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4 A must for fans of British cinema , if only because so many titans of the industry are along for the ride .
4 It 's a fine , focused piece of work that reopens an interesting controversy and never succumbs to sensationalism .
4 Romantic comedy and Dogme 95 filmmaking may seem odd bedfellows , but they turn out to be delightfully compatible here .
1 At a time when we 've learned the hard way just how complex international terrorism is , Collateral Damage paints an absurdly simplistic picture .
4 A fascinating documentary about the long and eventful spiritual journey of the guru who helped launch the New Age .
3 Rodriguez has the chops of a smart-aleck film school brat and the imagination of a big kid ...
0 The film 's lack of personality permeates all its aspects -- from the TV movie-esque , affected child acting to the dullest Irish pub scenes ever filmed .
1 Eight Legged Freaks wo n't join the pantheon of great monster/science fiction flicks that we have come to love ...
3 There is a beautiful , aching sadness to it all .
2 Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets is deja vu all over again , and while that is a cliche , nothing could be more appropriate .
3 The kind of primal storytelling that George Lucas can only dream of .
1 The actors must indeed be good to recite some of this laughable dialogue with a straight face .
1 Stress ' dumb . '
3 In questioning the election process , Payami graphically illustrates the problems of fledgling democracies , but also the strength and sense of freedom the Iranian people already possess , with or without access to the ballot box .
1 While the film is competent , it 's also uninspired , lacking the real talent and wit to elevate it beyond its formula to the level of classic romantic comedy to which it aspires .
3 It works well enough , since the thrills pop up frequently , and the dispatching of the cast is as often imaginative as it is gory .
4 The hard-to-predict and absolutely essential chemistry between the down-to-earth Bullock and the nonchalant Grant proves to be sensational , and everything meshes in this elegant entertainment .
2 Norton holds the film together .
0 There 's not one decent performance from the cast and not one clever line of dialogue .
4 The film brilliantly shines on all the characters , as the direction is intelligently accomplished .
4 A delightful surprise because despite all the backstage drama , this is a movie that tells stories that work -- is charming , is moving , is funny and looks professional .
1 ... the maudlin way its story unfolds suggests a director fighting against the urge to sensationalize his material .
0 too many scenarios in which the hero might have an opportunity to triumphantly sermonize , and too few that allow us to wonder for ourselves if things will turn out okay .
2 A flawed film but an admirable one that tries to immerse us in a world of artistic abandon and political madness and very nearly succeeds .
1 It would n't matter so much that this arrogant Richard Pryor wannabe 's routine is offensive , puerile and unimaginatively foul-mouthed if it was at least funny .
1 The makers of Mothman Prophecies succeed in producing that most frightening of all movies -- a mediocre horror film too bad to be good and too good to be bad .
0 Epps has neither the charisma nor the natural affability that has made Tucker a star .
0 Given the fact that virtually no one is bound to show up at theatres for it , the project should have been made for the tube .
3 I am not generally a huge fan of cartoons derived from TV shows , but Hey Arnold !
4 This is a fascinating film because there is no clear-cut hero and no all-out villain .
3 Rehearsals are frequently more fascinating than the results .
2 The dark and bittersweet twist feels strange as things turn nasty and tragic during the final third of the film .
2 The film thrusts the inchoate but already eldritch Christian Right propaganda machine into national media circles .
3 The engagingly primitive animated special effects contribute to a mood that 's sustained through the surprisingly somber conclusion .
1 Hip-hop prison thriller of stupefying absurdity .
1 is a question for philosophers , not filmmakers ; all the filmmakers need to do is engage an audience .
0 If you enjoy being rewarded by a script that assumes you are n't very bright , then Blood Work is for you .
3 Nair does n't treat the issues lightly .
3 By and large this is Mr. Kilmer 's movie , and it 's his strongest performance since The Doors .
3 This masterfully calibrated psychological thriller thrives on its taut performances and creepy atmosphere even if the screenplay falls somewhat short .
3 The charming result is Festival in Cannes .
2 '' Home Movie '' is the film equivalent of a lovingly rendered coffee table book .
1 Cherry Orchard is badly edited , often awkwardly directed and suffers from the addition of a wholly unnecessary pre-credit sequence designed to give some of the characters a ' back story . '
2 Though excessively tiresome , The Uncertainty Principle , as verbally pretentious as the title may be , has its handful of redeeming features , as long as you discount its ability to bore .
2 So brisk is Wang 's pacing that none of the excellent cast are given air to breathe .
2 The only time 8 Crazy Nights comes close to hitting a comedic or satirical target is during the offbeat musical numbers .
4 Me Without You has a bracing truth that 's refreshing after the phoniness of female-bonding pictures like Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood .
3 Some of the most ravaging , gut-wrenching , frightening war scenes since '' Saving Private Ryan '' have been recreated by John Woo in this little-known story of Native Americans and their role in the second great war .
0 ... a plotline that 's as lumpy as two-day old porridge ... the filmmakers ' paws , sad to say , were all over this '' un-bear-able '' project !
1 The story has some nice twists but the ending and some of the back-story is a little tired .
1 There 's no excuse for following up a delightful , well-crafted family film with a computer-generated cold fish .
1 On top of a foundering performance , Madonna 's denied her own athleticism by lighting that emphasizes every line and sag .
3 Shiner can certainly go the distance , but is n't world championship material
4 The film is bright and flashy in all the right ways .
3 If anything , see it for Karen Black , who camps up a storm as a fringe feminist conspiracy theorist named Dirty Dick .
4 The AAA of action , XXX is a blast of adrenalin , rated EEE for excitement .
0 What remains is a variant of the nincompoop Benigni persona , here a more annoying , though less angry version of the irresponsible Sandlerian manchild , undercut by the voice of the star of Road Trip .
