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.

Quirky, sometimes brilliant, and mostly ice-cold.

Though carefully cast and set in the most exotic of locales, the drama lacks any real excitement, the director's glacial style aligning itself all too patly with Hwang's arid rhetoric.

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 But this Disney film, a stale and out-of-date offering, is far less interesting than seeing the real athletes during the Olympic telecasts.

A tricky thriller, Malice begins well but betrays its coolly calculating premise and degenerates into a silly horror story.

At first glance, FOR LOVE OR MONEY looks like a holdover from the greed-filled 1980s, a last gasp glorification of Reagan/Bush era yuppiedom. The surprise is that it's actually an amusing, if occasionally formulaic, comedy.

As subversively clever as it is unsubtle.

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

Bopha!'s intentions are all good, but it preaches (and that is the operative word) to the converted.

The Good Son is a second-rate thriller with first-rate production values. On a lower budget and without the hottest child star in America in the cast, Ruben and McEwan might have made a meaner, tougher and more successful thriller.

THE PROGRAM was a surprisingly thoughtful entry in a season glutted with sports films. (RUDY; BLUE CHIPS; THE AIR UP THERE; ABOVE THE RIM; D2; and MAJOR LEAGUE 2.) The game sequences, in particular, are deftly choreographed and charged with a real sense of drama.

A Bronx Tale tries to cover too much ground; racial conflict, family drama, first love, the lure of the gangster life, and the joys and tribulation of coming of age in a kinder, gentler New York are all crammed into the slight story. It all feels too familiar to sustain the viewer's interest, but Palminteri's and De Niro's equally compelling performances help give it life.

Its loving exploration of the arcane workings of a closed society, that of wealthy, well-bred New Yorkers of the 1870s, has more in common than one might expect with Scorsese's earlier work, from "Mean Streets" through "Goodfellas."

This enchanting adventure story about a pair of poor Irish lads and their possibly magical horse is a vivid reminder that there is more to kid film culture than animated toys, chop-socky amphibians, and Macauley Culkin vehicles.

The plot of STRIKING DISTANCE is full of implausibilities, but they're entirely beside the point, since the film delivers what it promises: tough talk, chase scenes by land and by water, plenty of explosions, and pretty girls murdered in nasty and imaginative ways, served up with a dash of sex and a generous helping of knee-jerk cynicism.

Fortunately, the movie is so flat and boring that any children who might be tempted to ape its stunts will probably not sit still long enough to see them.

Household Saints succeeds in raising issues and religious ideas like few films before it, making it a movie that's more compelling to discuss and mull over afterward than to sit through.

Blends and recycles elements of scores of crime and road movies, from "Bonnie and Clyde" to "Badlands" but it does so with enough energy and verve to create something entirely fresh and infectiously entertaining.

The non-stop insouciance soon becomes more grating than charming, and is sustained by some remarkably flat dialogue. Adding to the film's troubles is the gratuitously "cute" use made of the baby--one scene exists purely so the audience can coo appreciatively as she takes her first steps. Ten minutes of this, and Nick and Nora Charles would have ducked home for a highball.

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

Lynch's fatal flaw is in her handling of the leads. Sands is made to play his single-minded romantic as a spineless, groveling wimp, while Helena is a one-note ice queen for more than half the movie, never reacting realistically to her predicament. The characters are so lacking in dimension and unsympathetic that it's hard to care about them or their story.

A technically accomplished but dramatically uneven futuristic action film.

As with many Stephen King adaptations, the problem no doubt partially lies in the necessity to condense the lengthy source novel, with material that might have given the story more depth lost in favor of packing in the horrific highlights

Each new installment has become like a visit with old friends who are often annoying and frequently boring, but are missed in some strange way when they're not around.

While the deliberately amateurish, stilted acting seems at odds with the fruity dialogue, Maddin's intention is to subdue every aspect of his peculiar dreamscape; acting, decor, costuming, cinematography and sound recording remain equal components. No one element predominates or upsets the director's carefully controlled chaos.

Despite her underwritten character, Mathis easily takes top acting honors with equal parts toughness and tenderness.

The Man Without a Face marks a solidly crafted directorial debut for actor Mel Gibson, who approaches his melodramatic story with commendable restraint.

Though working on a Jean-Claude Van Damme vehicle can be seen as a comedown for Woo, he rises to the occasion to create an often rousing entertainment that is almost inarguably Van Damme's best film to date.