Surprisingly funny and expectedly rude, this first starring vehicle by vilified standup comic Andrew Dice Clay has a decidedly lowbrow humor that is a sort of modern equivalent of that of the Three Stooges.

A shrill, mechanical comedy.

Dull and tamped down throughout, Scott convinces well enough as a guy who wants be put out of his misery, and there isn’t an actor here who doesn’t look ready to join him.

The strongest dimensions of this self-conscious but centerless film are four sexy actresses parading in colorful costumes and Amy Vincent's radiant lensing, which makes the picture seem hipper than it is.

Correctly ascertaining that auds will be less interested in the outcome than in the obstacles along the way, Levasseur plants and executes the pic’s exclamation-point scares with grinning, squelching gusto.

Highly reminiscent of Kingpin in its willingness to try anything for a laugh, Dirty Work is a shameless and sporadically hilarious comedy about two thirtysomething underachievers who start a revenge for hire business.

This decent if derivative scare machine should benefit from a lack of genre competition.

Destined to be better remembered for its grisly billboard imagery than for its relatively tame torture-porn tropes, Captivity is a thoroughly nasty piece of work that nonetheless earns credit for generating modest suspense after a predictable but effective plot twist around the 50-minute mark.

Bringing absolutely no fresh angles to a time-tested formula that's seemed particularly overworked of late.

Lightning fails to strike twice -- an underwhelming follow-up to one of the career-stalled action star's better efforts.

It’s a good movie: tense, bold, angry, empathetic, provocative, observant, morally engaged. And also, to be honest, a trifle gimmicky.

Knucklehead has a professional slickness about it, flawless shooting by d.p. Kenneth Zunder, and Johnston's perfectly cloying score. The acting leaves a bit to be desired: Malick is hilarious; Wight is endearing; Rebecca Creskoff ("Hung"), who plays Mary's friend and fellow ex-"dancer," is refreshingly natural.

Gruff and downright smelly, especially when star David Arquette is forced at one point to flop around in a pile of doggy doo.

With its uneven mix of comedy, melodrama and action, pic will need all the help Shaq's name and a rap soundtrack can provide.

Sherman's personal wounds feel fresh, which makes for a superficially beautiful but otherwise bitter story.

Writer-executive producer John Hughes conjurs up a romance between Candy’s teenage son (Chris Young) and a local girl (Lucy Deakins), but that proves the film’s biggest letdown. Last third of the film is a real mess, as filmmakers try to whip up a crisis that will unite the family, with the redheaded twins getting lost in a mineshaft during a wild rainstorm. Despite all this, the Aykroyd-Candy pairing is charmed. Stephanie Faracy is excellent as Candy’s sweet, happy wife, and Bening is also savvy in her role.

The trouble is, Sherlock Holmes exists so large in audiences’ minds already that the pair’s uninspired take feels neither definitive nor an especially fresh take, but just an off-brand, garden-variety parody.

Lacking the manipulative structure of "Speed," which shrewdly interspersed rousing set pieces throughout the story, Speed 2 is vastly uneven, trying in its second hour to recoup energy and compensate the audience for all the exposition of the initial reels.

Director Russell Mulcahy can’t seem to decide from one scene to the next whether he’s making a sci-fi, thriller, horror, music video or romance – end result is a mishmash.

The bottom line is that Staying Alive is nowhere as good as its 1977 predecessor, "Saturday Night Fever."

Despite some hackneyed qualities, helmer William Brent Bell's good-looking if undistinguished cast and the seemingly fresh twist on an old tale should lure the usual fans of mayhem, murder and the medieval.

Solid performances, handsome production values and a few genuinely creepy scenes are not enough to save Godsend.

Pic's future as a cult item is a sure bet.

That Saw 3D is relentlessly repugnant will delight the franchise's fans and surprise almost no one. The best that can be said for the picture, gamely directed by longtime "Saw" cutter Kevin Greutert, is that it offers little in between the traps, which are more creatively vicious than they've ever been.

Vaxxed comes across as a grab-bag of charts, theories and anecdotal evidence that would never pass muster by the editors of any major scientific journal (like, say, the Lancet), and too often resembles the kind of one-sided, paranoia-stoking agitprop that political activists construct to sanctify true believers and assault infidels.

He’s a mystery writer, she’s a mystery; and it’s also a mystery how TV fodder like this manages to get the high-gloss, top-talent treatment at studios.

It’s a functional piece of exploitation — an efficient little crime-porn snuff-thriller potboiler. It’s like a fast-food meal that makes you think, “Okay, that wasn’t good for me, but I got what I paid for.” A film like this one is a junk-franchise burger: tasty, processed, and basically fake.

So relentlessly juvenile as to merit a new twist on the PG-13 rating -- one that strongly cautions not only those under 13 but anyone much above it, too.