4 A well-done film of a self-reflexive , philosophical nature .
3 An old-fashioned scary movie , one that relies on lingering terror punctuated by sudden shocks and not constant bloodshed punctuated by flying guts .
2 Although melodramatic and predictable , this romantic comedy explores the friendship between five Filipino-Americans and their frantic efforts to find love .
0 Nothing sticks , really , except a lingering creepiness one feels from being dragged through a sad , sordid universe of guns , drugs , avarice and damaged dreams .
4 Brosnan gives a portrayal as solid and as perfect as his outstanding performance as Bond in Die Another Day .
2 Goes a long way on hedonistic gusto .
3 Thirteen Conversations About One Thing lays out a narrative puzzle that interweaves individual stories , and , like a Mobius strip , elliptically loops back to where it began .
1 I 'm sure there 's a teenage boy out there somewhere who 's dying for this kind of entertainment .
1 The acting is just fine , but there 's not enough substance here to sustain interest for the full 90 minutes , especially with the weak payoff .
1 The first hour is tedious though Ford and Neeson capably hold our interest , but its just not a thrilling movie .
3 Steven Soderbergh 's digital video experiment is a clever and cutting , quick and dirty look at modern living and movie life .
0 Weighted down with slow , uninvolving storytelling and flat acting .
1 Sheridan had a wonderful account to work from , but , curiously , he waters it down , turning grit and vulnerability into light reading .
0 No amount of arty theorizing -- the special effects are ' German-Expressionist , ' according to the press notes -- can render it anything but laughable .
1 What goes on for the 110 minutes of '' Panic Room '' is a battle of witlessness between a not-so-bright mother and daughter and an even less capable trio of criminals .
1 Illiterate , often inert sci-fi action thriller .
4 When compared to the usual , more somber festival entries , Davis ' highly personal brand of romantic comedy is a tart , smart breath of fresh air that stands out from the pack even if the picture itself is somewhat problematic .
3 The best thing about the movie is its personable , amusing cast .
3 Inherently caustic and oddly whimsical , the film chimes in on the grieving process and strangely draws the audience into the unexplainable pain and eccentricities that are attached to the concept of loss .
2 Heaven is a haunting dramatization of a couple 's moral ascension .
0 Haneke 's script from Elfriede Jelinek 's novel is contrived , unmotivated , and psychologically unpersuasive , with an inconclusive ending .
3 With an expressive face reminiscent of Gong Li and a vivid personality like Zhang Ziyi 's , Dong stakes out the emotional heart of Happy .
4 A modestly made but profoundly moving documentary .
3 Fred Schepisi 's tale of four Englishmen facing the prospect of their own mortality views youthful affluence not as a lost ideal but a starting point .
4 It is , however , a completely honest , open-hearted film that should appeal to anyone willing to succumb to it .
0 Movies like High Crimes flog the dead horse of surprise as if it were an obligation .
1 A zippy 96 minutes of mediocre special effects , hoary dialogue , fluxing accents , and -- worst of all -- silly-looking Morlocks .
1 The movie does n't generate a lot of energy .
1 One of those decades-spanning historical epics that strives to be intimate and socially encompassing but fails to do justice to either effort in three hours of screen time .
3 A captivatingly quirky hybrid of character portrait , romantic comedy and beat-the-clock thriller .
1 The plot is plastered with one Hollywood cliche after another , most of which involve precocious kids getting the better of obnoxious adults .
3 I like all four of the lead actors a lot and they manage to squeeze a few laughs out of the material , but they 're treading water at best in this forgettable effort .
0 Loud , chaotic and largely unfunny .
1 Abandon spends 90 minutes trying figure out whether or not some cocky pseudo-intellectual kid has intentionally left college or was killed .
1 The script is a disaster , with cloying messages and irksome characters .
3 The art demands live viewing .
1 Since Dahmer resorts to standard slasher flick thrills when it should be most in the mind of the killer , it misses a major opportunity to be truly revelatory about his psyche .
0 None of this sounds promising and , indeed , the first half of Sorority Boys is as appalling as any ' comedy ' to ever spill from a projector 's lens .
1 This mild-mannered farce , directed by one of its writers , John C. Walsh , is corny in a way that bespeaks an expiration date passed a long time ago .
2 Visually sumptuous but intellectually stultifying .
3 But that they are doing it is thought-provoking .
3 Vera has created a provocative , absorbing drama that reveals the curse of a self-hatred instilled by rigid social mores .
0 It aimlessly and unsuccessfully attempts to fuse at least three dull plots into one good one .
3 The film sounds like the stuff of lurid melodrama , but what makes it interesting as a character study is the fact that the story is told from Paul 's perspective .
3 A moving and weighty depiction of one family 's attempts to heal after the death of a child .
3 As I settled into my World War II memories , I found myself strangely moved by even the corniest and most hackneyed contrivances .
2 This is amusing for about three minutes .
2 Its strengths and weaknesses play off each other virtually to a stand-off , with the unfortunate trump card being the dreary mid-section of the film .
2 As happily glib and vicious as its characters .
4 Mr. Caine and Mr. Fraser are the whole show here , with their memorable and resourceful performances .
3 It really is a shame that more wo n't get an opportunity to embrace small , sweet ' Evelyn . '
1 The problem with the film is whether these ambitions , laudable in themselves , justify a theatrical simulation of the death camp of Auschwitz II-Birkenau .
1 Too much of the movie feels contrived , as if the filmmakers were worried the story would n't work without all those gimmicks .
3 The picture runs a mere 84 minutes , but it 's no glance .
3 An elegant and sly deadpan comedy .
2 With its hint of an awkward Hitchcockian theme in tact , Harmon 's daunting narrative promotes a reasonable landscape of conflict and pathos to support the scattershot terrorizing tone
0 The notion of deleting emotion from people , even in an advanced Prozac Nation , is so insanely dysfunctional that the rampantly designed Equilibrium becomes a concept doofus .
