A compelling but oddly empty film.

A terrifically droll satire on both horror movies and American middle-class values. Despite the subject matter, our hero and heroine emerge as genuinely sympathetic characters, which ultimately makes one wonder where the film's true sympathies lie.

If ever an English-language film needed English subtitles it's this.

Pure melodrama, but stylishly done, with finely tuned performances played out against meticulously realized settings.

Members of what used to be referred to euphemistically as the "raincoat crowd," will probably enjoy Winterbottom's experiment more than most.

Youth exploitation pictures were all the rage at the time, and while this is better than some in execution and intent, it's still exactly that.

Expertly captures the details and textures of the time without condescending or lapsing into cheap-shot parody.

For all the "touched by an angel" sentimentality, the movie's eerie, slightly menacing vision of black-clad angels lurking in the shadowy corners of unsuspecting lives is genuinely haunting.

It's a compelling story, and very of its tumultuous time.

It's an enjoyable ride.

Screenwriter Christopher McQuarrie's tough-guy dialogue and Bryan Singer's crisp direction give the ensemble cast every opportunity to shine, and they do.

Overall it's an enjoyable cruise down the Garden State Parkway, and Affleck and Castro are charming companions.

Although Sonny is computer generated, Tudyk supplied his voice and body language -- provides the story's emotional core, an irony Asimov would surely have appreciated.

While not as poetic or haunting as Edgar Ulmer's The Black Cat, The Raven is a remarkable tale of revenge, and memorable in its own right.

It's a bad sign when audience enthusiasm peaks during the credits sequence.

The film's real star is the stunning Montana landscape, beautifully captured by cinematographer Paul Ryan.

Holmes's story isn't pretty, but it's fascinating, in no small part because the people Paley interviews offer a glimpse into a brief time when making porn was an act of rebellion that attracted a diverse and eccentric group of filmmakers and performers.

Even after it becomes clearer which side of law Harris is operating on, the film continues to work as a taut -- if violent -- police thriller.

Its power lies both in Aronofsky's evocation of tightly wound paranoia and in his flawless dovetailing of personal obsession and cultural anxieties.

Consistently earnest and well-intentioned but only occasionally moving, despite the efforts of a generally top-notch cast.

It's cool and spare, but there's an essential lightness to the film's tone despite the heavy material, and Deborah Eve Lewis' glistening B&W cinematography is simply luscious.

A wickedly entertaining bit of domestic tragedy.

Bright, who reworked co-writer Stephen Johnston's screenplay, changed all the names except Bundy's so he could "make up stuff," but the irony is how close to the facts -- at least to the degree they're known -- he stays.

Wickedly funny and surprisingly sweet film may be the perfect star vehicle for Grant. He's full of piss and vinegar and has at long last set aside the wobbly, stammering persona best left at "Four Weddings and a Funeral."

A good film for the viewer who isn't interested in being entertained but is willing to be thrown into the muck of the problems facing hard-working American farmers.

A few effectively directed sequences and special makeup effects by Tom Savini (most of which were cut to avoid an "X" rating) are the only reasons to sit through this terribly familiar material.

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.

Most of the superstars in this fascinating but offbeat production are thoroughly unrecognizable, buried under pounds of makeup or smothered in cumbersome costumes.

With the exception of a brief sequence on the Galapagos Islands, where Maturin briefly indulges in some pre-Darwinian study of its unique ecosystem, the entire film takes place aboard the ship, and Weir's greatest accomplishment may be that it never feels claustrophobic.

It's not about sex -- it's about Barbra and Bette and the Village People: That's the lesson of this cheerful, mainstream comedy about tabloid TV, Hollywood sophistry and family values that finally gets discussion about gay people out of the bedroom and into the record store, where it belongs.

The fourth remake of this story, this is a fairly good, though overlong, film.

Ridiculous, yes, but in an eminently watchable way. Most of the plot twists work surprisingly well, and the frequently naked leads work up some genuine chemistry.

A bravura tap-dancing finale as exhilarating as it is bizarre.

This is the ultimate student film.... The film is a creative, ultra-low-budget effort with a good sense of place and character. Scorsese presents a detailed look at the lives of these confused boys struggling to become men in an oppressive environment.

The meat of the matter is fight sequences, and rather than being goosed with now-common digital effects and Hong Kong-style wirework, it's all real and all breathtaking.

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

Totally daft and a lot of fun.

