A romantic comedy whose no-holds-barred gross-out elements sour an already graceless mix of crude pratfalls and heartache.

Relentlessly gray and paralyzed by narrative inertia, it collapses under the weight of its stars.

One-scene guest star Sissy Spacek packs enough genuine madness into her brief screen time to make the surrounding film feel like so much listless play-acting.

Overall it's a frustratingly uneven movie, delicate at one moment and bluntly obvious the next.

The kind of film only a mother could really love.

The insidious influence of too much therapy permeates this misguided and very long picture.

Whatever the project's "reality," it's insightful as well as entertaining, and the inclusion of real interviews with people both inside and outside the business means it functions as both an intelligent critique and a dire warning.

Campy hogwash.

The kids are fine, the original songs range from OK to wretched, and Barney is annoying as ever -- even more so, given his big-screen size and Dolby-enhanced guffaw.

It's an entertaining diversion whose clever structure gives pulp-crime cliches a welcome twist.

For the more intelligent Eastwood fan, the film offers an interesting exploration of the actor-director's screen persona. Throughout, he experiments with a number of different disguises, finally embracing total dehumanization when he steps into the Firefox, dons the special mind-reading helmet, and becomes one with the sleek, gleaming, high-tech killing machine.

Though positioned as a female buddy comedy, this uneven and overly busy comedy is more focused on the romantic travails of Vardalos and Duchovny, who's very nearly a carbon copy of her love interest in "My Big Fat Greek Wedding."

The film's gotcha! payoff doesn't justify the gloomy journey.

Labored and dispiriting.

Not much happens, but the the filmmakers' knowing, stylized eroticization of biker culture is extraordinary.

The movie turns into a rather-dull mad-scientist romp. Craven's direction is nothing more than workmanlike, and it appears that out of sheer boredom he threw two nightmare sequences into the mix.

CADENCE is watchable while it lasts, with a generous leavening of humor, but the film keeps throwing emotional punches that never quite connect.

Uneven tragicomedy.

John Irvin's direction is rudimentary for an action film and adds little excitement to the proceedings. There's not much suspense, with good guys and bad guys clearly drawn, and the final shootout is all too routine.

Johnny Depp's coruscating, rigorously uningratiating performance as debauched, self-destructive 17th-century aristocrat John Wilmot, the Earl of Rochester, is the glue that doesn't quite hold together first-time director Laurence Dunmore's adaptation of Stephen Jeffreys' 1994 play.

Delivers equal parts overwrought tedium and mind-bending beauty, spiked with brilliant throwaway images that more than make up for Kelly's heavy-handed hot-button pretensions.

Light and sweet, comfort food dressed up with a dash of exotic spice.

A combination of fresh twists, worn cliches, and frenetic camerawork, this film offers a premise that adults may not subscribe to--namely, that even Santa gets old, tired, forgetful, and in need of replacement. Still, the character with a heart of gold aims to entertain the young set and generally hits his targets.

A painfully self-conscious comedy that mistakes relentless self-referentiality for cleverness, this half-witted misfire is filled with accelerated motion, repeated and overlapping scenes, direct address to the camera and other cliches of defamiliarization.

Considering the standards set by the first two Superman films, Superman III is a disappointment. The story's mythic qualities had worn thin by the time this film was made, so the makers had to rely on Richard Pryor as their audience grabber.

The film is graphic without being lurid, and the naked emotions onscreen are far more shocking than the naked bodies -- though there are plenty of those, in all shapes and sizes.

Though clearly shot on a shoestring, it's handsome, tightly written and generally well acted.

Impressively stylish but curiously empty.