3 Best enjoyed as a work of fiction inspired by real-life events .
0 Mr. Soderbergh 's direction and visual style struck me as unusually and unimpressively fussy and pretentious .
2 Debate it .
4 A wildly entertaining scan of Evans ' career .
4 Like The Full Monty , this is sure to raise audience 's spirits and leave them singing long after the credits roll .
3 But not without cheesy fun factor .
3 Upsetting and thought-provoking , the film has an odd purity that does n't bring you into the characters so much as it has you study them .
3 A live-action cartoon , a fast-moving and cheerfully simplistic 88 minutes of exaggerated action put together with the preteen boy in mind .
3 A dazzling thing to behold -- as long as you 're wearing the somewhat cumbersome 3D goggles the theater provides .
3 Could use a little more humanity , but it never lacks in eye-popping visuals .
1 Mostly , Shafer and co-writer Gregory Hinton lack a strong-minded viewpoint , or a sense of humor .
0 I 'm not sure these words have ever been together in the same sentence : This erotic cannibal movie is boring .
2 Gambling and throwing a basketball game for money is n't a new plot -- in fact Toback himself used it in Black and White .
4 With an admirably dark first script by Brent Hanley , Paxton , making his directorial feature debut , does strong , measured work .
4 Bolstered by exceptional performances and a clear-eyed take on the economics of dealing and the pathology of ghetto fabulousness .
4 Douglas McGrath 's Nicholas Nickleby does Dickens as it should be done cinematically .
2 How I Killed My Father would be a rarity in Hollywood .
2 The problem is not that it 's all derivative , because plenty of funny movies recycle old tropes .
3 That the e-graveyard holds as many good ideas as bad is the cold comfort that Chin 's film serves up with style and empathy .
1 Ends up offering nothing more than the latest Schwarzenegger or Stallone flick would .
2 The film 's only missteps come from the script 's insistence on providing deep emotional motivation for each and every one of Abagnale 's antics .
1 At best this is a film for the under-7 crowd .
4 A thoughtful movie , a movie that is concerned with souls and risk and schemes and the consequences of one 's actions .
1 Jaw-droppingly superficial , straining to get by on humor that is not even as daring as John Ritter 's glory days on Three 's Company .
3 Even through its flaws , Revolution # 9 proves to be a compelling , interestingly told film .
2 It 's still Adam Sandler , and it 's not Little Nicky .
3 Sorvino is delightful in the central role .
2 Bogs down badly as we absorb Jia 's moody , bad-boy behavior which he portrays himself in a one-note performance .
0 An awful movie that will only satisfy the most emotionally malleable of filmgoers .
3 Exhilarating but blatantly biased .
0 The story of Trouble Every Day ... is so sketchy it amounts to little more than preliminary notes for a science-fiction horror film , and the movie 's fragmentary narrative style makes piecing the story together frustrating difficult .
1 Lame Sweet Home leaves no Southern stereotype unturned .
3 First-time writer-director Dylan Kidd also has a good ear for dialogue , and the characters sound like real people .
0 It is very difficult to care about the character , and that is the central flaw of the film .
3 What makes it worth watching is Quaid 's performance .
3 By turns pretentious , fascinating , ludicrous , provocative and vainglorious .
2 An empty , ugly exercise in druggy trance-noir and trumped-up street credibility .
4 Especially give credit to Affleck .
3 If you grew up on Scooby -- you 'll love this movie .
4 It 's hard to imagine anyone managing to steal a movie not only from charismatic rising star Jake Gyllenhaal but also from accomplished Oscar winners Susan Sarandon , Dustin Hoffman and Holly Hunter , yet newcomer Ellen Pompeo pulls off the feat with aplomb .
0 After you laugh once maybe twice , you will have completely forgotten the movie by the time you get back to your car in the parking lot .
1 The screenplay flounders under the weight of too many story lines .
1 Snipes is both a snore and utter tripe .
1 The troubling thing about Clockstoppers is that it does n't make any sense .
1 There 's no good answer to that one .
3 Singer/composer Bryan Adams contributes a slew of songs -- a few potential hits , a few more simply intrusive to the story -- but the whole package certainly captures the intended , er , spirit of the piece .
0 It 's a road-trip drama with too many wrong turns .
1 Seriously , rent the Disney version .
0 You 'll forget about it by Monday , though , and if they 're old enough to have developed some taste , so will your kids .
0 Like many such biographical melodramas , it suffers from the awkwardness that results from adhering to the messiness of true stories .
0 No cute factor here ... Not that I mind ugly ; the problem is he has no character , loveable or otherwise .
3 A remarkable movie with an unsatisfying ending , which is just the point .
4 If you 're a fan of the series you 'll love it and probably want to see it twice .
1 Unless Bob Crane is someone of particular interest to you , this film 's impressive performances and adept direction are n't likely to leave a lasting impression .
1 It does n't flinch from its unsettling prognosis , namely , that the legacy of war is a kind of perpetual pain .
1 If you recognize Zeus the dog from Snatch it will make you wish you were at home watching that movie instead of in the theater watching this one .
2 ... a trashy little bit of fluff stuffed with enjoyable performances and a bewildering sense of self-importance
2 If you 're really renting this you 're not interested in discretion in your entertainment choices , you 're interested in Anne Geddes , John Grisham , and Thomas Kincaid .
0 Like a can of 2-day old Coke .
1 What Jackson has done is proven that no amount of imagination , no creature , no fantasy story and no incredibly outlandish scenery
4 As a girl-meets-girl romantic comedy , Kissing Jessica Steinis quirky , charming and often hilarious .
4 Humorous and heartfelt , Douglas McGrath 's version of ' Nicholas Nickleby ' left me feeling refreshed and hopeful .
4 ... a solid , well-formed satire .
