Sometimes laughably incoherent.

Even its pre-teen audience could use a bit more quirkiness and a little less formula.

Not too many R-rated revenge pics depend on "Uptown Girls'" Dakota Fanning for the stronger scenes. Yet once the 10-year-old star exits the picture, Man on Fire starts blowing a lot of smoke.

Though there's nothing wrong with moral outrage, it doesn't always aid the telling of a complex story. More subtlety might have worked better.

Though not much of a movie, Loaded probably will bring fleeting satisfaction to audiences who don't know Dean Jones from Spike Jones.

But Game really isn't a performer's movie. And the climactic contest (in which the Americans amazingly eked out a 1-0 win against England, considered by many to be the world's finest team at the time) is only serviceably staged.

A wide-eyed 4-year-old makes a fairly convincing case for the existence of an afterlife in Heaven is for Real. But it's Greg Kinnear — with his characteristic affability — that just about seals the deal.

While the adult performances are strong, especially Jeff Bridges in the title role, youthful characterizations are not nearly as illuminating as they were on the page.

Borderline ponderous in hour one, Wyatt Earp picks up once it reaches Dodge, thanks in part to drolly delivered guffaw lines from sunken-cheeked Dennis Quaid, who lost 43 pounds to play tubercular Doc Holliday. [24 Jun 1994, p.1D]

Director Iain Softley employs intriguing camera angles to heighten some of the suspense. It's too bad the movie goes over the top and falls apart in the last third.

While it's an energetic romp, there is more slapstick humor than wit at work here, and a good deal of borrowing from the far more clever "Monsters, Inc."

Don't stop believing. Just avoid clichéd musicals that try to capture the anarchic spirit of rock with trite commercial re-treads.

It feels like a wan version of the show -- one that has lost its otherworldly edge.

Pleasant but not more than recycled jock piffle.

The script is consistently humorous, even if a few punch lines are predictable and the wit is neither highbrow nor split-a-gut funny.

Somewhere within all of this there really is a homicide -- a hip-hop industry rub-out that may someday make this movie half of a passable DVD double feature with Nick Broomfield's documentary Biggie and Tupac.

This family entertainment hard sell lags far behind even "Dr. Dolittle 2."

Thornton is excellent and now seems genetically incapable of being anything less than great in any role he takes.

You don't get the sense that too many enthusiasts are hanging up wanted posters for the ho-hum-ish U.S. Marshals. [6 March 1998, pg. 04.D]

Untantalizingly reverent remake. [7 December 1998, p.4D]

Drama/comedy fables such as "Big" and "13 Going on 30" effectively transported viewers to their whimsical alternate reality. But Timothy Green feels more predictable than other-worldly.

Definitely more than semi-funny.

The worst of '88's major Christmas pics has scientist Dan Aykroyd inadvertently beaming Kim Basinger to Earth in a bum experiment; the result is as tired as its title, though Basinger gives another smooth comic performance. [09 Jun 1989, p.3D]

Anyone who has ever had an annoying neighbor will see their worst nightmares fulfilled in the overheated but entertaining Lakeview Terrace.

Only the Lonely comes close enough to being halfway watchable that some may call it a Candy triumph. [24 May 1991, p.7D]

It's a syrupy, downbeat film.

“Fury” piles on the mythos, monsters and magic, a smidge too heavily at times, but stays grounded, thanks to its earnestly goofy main man.

The sad truth is that Cadillac is still another of the amiably lazy efforts that Eastwood and his band of production regulars have been mass-producing for too many years. (And by now, it's decades.) [26 May 1989, p.4D]