Imagine the John Waters remake of an Agatha Christie mystery directed by Douglas Sirk, and you'll get some idea of the tone of this retro musical melodrama, which features a cast whose combined wattage could eclipse a small solar system.

Yes, the story is pure formula, though given less twinkle and lip gloss than Hollywood would have brought to bear on it; the film is so remake-friendly you can cast it in your head.

It's easy to view the story of these brothers as a larger metaphor for the relationship between the two Koreas, which gives the film an added resonance that your typical Hollywood war movie wouldn't possess.

Not for everyone, but those who respond to it will find it unforgettable.

Dreams With Sharp Teeth Or, Why is Harlan Ellison so gosh darned angry?

Slick, stylish and super-violent, but also oddly dull.

It should come as no surprise that Wes Craven's return to the horror series he created is the strongest of the NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET sequels, but even his fans might not have expected the ironic depth and self-reflexivity he brings to this chapter.

A rarity for Neil Simon's screen efforts, The Goodbye Girl perfectly blends humor, sentiment, and romance on a level so pleasant it's almost suspicious.

The action is reasonably well-staged, but the film is overlong and occasionally draggy.

Brooks, hardly a great director, doesn't quite pull off this adaptation of the Rossner novel.

Hope and Crosby had been making "Road" films for 12 years when they did this, their sixth installment in the series, the only one in color. It was getting tiresome by that time, although they managed some fun out of the slim plot.

Writer-director James Mangold has surrounded Stallone with an exceptional ensemble cast, and Sly is smart enough to let the actors do the acting.

The underlying political motivation may be unclear, but the violence and desperation of lives lived in something close to hell on earth is terrifyingly clear.

Yeah, but at the end, he gets into hand-to-hand combat with Saddam, and he kicks the guy's butt! I love that part.

An oddly lifeless affair, though Gretchen Mol's sunny performance almost hauls it out of its doldrums.

The ensemble performances are perfectly meshed, and the Sprechers deserves special credit for bringing the desperate underside of Posey's brittle self-assurance to the surface.

It's the perfect "smackeral" of adventure for youngsters craving Pooh Bear and his pals.

Too bad that Romanek feels compelled to tie it all up with a banal pop psych explanation that offers an all-too simplistic solution to an otherwise uncommonly complex thriller.

The film is meticulously crafted but frustratingly meaningless.

The unspoken question that underlies their struggles is whether a facility run by sheer force of personality can survive when that personality is gone; the film ends on a cautiously hopeful note.

Hypnotic film.

It's just as juvenile as you'd expect, and even funnier.

Among those who are on hand to offer their own feelings about the man known as Peter Berlin and his art are fellow porn legend Jack Wrangler, groundbreaking gay writer Armistead Maupin, pornographer Wakefield Poole and director John Waters, who remembers Peter from his days in San Francisco, and still doesn't quite get what he's all about.

Ramshackle as comedy and mundane as drama, this noisily energetic and splashily - literally - photographed hang-ten flick doesn't wipe out due to spectacular surfing stunts and the fun of seeing McGregor and Zeta-Jones in pre-stardom mode.

A visually fascinating rumination on the genre.

Rough around the edges but rock-solid in its sense of place and its depiction of real people overreaching their apparent limitations.

Offers substantial food for thought on the subject of prison reform, and Ariel and Menahami close by noting that Bedi's example has been followed in Thai and -- surprisingly -- U.S. prisons with encouraging results.

Film works best as a soberly witty commentary on the workplace and makes an interesting companion piece to "Mondays in the Sun."