1 May offend viewers not amused by the sick sense of humor .
2 The Lady and the Duke is Eric Rohmer 's economical antidote to the bloated costume drama
3 Assayas ' ambitious , sometimes beautiful adaptation of Jacques Chardonne 's novel .
0 It does n't take a rocket scientist to figure out that this is a Mormon family movie , and a sappy , preachy one at that .
2 There are many things that solid acting can do for a movie , but crafting something promising from a mediocre screenplay is not one of them .
1 A cautionary tale about the folly of superficiality that is itself endlessly superficial .
0 It should be doing a lot of things , but does n't .
2 I was hoping that it would be sleazy and fun , but it was neither .
0 The logic of it all will be Greek to anyone not predisposed to the movie 's rude and crude humor .
4 About as big a crowdpleaser as they possibly come .
4 Thumbs up to Paxton for not falling into the Hollywood trap and making a vanity project with nothing new to offer .
1 Why '' they '' were here and what '' they '' wanted and quite honestly , I did n't care .
3 Together Time Out and Human Resources establish Mr. Cantet as France 's foremost cinematic poet of the workplace .
3 It 's mildly entertaining , especially if you find comfort in familiarity .
1 The chocolate factory without Charlie .
1 Why , you may ask , why should you buy the movie milk when the TV cow is free ?
1 The trappings of I Spy are so familiar you might as well be watching a rerun .
0 We 've liked Klein 's other work but Rollerball left us cold .
0 Even on its own ludicrous terms , The Sum of All Fears generates little narrative momentum , and invites unflattering comparisons to other installments in the Ryan series .
3 But the actors make this worth a peek .
0 This mess of a movie is nothing short of a travesty of a transvestite comedy .
1 A determined , ennui-hobbled slog that really does n't have much to say beyond the news flash that loneliness can make people act weird .
0 The satire is unfocused , while the story goes nowhere .
4 Easily the most thoughtful fictional examination of the root causes of anti-Semitism ever seen on screen .
3 Conceptually brilliant ... Plays like a living-room War Of The Worlds , gaining most of its unsettling force from the suggested and the unknown .
0 I have to admit I walked out of Runteldat .
2 Less worrying about covering all the drama in Frida 's life and more time spent exploring her process of turning pain into art would have made this a superior movie .
3 It 's excessively quirky and a little underconfident in its delivery , but otherwise this is the best ' old neighborhood ' project since Christopher Walken kinda romanced Cyndi Lauper in The Opportunists .
4 This is a movie full of grace and , ultimately , hope .
4 Ferrera has the charisma of a young woman who knows how to hold the screen .
2 We get an image of Big Papa spanning history , rather than suspending it .
2 '' On Guard ! ''
1 Average , at best , I 'm afraid .
4 An eloquent , reflective and beautifully acted meditation on both the profoundly devastating events of one year ago and the slow , painful healing process that has followed in their wake .
3 Fortunately , Elling never gets too cloying thanks to the actors ' perfect comic timing and sweet , genuine chemistry .
4 Tully is worth a look for its true-to-life characters , its sensitive acting , its unadorned view of rural life and the subtle direction of first-timer Hilary Birmingham .
1 Two badly interlocked stories drowned by all too clever complexity .
3 - I also wanted a little alien as a friend !
4 It 's immensely ambitious , different than anything that 's been done before and amazingly successful in terms of what it 's trying to do .
1 Forget the misleading title , what 's with the unexplained baboon cameo ?
1 Though an important political documentary , this does not really make the case the Kissinger should be tried as a war criminal .
3 Not everyone will welcome or accept The Trials of Henry Kissinger as faithful portraiture , but few can argue that the debate it joins is a necessary and timely one .
0 It 's always disappointing when a documentary fails to live up to -- or offer any new insight into -- its chosen topic .
0 A frustrating ' tweener ' -- too slick , contrived and exploitative for the art houses and too cynical , small and decadent for the malls .
0 Muddled , simplistic and more than a little pretentious .
3 The Mothman Prophecies is best when illustrating the demons bedevilling the modern masculine journey .
3 An oddity , to be sure , but one that you might wind up remembering with a degree of affection rather than revulsion .
2 Although bright , well-acted and thought-provoking , Tuck Everlasting suffers from a laconic pace and a lack of traditional action .
0 Feel free to go get popcorn whenever he 's not onscreen .
0 The very simple story seems too simple and the working out of the plot almost arbitrary .
3 Allen manages to breathe life into this somewhat tired premise .
1 After a while , Hoffman 's quirks and mannerisms , particularly his penchant for tearing up on cue -- things that seem so real in small doses -- become annoying and artificial .
3 There are flaws , but also stretches of impact and moments of awe ; we 're wrapped up in the characters , how they make their choices , and why .
1 Who cares ? .
4 While general audiences might not come away with a greater knowledge of the facts of Cuban music , they 'll be treated to an impressive and highly entertaining celebration of its sounds .
1 Exploitative and largely devoid of the depth or sophistication that would make watching such a graphic treatment of the crimes bearable .
3 A sentimental but entirely irresistible portrait of three aging sisters .
2 A typically observant , carefully nuanced and intimate French coming-of-age film that is an encouraging debut feature but has a needlessly downbeat ending that is too heavy for all that has preceded it .
4 Good , solid storytelling .
4 As gory as the scenes of torture and self-mutilation may be , they are pitted against shimmering cinematography that lends the setting the ethereal beauty of an Asian landscape painting .
3 We 're drawn in by the dark luster .
2 A pleasant , if forgettable , romp of a film .
4 A classic fairy tale that perfectly captures the wonders and worries of childhood in a way that few movies have ever approached .
