Elvis & Nixon makes for a diverting, often absurdly funny double portrait of two men engulfed by changes they can’t fathom, much less accept.

Really nothing more than "Clueless" redux but without the edgy, knowing wit.

Simultaneously violent and droll, The Final Girls is a way to have your blood-soaked cake and eat it, too.

There isn’t quite as much pep to the film’s narrative engine on this trip.

It's a combination of good story, nice moments and appealing texture.

The movie turns what was once antic into something closer to manic. With a throwaway plot and a parade of weird characters, the comedy tries to be bigger, bolder and more outrageous than the television series, but it ends up being a lot less funny.

Savages is a B-movie striving for an A-plus, a decadently energetic summer escape with bloody action, bold visuals and bodacious attitude to burn.

The film can't get its rhythms right, fluctuating wildly between comedy and pathos.

Even at its most glancing and superficial, Together offers a diverting attempt at capturing recent history, in all its maddening contradictions and compromises, recriminations and rages. It reflects a time when all we had was each other, for better or — way too often — for worse.

An extravagant and thoroughly irresistible story of intrigue, romance, comedy and artistic inspiration.

Humorless, charmless and flat.

An overgrown hybrid of disaster epic, can-do combat adventure and '50s sci-fi movie, this craft has visited our world many times before. And while she's a beaut, the sticker on her titanium bumper reads: "Been There, Done That, Beam Me Up, Scotty."

Sliding Doors is frothy stuff, far more complicated in structure than in content.

It's great to watch the cat-and-mouse of it all -- even when the movie might not be firing on all points.

Modest and winning.

The movie has many of the elements that made the first "Dawn" so darkly entertaining.

But by far the most powerful element is N'Dour's lone voice, a thing of high, pure beauty that feels at once ancient and new. When he sings, an otherwise earnestly conventional film becomes a vehicle of incantatory power.

My Zoe is well acted and well filmed, yes, but the storytelling, in which Delpy stitches together mismatched parts like a Dr. Frankenstein, is its weak suit.

A heck of a ride. On the way to its unpredictable (if less than wholly satisfying) conclusion, it is entertaining, a little silly and visually dazzling.

Making memories it ain’t. But making 89 minutes of your life disappear almost painlessly has its place, too.

The most enjoyable moments of an otherwise oddly joyless film actually belong to Jake Johnson and Lauren Lapkus, who steal the show in an especially amusing scene during a panicked evacuation.

An intoxicating blend of comedy, kung fu, corny romance, special effects and rock videos, it's as electrically sleepless as the New York it's set against.

Like its predecessor, the movie is a joyous celebration of extravagant pulp and post-Soviet kitsch, joyously trafficking in gore, loud cars, ladies' stilettos and excess for its own sake.

Rolls straight over silly, smashing through stupid without stopping and then barreling into a kind of insane comic brilliance without so much as a speed bump to slow it down.

Let’s just say that, for the right audience, Junior may deliver. But there’s a whole lot of pregnancy to go through first.

In old-fashioned movie terms, it's enjoyable, thanks mostly to Neeson who, not unlike Jeff Bridges, always eclipses your expectations of him. [25 Oct 1996, Pg.N.42]

Pretentious, ponderous and redundant -- You may not need linear narrative to create a great movie, but you do need some original ideas.

Shot almost entirely on location with a hand-held camera, director Karim Ainouz's film draws you in close. The charisma and intensity of Lazaro Ramos as Joao holds you there.

What separates Calvin and Eddie from the typical comic hero -- and each "Barbershop" movie from the standard yuk-fest -- is that these folks know how to back up all the hot air with meaningful action.

At best, the movie is a problematic chamber piece; at worst, a misdirected, slightly misanthropic pretension.

Smith makes it look easy, but underneath the physical high jinks and slick veneer of I, Robot lies a performance of real discipline and intelligence.

Stone has a knack for pacing, detail and atmosphere that manages to feel authentic and fancifully allegorical at the same time.

Directed by Mary Harron from a screenplay by John Walsh, the thoroughly unengaging film is a remarkable achievement, but only considering the misspent potential of its juicy source material.

This is a weird and wonderfully expansive story, adroitly executed by Morosini with the compassion to mine it for humanism rather than droll, oddball quirk. By putting viewers inside the strangeness of what happened to him, he provides the audience the rare privilege of genuinely laughing with his characters instead of at them.

It speaks to a cultural sisterhood that knows exactly what Paola Cortellesi is talking about. But some things get lost in translation, and this lovingly crafted work of neorealist cosplay is one of them.

Heights is nothing more than a second-rate version of several much better movies, all of which are available on DVD and video.

A classic example of a film that doesn't trust the strength of its source material - or the intelligence of its audience.

When Miss You Already works, it’s because of the cast.

