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Romantic comedies are a little like junk food: they're not healthy or sophisticated but, when made right, there's something addictive about their tasty familiarity. Going in, you know what you're going to get. There are no surprises, nasty or other...

Nobody's Fool is about as sublime a motion picture as is likely to come out of Hollywood. With a structure that contravenes the norm, this film concentrates on character first, letting the plot fall naturally into place. Situations are forced on ...

Non-Stop plays like what might happen if Michael Bay directed a screenplay developed for Alfred Hitchcock. The movie, while so utterly preposterous as to provoke guffaws, is presented in such a way that there's a building sense of tension. As a res...

The Nutcracker and the Four Realms is a miscalculation of Magic Kingdom-sized proportions. Designed for and targeted at prepubescent girls, the holiday-themed fantasy adventure drowns in CGI, underdeveloped characters, and a plot utterly devoi...

There are a number of ways one can categorize October Sky. My preference is to call it Varsity Blues for those who don't like athletics. And, while such a facile description threatens to reduce this movie to a plateau far below its worth, it ...

It's probably just a coincidence, but the two Bond films that Maud Adams appeared in -- The Man with the Golden Gun and Octopussy -- are easily the silliest entries in the long-running series (not counting the intentional spoof Casino Royale). In...

Here's a primer for how to endure Old Dogs if an unfortunate series of circumstances should place you where seeing it is unavoidable. Arrive late and leave early. In between, visit the concession stand as frequently as possible and stand in the lo...

Oliver Twist has never been one of my favorite Dickens novels, so perhaps that’s part of the reason why I’m lukewarm about Oliver!, the stage musical-turned-Oscar-winning motion picture adaptation of the book. It’s an uneven film with a...

There’s something eerie about the way The Omega Man opens: Charlton Heston driving around a seemingly deserted Los Angeles (the empty streets are shown via helicopter shots as well as on the ground) while the theme from A Summer Place plays ...