The conspicuous lack of emotional resonance makes this film "Queen Margot's" poor cold English cousin.

Unwilling to offend, Zwick whitewashes a culture in which brutality and contemplative beauty were inextricably intertwined and, afraid to alienate audiences, he shies away from the story's logical downbeat conclusion, replacing it with an "ambiguous" ending that recalls, of all things, "The Road Warrior."

The swooping helicopter shots, the POV camerawork from the front seat of a 800 hp trophy-truck and the propulsive soundtrack will have your heart racing towards the finishing line along with the drivers.

It all seems terribly familiar.

Though this frank documentary about extreme sexual practices comes with a cautionary message, it could perhaps use a stronger one.

While there's no denying that the film's animation is technically impressive and is sometimes quite clever, its inventiveness is frequently at the service of gags so distasteful that gag is the operative word.

As live-action adaptations of cheap, unapologetically stupid cartoons go, this is top of the line: The cast is appealing, the sets brightly colored and fun to look at, the mystery as lame and goofy as any featured in the many inexplicably beloved Scooby-Doo cartoons.

As a modest little dramedy about the everyday adventures of starting a family, Marley & Me is pretty solid, but as a movie about the joy and heartbreak of owning a dog, it goes straight for the jugular.

Moritsugu's film is really just a loose collection of encounters between characters that at times barely hangs together.

Shot in the same campy style that characterized the TV show, all the cast members look like they are having a great time chewing up the scenery. Meredith as the Penguin and Gorshin as the Riddler are the villainous standouts.

Luckily the atmospheric photography and fine sets (Universal claimed it built an exact duplicate of the original Salem house) pull the sometimes melodramatic performances through.

An earnest, thoughtful, surprisingly well-written (given the number of writers who worked on it) drama about guilt and betrayal that features excellent performances by Harrison Ford and Brad Pitt and dares to defy the juvenile wham bam thank you ma'am aesthetics that have turned mainstream action pictures into feature-length video games.

A tense geopolitical thriller that leaves a curiously bad aftertaste.

As to what happens between shows, well, apparently not a whole hell of a lot. If there are groupies, demolished hotel rooms, midnight payoffs to the vice squad or drug- and alcohol-fueled misbehavior, there's no evidence of it here.

Yet another variation on the woman-from-hell subgenre, THE CRUSH fails to come up with many new twists beyond casting a teenager as its villain. Dancing around its own salacious possibilities, the movie is only briefly offensive and rarely surprising.

The film was directed and scripted by Douglas Heyes, who was smart enough to know he couldn't improve on William Wellman's 1939 version, so he made some changes in plot and emphasis, and put a great deal of care into the casting of secondary roles.

This frothy musical has a likable cast and a gossamer-thin story.

The images of gods and ordinary Tibetans that Bush captures are more eloquent that his turgid narration, and overall the film works better as a travelogue than an introduction to Tibetan Buddhist beliefs or history.

Overall, this puff piece is shapeless, repetitive and feels much longer than it is.

The film's bright spot is Irish comedian Dylan Moran, who plays Libby's charmingly dissolute cousin and who also happens to be Dennis' best friend. He's fresh, unpredictable and genuinely funny -- everything the film isn't.

A series of outrageous situations and generally manages to walk the thin line between poking fun at racial stereotypes and reinforcing them.

Cool Runnings has a great premise: a movie based on the true story of the Jamaican bobsledders who amused the world at the 1988 Olympics. But this Disney film, a stale and out-of-date offering, is far less interesting than seeing the real athletes during the Olympic telecasts.

This supremely silly supernatural potboiler is slickly entertaining for just under two hours and absolutely hilarious for 10 minutes near the end.

Though the story is tired, most of ROBOCOP 3's action sequences and special effects are imaginative and effective, and the gruesomeness of the first two films has been toned down in a commercially wise attempt to make it more accessible to the younger audiences who love Robocop.

Like any good soap opera, the script deftly flits among story lines, offering just enough tantalizing plot development to keep you sticking around for another bite.

With a little more plot, this could have been a killer.

An admirable attempt at a fresh version of an old genre, Teachers falls short, but not by much.

Should have been pared down into an episode of the series.

Gloriously seductive musical sequences seem suddenly hokey and self-conscious when they're staged in Western settings, and the songs' English-language lyrics are painfully banal.

You can almost feel writer-director Ron Shelton praying for lightning to strike twice, but to no avail.