If you are a science-fiction fan (and I am), Enemy Mine is a fun diversion, maintaining a precarious balance between laughable and melodramatic. But you do get the feeling they had hoped for an earth-shaking metaphor. [27 Dec 1985, p.21]

One of the worst ideas in Murder on the Orient Express was the repeated reenactment of the murder scene. Death on the Nile compounds this vulgarity by visualizing almost every speculation Poirot entertains about his fellow passengers. The redundancy of it all becomes ridiculous. [29 Sep 1978, p.D1]

All of the actors acquit themselves admirably, especially Stolz, who has a star's low-key magnetism, and the jazz stylist Harry Connick Jr., who makes his acting debut here as the drawling rear gunner. But the roles are too generic for anything like real depth. The fight scenes are about what you'd expect; they're competently shot, but even when they deliver thrills, every scene, every passage, is familiar. We've seen it all before.

In Those Who Wish Me Dead, Jolie demonstrates her career-long fascination with action derring-do and physical punishment, to diminishing effect. In this pulpy, borderline laughable genre picture, not even her hair is believable.

The good-natured tension and ribbing between the two old “boys” is still there — and still a bit old hat — but there is a new dynamic that juices the entertainment factor.

Learning to Drive would be an entirely inert expedition were it not for Clarkson, who plays against Kingsley’s sentinel of propriety with her signature radiance and birdlike gracefulness.

Annaud, who wrote the adaptation with frequent collaborator Gerard Brach, showed more consideration for the cub in "The Bear" than he does for young Miss March, who is shamefully overexposed. True, Leung's bodacious, cantaloupe-colored bottom is showcased, but the only thing we miss of March's is the skin between her toes. Never mind that in portraying passion, the two seem to be demonstrating the proper use of the Salad Shooter.

De Armas simply doesn’t have a purchase on the cultural affection that Reeves has built over four decades of stardom, and that lack keeps “Ballerina” firmly in the minor leagues for about two-thirds of its running time.

Paranormal Activity 3 just uses new technology to deliver the same old ghosts-and-goblins hokum.

A bracing, quietly exhilarating documentary.

Definitely an overlong exercise in the concept of kismet, and maybe it's just what you want, in lieu of chocolates.

The truth is, it’s just a movie — a fine movie, not a great movie, a movie that will please the specific subculture of fans it aims to service, while those who have survived this long without caring about comic-book movies can go on not caring.

This sweet little tale is as informative as it is entertaining for its target audience, the very youngest of the Muppet franchise's fans.

It becomes, after a while, little more than a mind-numbing bloodbath.

A cheaply made science-fiction movie that enters the atmosphere without ever igniting.

Bailey nails the iconic moments (that head toss) and the high notes, but also her character’s combination of spunk and innocence. She delivers a lovely performance that’s all the more accomplished for being delivered amid crashing waves, sweeping vistas and the crushing expectations of generations of fans. As a new generation’s Ariel, she makes The Little Mermaid her own — with confidence, charisma and oceans of charm.

Overwrought and overthought, this Carmen somehow winds up being underbaked, as Millepied throws various ideas at the screen, with precious few taking hold with any conviction.

Time has been good to the brave blend of stark realism and Hollywood production values of this drama, inspired by the writings of the young girl who continued to believe in the fundamental decency of mankind even as her family hid from the Nazis in an Amsterdam attic. [07 Nov 2004, p.N03]

If you can suspend your incredulity for a moment, What If has its bright moments. And that’s thanks in large part to its leads, who manage to do what Radcliffe has always done well: conjure up a little magic.

As it unreels, The Ref keeps getting dumber, and, unfortunately, it simply wasn't that brilliant to begin with.

It canters along, content to follow the Rules of Cute and Fuzzy Horse Movies.

I don't think the ending is up to the rest of the movie, but Grant and Barrymore are great together, and the movie has both zing and song.

At times, Unfriended really clicks — but ultimately, it’s a drag.

With “1982,” Mouaness gives viewers an immersive, ineffable sense of what it feels like to have the world shift under your feet before you even know it.

A handsome-looking if occasionally dull affair.

Overlong, unnecessarily sex-obsessed and downright nasty at times, This Is 40 feels haphazard and unfinished, despite a few moments of laugh-out-loud humor.

Vicious and hypocritical as it is, The Gauntlet remains an entertaining sort of disreputable show, considerably more proficient and interesting than junk melodramas in a dogged vein.

It's an eroticism of nastiness -- triple-X fare for dirty old men in raincoats. If you resist this sleazy gorefest, you'll be right to feel proud of yourself.

Whatever good intentions were brought to bear in Cruella are lost in an overlong, awkwardly shaped mash-up of coming-of-age drama, caper flick, action adventure and fashion world sendup.

Even Thompson, the one you look forward to watching, is disappointing.