4 Congrats Disney on a job well done , I enjoyed it just as much !
2 Some movies can get by without being funny simply by structuring the scenes as if they were jokes : a setup , delivery and payoff .
2 Big time .
1 I wish it would have just gone more over-the-top instead of trying to have it both ways .
1 It just does n't have anything really interesting to say .
2 ... would be a total loss if not for two supporting performances taking place at the movie 's edges .
2 Cox is far more concerned with aggrandizing madness , not the man , and the results might drive you crazy .
3 A rather brilliant little cult item : a pastiche of children 's entertainment , superhero comics , and Japanese animation .
2 Oozes condescension from every pore .
0 Clumsy , obvious , preposterous , the movie will likely set the cause of woman warriors back decades .
1 The result is an ' action film ' mired in stasis .
1 Hollywood has taken quite a nosedive from Alfred Hitchcock 's imaginative flight to Shyamalan 's self-important summer fluff .
4 Takes a simple premise and carries it to unexpected heights .
1 It 's lost the politics and the social observation and become just another situation romance about a couple of saps stuck in an inarticulate screenplay .
3 The film 's plot may be shallow , but you 've never seen the deep like you see it in these harrowing surf shots .
1 This is a movie where the most notable observation is how long you 've been sitting still .
3 The film is hard to dismiss -- moody , thoughtful , and lit by flashes of mordant humor .
2 If Jews were Catholics , this would be Catechism
4 Hard , endearing , caring , warm .
3 Shanghai Ghetto , much stranger than any fiction , brings this unknown slice of history affectingly to life .
0 Boy , has this franchise ever run out of gas .
1 I 've seen some bad singer-turned actors , but Lil Bow Wow takes the cake .
1 Follows the original film virtually scene for scene and yet manages to bleed it almost completely dry of humor , verve and fun .
1 A pathetically inane and unimaginative cross between XXX and Vertical Limit .
3 Arteta paints a picture of lives lived in a state of quiet desperation .
4 Shot largely in small rooms , the film has a gentle , unforced intimacy that never becomes claustrophobic .
1 But I had a lot of problems with this movie .
3 Takes you by the face , strokes your cheeks and coos beseechingly at you : slow down , shake off your tensions and take this picture at its own breezy , distracted rhythms .
3 ... the plot weaves us into a complex web .
2 The messy emotions raging throughout this three-hour effort are instantly recognizable , allowing the film to paradoxically feel familiar and foreign at the same time .
2 Plods along , minus the twisted humor and eye-popping visuals that have made Miike ... a cult hero .
3 The Cockettes provides a window into a subculture hell-bent on expressing itself in every way imaginable . '
1 An exceptionally dreary and overwrought bit of work , every bit as imperious as Katzenberg 's The Prince of Egypt from 1998 .
3 In its treatment of the dehumanizing and ego-destroying process of unemployment , Time Out offers an exploration that is more accurate than anything I have seen in an American film .
4 Renner carries much of the film with a creepy and dead-on performance .
2 ... if you 're just in the mood for a fun -- but bad -- movie , you might want to catch Freaks as a matinee .
1 Feels like a cold old man going through the motions .
2 Vampire epic succeeds as spooky action-packed trash of the highest order .
3 The film 's images give a backbone to the company and provide an emotional edge to its ultimate demise .
4 These three films form a remarkably cohesive whole , both visually and thematically , through their consistently sensitive and often exciting treatment of an ignored people .
1 Hoffman waits too long to turn his movie in an unexpected direction , and even then his tone retains a genteel , prep-school quality that feels dusty and leatherbound .
3 The dirty jokes provide the funniest moments in this oddly sweet comedy about jokester highway patrolmen .
0 In a big corner office in Hell , Satan is throwing up his hands in surrender , is firing his R&D people , and has decided he will just screen The Master of Disguise 24/7 .
4 A delicious , quirky movie with a terrific screenplay and fanciful direction by Michael Gondry .
1 It does n't really know or care about the characters , and uses them as markers for a series of preordained events .
3 Jackson and co have brought back the value and respect for the term epic cinema .
3 The fourth '' Pokemon '' is a diverting -- if predictable -- adventure suitable for a matinee , with a message that cautions children about disturbing the world 's delicate ecological balance .
1 Supposedly authentic account of a historical event that 's far too tragic to merit such superficial treatment .
0 ... if you , like me , think an action film disguised as a war tribute is disgusting to begin with , then you 're in for a painful ride .
2 ... a somber film , almost completely unrelieved by any comedy beyond the wistful everyday ironies of the working poor .
0 Journalistically dubious , inept and often lethally dull .
1 He 's not good with people .
0 The sheer dumbness of the plot other than its one good idea and the movie 's inescapable air of sleaziness get you down .
2 It 's not a classic spy-action or buddy movie , but it 's entertaining enough and worth a look .
0 Priggish , lethargically paced parable of renewal .
2 Everything else about High Crimes is , like the military system of justice it portrays , tiresomely regimented .
4 Warm in its loving yet unforgivingly inconsistent depiction of everyday people , relaxed in its perfect quiet pace and proud in its message .
3 An eye-boggling blend of psychedelic devices , special effects and backgrounds , ' Spy Kids 2 ' is a visual treat for all audiences .
0 '' The Adventures of Pluto Nash '' is a big time stinker .
0 Quite frankly , I ca n't see why any actor of talent would ever work in a McCulloch production again if they looked at how this movie turned out .
1 It 's such a mechanical endeavor that it never bothers to question why somebody might devote time to see it .
1 And second , what 's with all the shooting ?
1 Despite some strong performances , never rises above the level of a telanovela .
2 ... best seen as speculative history , as much an exploration of the paranoid impulse as a creative sequel to the Warren Report .
