligent actor with terrific instincts. Still, this movie leaves a bit to be desired: much of the movie seems recycled, and there is precious little subtlety in the villains' characterizations. The film is also about 15 minutes too long, with far too many convenient plot devices.

Lurie's film never fully reconciles the story about newsroom ethics with the sentimental drama about bad dads and bereft sons.