The best thing about all of this is Bettany.

The movie is an epic adventure with a rigorously moral point of view.

It's hardly a muckraking piece but more a celebration of racing at the high end and the extremely prosperous folks who play it.

A surprisingly lush, endearing little film, in which a swelling sense of romanticism thoroughly banishes even the most far-fetched improbabilities.

It’s a movie about exploring the vast, “dark continent” of the ocean’s deepest places (to quote Cameron, who produced and narrates the film) that ends up feeling claustrophobic. Much of it was shot inside a metal sphere the size of a fitness ball.

Too raw to be entertaining, too entertaining to be dismissed, it’s one of the weirder mainstream releases to come along in some time.

This was a man who needed no help standing out from the crowd.

Bekmambetov handles these narrative bumps with ease, infusing even the hoariest -- and goriest -- of horror movie cliches with equal parts macabre fascination and jaunty humor. The film lives up to its hype with a style, swagger and substance that will appeal not just to the fanboys (and girls) but to their uninitiated friends as well.

Even with a gimmick engineered to orchestrate endless bursts of Looney Tunes-style hyperviolence, “Novocaine” lives up to its name, all right — a tedious action-comedy so numbingly bland, you feel the pain of its 110-minute run time even as its protagonist can’t feel a thing.

Even if it’s not quite as thrilling as it first seems, Complete Unknown poses questions that practically beg for animated conversation about the fantasy of leaving it all behind — and what that might look like if someone actually did it, again and again.

The film’s central metaphor — life is like wine — is an overripe one.

The movie doesn't offer much new to anyone familiar with Carter.

The Coca-Cola Kid starts out as a lively satire of American business, posing a young Harvard MBA as a pin-striped cowboy attempting to claim a piece of the Australian outback for Coca-Cola. But Yugoslavian director Dusan Makavejev, like a ham-handed juggler in a high wind, thwarts his promising idea by tossing up a jumble of plot detours and subplots that never come down. [30 Aug 1985, p.B1]

Taking frantic aim at a fairly promising target -- American jurisprudence -- And Justice for All makes a trigger-happy, scatterbrained spectacle of itself. Although it shatters all over the screen, this would-be topical satire may strike enough chords among rabble-rousing yahoos to become a hit of sorts. Profoundly depressing sorts, that is. [19 Oct 1979, p.B6]

Playful as it is, Clare Peploe's adaptation of Pierre Marivaux's romantic comedy coughs and sputters on its own postmodern conceit.

A heartfelt but eccentric, pseudo-documentary tribute to his sister Maria.

True to IMAX form, the high-tech graphics and sounds are great.

It’s the characters, not the convoluted plot or digital magic, that make “Welcome to the Jungle” such fun. For a high-concept Hollywood special-effects movie, that’s quite a concept indeed.

The tone is all over the map, switching from fantastical one moment to naturalistic the next... It all gives God Help the Girl a disconnected, haphazard feel.

The Fast and the Furious is "Rebel Without a Cause" without a cause. The young and the restless with gas fumes. The quick and the dead with skid marks.

On one level, Brian’s story is meant to be inspirational; the real Banks would ultimately go on to play in the NFL. But it is also a painful reminder of how young black people still face overwhelming disadvantages. The film leaves you wondering: What might have happened if Brian hadn’t been a talented linebacker?

At times, the story seems to exist in the instant between wakefulness and sleep, a dreamy state that's also startlingly realistic.

Take the kids. Have fun.

Clocks in at close to two hours. It feels much longer. By comparison, Malick’s World War II epic “The Thin Red Line” tipped the scales at a whopping 170 minutes. But at least that 1998 film had people shooting at each other. There’s no such excitement here.

Like Parker's earlier features, Fame is a stylistic self-advertisement. The locale has shifted, but one recognizes the identical false urgency and coy tumult. Parker seems destined to spend his career whipping up ephemeral picturesque frenzies. [20 June 1980, p.C2]

Nonetheless, there's something life affirming in all of this. Even as most of us recoil with self-preservation at their feats, we also secretly applaud them pushing the envelope of mortality.

Benefits from a sensitive, even-tempered tone, as well as terrific supporting performances from Spencer, Ann Dowd (as Alex’s status-obsessed mom) and a scene-stealing Amy Landecker, who plays an ambivalent therapy client of Greg’s.

Brax’s knuckles may be perpetually bared, but his heart’s always in the right place, which “The Accountant 2” spares nothing to remind us, even while the mayhem escalates into sheer outlandishness.

Hitch works best when it's a buddy comedy, with Smith and James having a blast as smooth Yoda and jiggly Jedi.

An admirably crisp, incisive counter-terrorist thriller, the most proficient and entertaining movie of its kind since Richard Lester's Juggernaut.