4 Rarely , indeed almost never , is such high-wattage brainpower coupled with pitch-perfect acting and an exquisite , unfakable sense of cinema .
2 There 's no clear picture of who killed Bob Crane .
1 Payami tries to raise some serious issues about Iran 's electoral process , but the result is a film that 's about as subtle as a party political broadcast .
1 The action here is unusually tame , the characters are too simplistic to maintain interest , and the plot offers few surprises .
2 The message is that even the most unlikely can link together to conquer all kinds of obstacles , whether they be of nature , of man or of one another .
2 Merci pour le movie .
4 Devos and Cassel have tremendous chemistry -- their sexual and romantic tension , while never really vocalized , is palpable .
3 Poignant and funny .
1 The overall vibe is druggy and self-indulgent , like a spring-break orgy for pretentious arts majors .
3 A glib but bouncy bit of sixties-style slickness in which the hero might wind up caught but the audience gets pure escapism .
4 The storylines are woven together skilfully , the magnificent swooping aerial shots are breathtaking , and the overall experience is awesome .
1 It finds no way to entertain or inspire its viewers .
3 With an unusual protagonist a kilt-wearing Jackson and subject matter , the improbable '' Formula 51 '' is somewhat entertaining , but it could have been much stronger .
1 Director Elie Chouraqui , who co-wrote the script , catches the chaotic horror of war , but why bother if you 're going to subjugate truth to the tear-jerking demands of soap opera ?
1 Is anyone else out there getting tired of the whole slo-mo , double-pistoled , ballistic-pyrotechnic Hong Kong action aesthetic ?
1 It 's the humanizing stuff that will probably sink the film for anyone who does n't think about percentages all day long .
3 A moving essay about the specter of death , especially suicide .
1 A disaster of a drama , saved only by its winged assailants .
0 When it comes out on video , then it 's the perfect cure for insomnia .
3 A beguiling evocation of the quality that keeps Dickens evergreen : the exuberant openness with which he expresses our most basic emotions .
2 The movie should be credited with remembering his victims .
1 Coupling disgracefully written dialogue with flailing bodily movements that substitute for acting , Circuit is the awkwardly paced soap opera-ish story .
2 Snipes relies too much on a scorchingly plotted dramatic scenario for its own good .
1 Kurys seems intimidated by both her subject matter and the period trappings of this debut venture into the heritage business .
2 The Sweetest Thing , a romantic comedy with outrageous tendencies , may be a mess in a lot of ways .
3 Has its moments -- and almost as many subplots .
3 A chilly , brooding but quietly resonant psychological study of domestic tension and unhappiness .
3 Smart and fun , but far more witty than it is wise .
3 Succeeds where its recent predecessor miserably fails because it demands that you suffer the dreadfulness of war from both sides .
4 A rare and lightly entertaining look behind the curtain that separates comics from the people laughing in the crowd .
3 High Crimes steals so freely from other movies and combines enough disparate types of films that it ca n't help but engage an audience .
3 Michel Piccoli 's moving performance is this films reason for being .
0 Purposefully shocking in its eroticized gore , if unintentionally dull in its lack of poetic frissons .
3 An intimate contemplation of two marvelously messy lives .
2 The party scenes deliver some tawdry kicks .
2 Meandering and glacially paced , and often just plain dull .
1 A fake street drama that keeps telling you things instead of showing them .
3 A quietly moving look back at what it was to be Iranian-American in 1979 .
0 Confuses its message with an ultimate desire to please , and contorting itself into an idea of expectation is the last thing any of these three actresses , nor their characters , deserve .
4 ... a good film that must have baffled the folks in the marketing department .
1 ... its solemn pretension prevents us from sharing the awe in which it holds itself .
2 but ' Why ? '
2 Denis forges out of the theories of class - based rage and sisterly obsession a razor-sided tuning fork that rings with cultural , sexual and social discord .
0 If you value your time and money , find an escape clause and avoid seeing this trite , predictable rehash .
3 While most films these days are about nothing , this film seems to be about everything that 's plaguing the human spirit in a relentlessly globalizing world .
3 She boxes these women 's souls right open for us .
4 In his U.S. debut , Mr. Schnitzler proves himself a deft pace master and stylist .
4 Sex With Strangers is fascinating ...
0 It made me feel unclean , and I 'm the guy who liked There 's Something About Mary and both American Pie movies .
2 Anyone who 's ever suffered under a martinet music instructor has no doubt fantasized about what an unhappy , repressed and twisted personal life their tormentor deserved .
1 Just a collection of this and that -- whatever fills time -- with no unified whole .
0 And it 's a lousy one at that .
2 Not one moment in the enterprise did n't make me want to lie down in a dark room with something cool to my brow .
2 It gets bogged down by hit-and-miss topical humour before getting to the truly good stuff .
3 Between bursts of automatic gunfire , the story offers a trenchant critique of capitalism .
4 In addition to gluing you to the edge of your seat , Changing Lanes is also a film of freshness , imagination and insight .
3 Lasker 's canny , meditative script distances sex and love , as Byron and Luther ... realize they ca n't get no satisfaction without the latter .
1 This angst-ridden territory was covered earlier and much better in Ordinary People .
3 A smart little indie .
0 My only wish is that Celebi could take me back to a time before I saw this movie and I could just skip it .
0 Imagine Kevin Smith , the blasphemous bad boy of suburban Jersey , if he were stripped of most of his budget and all of his sense of humor .
2 this film is not a love letter for the slain rappers , it 's a taunt - a call for justice for two crimes from which many of us have not yet recovered .