It's really just "Rocky" in gleaming dress whites.

The child actors are bland, the adult characters are forced to act like dunderheads to keep the paper-thin plot going, and the generic-sounding Jimmy Buffett songs are just a LITTLE out of sync with the film's target age group.

On the plus side, King Kong Vs. Godzilla had a higher budget than most films, and it shows.

POPCORN seems to be a case of too many ideas; the basic story could probably have made a very effective short. The acting in the film varies greatly, and some mediocre dubbing adds to the amateur feel.

Schwarzenegger proves to be mildly amusing, but DeVito seems to be coasting on his past reputation as an audience pleaser.

Most of the film consists of meetings between different factions and groups, all conducted according to ancient tribal customs.

Buoyed by a good cast, strong direction, and excellent effects, Child's Play almost works. Unfortunately, the screenplay is full of plot holes, lapses of logic, and missed opportunities.

To his eternal credit, Jones gives his considerable all and even coaxes a startling note of poignancy from one scene, while Smith just bops along, lobbing gags and grinning at the special effects.

Directed with flair by George Pan Cosmatos and filled with sly references to Moby Dick and The Old Man and the Sea, this film is a successful blend of terror and humor, played with some real fervor by Weller.

Anyone who understands the meaning of the title or catches all the frog references scattered through writer-director Martin Curland's feature debut will have a head start understanding this confused and confusing comedy.

An intoxicatingly beautiful but painfully simplistic fable about love and death.

A screwball comedy without a charismatic, smart-talking dame is no screwball comedy at all.

It's strange to imagine the subject of World War II a now no-brainer in the same league as sequels and old TV show-spinoffs, something safe and familiar in light of its new, "inspiring" spin. But that's the only way to explain the existence of this otherwise pointless picture.

Despite its mildly raunchy tone and obsession with Peterson's considerable cleavage, the film is a decent, good-hearted comedy that never takes itself seriously.

The only bright spots are Cavanagh's easy charm about him and Cumming's performance as Grody -- he's much more believable as a straight man than Graham is as a gay woman.

For what amounts to a fairly sentimental glance backward, the film is oddly styled; Andrew Dunn (who also shot the baroque "Monkeybone") favors oblique angles and lighting worthy of an Italian horror movie.

Despite some plausibility problems, the movie is well handled by director Peter Yates. There is no question that Suspect is capable of putting a lump in one's throat; the problem is that it's a little hard to swallow.

Atonal romantic comedy.

Broomfield's film is didactic, awkwardly acted by the cast of former Marines who are meant to lend the film credibility, and clumsily inflammatory.

And while the divas make their characters hugely entertaining, they're also such high profile actresses in such a soft-edged film that it's hard to actually worry about what's to become of them.

Angel Heart is a convoluted combination of film noir and horror that, although expertly filmed by director Alan Parker, seems more an exercise in flashy visuals than mature cinematic storytelling.

Tony Randel, confirming himself as one of the more talented directors on the '90s low-budget horror scene, orchestrates the buggy mayhem with a good deal of skill.

Unfortunately, that imagination flags early in the first sequel to the grisly 2004 sleeper hit, though the bang-up ending nearly makes it all worthwhile and it opens with a set piece worthy of its predecessor.

This film's splendid visuals suit the subject, Spain's greatest painter, but its stilted dramatics are wholly at odds with Francisco de Goya's tumultuous life and times.

Insubstantial, predictable and often dull, it's a dismaying move from director Allen Moyle, who displayed a real grasp of pulp energy in 1990's "Pump Up the Volume".

A movie whose best features are its lush tropical vistas has evident limitations.

All that menace is simply decorative, and it's disappointing that Laconte never properly addresses the intriguing sexual undertones (like voyeurism, exhibitionism and sexual obsession) he uses to darken the film's palette.

Naturally, Big Bird meets some intriguing people going East. Lots of cameos are here to delight parents who take the kids to see this movie.

But anyone who would be inherently interested in this kind of sendup is unlikely to be surprised by anything in this film -- overall it feels like a trifle, if an entertaining one.

For every bit that works there are three that don't, and the movie becomes somewhat tedious at times. Hamilton, however, is obviously having a good time with his role and has a field day with the Bela Lugosi accent.

The action sequences, especially the climax, are painfully deficient, one of the many demerits of Hamilton's dull direction. Only the cast makes this worth catching for less demanding fans of the war genre.