2 Whether you like it or not is basically a matter of taste .
2 The best way to describe it is as a cross between Paul Thomas Anderson 's Magnolia and David Lynch 's Mulholland Dr.
3 harmlessly
1 After a while , the only way for a reasonably intelligent person to get through The Country Bears is to ponder how a whole segment of pop-music history has been allowed to get wet , fuzzy and sticky .
4 A powerful performance from Mel Gibson and a brutal 90-minute battle sequence that does everything but issue you a dog-tag and an M-16 .
1 So much about the film is loopy and ludicrous ... that it could have been a hoot in a bad-movie way if the laborious pacing and endless exposition had been tightened .
0 By the time the plot grinds itself out in increasingly incoherent fashion , you might be wishing for a watch that makes time go faster rather than the other way around .
1 Director Tom Shadyac and star Kevin Costner glumly mishandle the story 's promising premise of a physician who needs to heal himself .
1 It 's a big idea , but the film itself is small and shriveled .
1 Some fine acting , but ultimately a movie with no reason for being .
2 The movie has no respect for laws , political correctness or common decency , but it displays something more important : respect for its flawed , crazy people .
1 The film lapses too often into sugary sentiment and withholds delivery on the pell-mell pyrotechnics its punchy style promises .
1 One well-timed explosion in a movie can be a knockout , but a hundred of them can be numbing .
2 A dark , dull thriller with a parting shot that misfires .
3 Audacious-impossible yet compelling ...
3 In its own floundering way , it gets to you .
1 Presents nothing special and , until the final act , nothing overtly disagreeable .
1 Let 's see , a haunted house , a haunted ship , what 's next ... Ghost Blimp ?
1 The material and the production itself are little more than routine .
2 Haynes ' homage to such films as '' All That Heaven Allows '' and '' Imitation of Life '' transcends them .
0 Nobody seems to have cared much about any aspect of it , from its cheesy screenplay to the grayish quality of its lighting to its last-minute , haphazard theatrical release .
2 A movie that 's just plain awful but still manages to entertain on a guilty-pleasure , so-bad-it 's - funny level .
3 A good documentary can make interesting a subject you thought would leave you cold .
2 As self-aware movies go , Who is Cletis Tout ?
1 Britney Spears ' phoniness is nothing compared to the movie 's contrived , lame screenplay and listless direction .
3 Nothing can detract from the affection of that moral favorite : friends will be friends through thick and thin .
3 The film ... presents classic moral-condundrum drama : What would you have done to survive ?
0 Terminally brain dead production .
3 An interesting look behind the scenes of Chicago-based rock group Wilco ...
1 Has nothing good to speak about other than the fact that it is relatively short , tries its best to hide the fact that Seagal 's overweight and out of shape .
3 A winning and wildly fascinating work .
3 After watching it , you can only love the players it brings to the fore for the gifted but no-nonsense human beings they are and for the still-inestimable contribution they have made to our shared history .
1 Yet it 's not quite the genre-busting film it 's been hyped to be because it plays everything too safe .
2 The film is a blunt indictment , part of a perhaps surreal campaign to bring Kissinger to trial for crimes against humanity .
3 Intelligent , caustic take on a great writer and dubious human being .
2 The whole mildly pleasant outing -- the R rating is for brief nudity and a grisly corpse -- remains aloft not on its own self-referential hot air , but on the inspired performance of Tim Allen .
3 Gondry 's direction is adequate ... but what gives Human Nature its unique feel is Kaufman 's script .
3 This is a shrewd and effective film from a director who understands how to create and sustain a mood .
3 If you can swallow its absurdities and crudities Lagaan really is enormously good fun .
1 Cheap , vulgar dialogue and a plot that crawls along at a snail 's pace .
3 Alarms for Duvall 's throbbing sincerity and his elderly propensity for patting people while he talks .
2 Rob Schneider , Dana Carvey and Sarah Michelle Gellar in The Philadelphia Story ?
0 The acting is n't much better .
3 Zoom !
2 I had more fun with Ben Stiller 's Zoolander , which I thought was rather clever .
3 If the film 's vision of sport as a secular religion is a bit cloying , its through-line of family and community is heartening in the same way that each season marks a new start .
3 It 's pretty linear and only makeup-deep , but Bogdanovich ties it together with efficiency and an affection for the period .
4 More mature than Fatal Attraction , more complete than Indecent Proposal and more relevant than 9 1/2 Weeks , Unfaithful is at once intimate and universal cinema .
1 That 's its first sign of trouble .
4 A very charming and funny movie .
2 A good-looking but ultimately pointless political thriller with plenty of action and almost no substance .
0 '' ... something appears to have been lost in the translation this time .
0 A period story about a Catholic boy who tries to help a Jewish friend get into heaven by sending the audience straight to hell .
0 A markedly inactive film , City is conversational bordering on confessional .
2 The strong subject matter continues to shock throughout the film .
1 A fan film that for the uninitiated plays better on video with the sound turned down .
1 Romanek keeps adding flourishes -- artsy fantasy sequences -- that simply feel wrong .
3 The result is somewhat satisfying -- it still comes from Spielberg , who has never made anything that was n't at least watchable .
3 A wonderfully speculative character study that made up for its rather slow beginning by drawing me into the picture .
2 Gibney and Jarecki just want to string the bastard up .
1 Lazily directed by Charles Stone III ... from a leaden script by Matthew Cirulnick and novelist Thulani Davis .
4 Nonchalantly freaky and uncommonly pleasurable , Warm Water may well be the year 's best and most unpredictable comedy .
1 Though there 's a clarity of purpose and even-handedness to the film 's direction , the drama feels rigged and sluggish .
0 Sunk by way too much indulgence of scene-chewing , teeth-gnashing actorliness .
0 What starts off as a possible Argentine American Beauty reeks like a room stacked with pungent flowers .
4 ... by the time it 's done with us , Mira Nair 's new movie has its audience giddy with the delight of discovery , of having been immersed in a foreign culture only to find that human nature is pretty much the same all over .
4 Shot in rich , shadowy black-and-white , Devils chronicles , with increasingly amused irony , the relationship between reluctant captors and befuddled captives .
2 Bond-inspired ?
0 Staggeringly dreadful romance .
4 This method almost never fails him , and it works superbly here .
1 Weird .
4 Nolan proves that he can cross swords with the best of them and helm a more traditionally plotted popcorn thriller while surrendering little of his intellectual rigor or creative composure .
4 Maybe not a classic , but a movie the kids will want to see over and over again .
2 The film did n't move me one way or the other , but it was an honest effort and if you want to see a flick about telemarketers this one will due .
1 And as with most late-night bull sessions , eventually the content is n't nearly as captivating as the rowdy participants think it is .
4 The kind of sweet-and-sour insider movie that film buffs will eat up like so much gelati .
1 Ill-considered , unholy hokum .
2 Or that the battery on your watch has died .
3 Competently directed but terminally cute drama .
0 This pathetic junk is barely an hour long .
2 Taylor takes us on a ride that 's consistently surprising , easy to watch -- but , oh , so dumb .
1 Feels less like a change in Herzog 's personal policy than a half-hearted fluke .
1 Just too silly and sophomoric to ensnare its target audience .
3 Familiar but utterly delightful .
1 For those of us who respond more strongly to storytelling than computer-generated effects , the new Star Wars installment has n't escaped the rut dug by the last one .
4 Consider it ' perfection . '
0 At the one-hour mark , Herzog simply runs out of ideas and the pace turns positively leaden as the movie sputters to its inevitable tragic conclusion .
3 This is a more fascinating look at the future than '' Bladerunner '' and one of the most high-concept sci fi adventures attempted for the screen .
4 Samuel L. Jackson is one of the best actors there is .
3 Huppert 's show to steal and she makes a meal of it , channeling Kathy Baker 's creepy turn as the repressed mother on Boston Public just as much as 8 Women 's Augustine .
1 But no. .
1 Even in terms of the low-grade cheese standards on which it operates , it never quite makes the grade as tawdry trash .
3 If you love him , you 'll like it .
4 A new film from Bill Plympton , the animation master , is always welcome .
2 There 's no getting around the fact that this is Revenge Of The Nerds Revisited -- again .
1 The idea is more interesting than the screenplay , which lags badly in the middle and lurches between not-very-funny comedy , unconvincing dramatics and some last-minute action strongly reminiscent of Run Lola Run .
1 Woefully pretentious .
1 Lacks the visual flair and bouncing bravado that characterizes better hip-hop clips and is content to recycle images and characters that were already tired 10 years ago .
3 Makes one thing abundantly clear .
3 A flick about our infantilized culture that is n't entirely infantile .
1 Still , it just sits there like a side dish no one ordered .
1 We can tell what it is supposed to be , but ca n't really call it a work of art .
0 A ragbag of cliches .
3 It made me want to get made-up and go see this movie with my sisters .
3 Visually , ' Santa Clause 2 ' is wondrously creative .
1 Girlfriends are bad , wives are worse and babies are the kiss of death in this bitter Italian comedy .
3 And we do n't avert our eyes for a moment .
4 Exudes the fizz of a Busby Berkeley musical and the visceral excitement of a sports extravaganza .
1 For all its brilliant touches , Dragon loses its fire midway , nearly flickering out by its perfunctory conclusion .
3 An engaging , formulaic sports drama that carries a charge of genuine excitement .
2 with a couple of burnt-out cylinders
3 Tackles the difficult subject of grief and loss with such life-embracing spirit that the theme does n't drag an audience down .
4 A moving story of determination and the human spirit .
4 We admire this film for its harsh objectivity and refusal to seek our tears , our sympathies .
0 Disgusting .
1 ' Moore is like a progressive bull in a china shop , a provocateur crashing into ideas and special-interest groups as he slaps together his own brand of liberalism . '
2 Reno does what he can in a thankless situation , the film ricochets from humor to violence and back again , and Ryoko Hirosue makes us wonder if she is always like that .
2 The culmination of everyone 's efforts is given life when A Selection appears in its final form in '' Last Dance '' .
3 It goes down easy , leaving virtually no aftertaste .
0 Crossroads feels like a teenybopper Ed Wood film , replete with the pubescent scandalous innuendo and the high-strung but flaccid drama .
2 Certainly beautiful to look at , but its not very informative about its titular character and no more challenging than your average television biopic .
4 Mike Leigh populates his movie with a wonderful ensemble cast of characters that bring the routine day to day struggles of the working class to life
3 If you open yourself up to Mr. Reggio 's theory of this imagery as the movie 's set ... it can impart an almost visceral sense of dislocation and change .
1 Does not go far enough in its humor or stock ideas to stand out as particularly memorable or even all that funny .
3 It 's refreshing to see a romance this smart .
3 Like the chilled breath of oral storytelling frozen onto film .
3 Shattering , devastating documentary on two maladjusted teens in a downward narcotized spiral .
0 As exciting as all this exoticism might sound to the typical Pax viewer , the rest of us will be lulled into a coma .
3 The film is reasonably entertaining , though it begins to drag two-thirds through , when the melodramatic aspects start to overtake the comedy .
1 It never rises to its clever what-if concept .
3 Much has been written about those years when the psychedelic '60s grooved over into the gay '70s , but words do n't really do the era justice .
2 A sly dissection of the inanities of the contemporary music business and a rather sad story of the difficulties of artistic collaboration .
4 A gracious , eloquent film that by its end offers a ray of hope to the refugees able to look ahead and resist living in a past forever lost .
0 Every conceivable mistake a director could make in filming opera has been perpetrated here .