Movies with music written by James Newton Howard

With his third feature effort, writer/director M. Night Shyamalan has taken a huge step in the wrong direction. After showing great strides of maturity between his ineffective debut, Praying with Anger, and 1998's appealing Wide Awake, Shyamalan h...

Let's start out by not dwelling overmuch on the existence of Mirror Mirror. The basic story outline may be the same, but the similarities end there. Everything of importance is different: tone, intent, plot specifics, and so forth. Mirror Mirror is...

Joe Pytka is known best as a TV commercial director. He's the man behind the "Thank you for your support" Bartles & James ads, the "Bo knows" Nike ads, and the Ray Charles "Uh huh" Diet Pepsi ads. In fact, according to his bio, he has dir...

Stir of Echoes belongs to one of the oldest genres of horror films: the ghost story. And, unlike a multitude of subpar entries that have borne this appellation over the years, it's mostly effective. Like all good ghost stories, it understands tha...

Given the screenplay for The Tourist, Alfred Hitchcock would have hired Cary Grant (or Jimmy Stewart) and Grace Kelly. Then he would have applied his particular brand of magic - the one that allowed him to sell the improbable - and an engaging rom...

The Trigger Effect, a psychological thriller from David Koepp, opens with an image of coyotes tearing at a dead carcass. An electrical power plant stands in the background. It's a visceral, unsettling scene, and you'd have to be more than a littl...

The primary draw for Water for Elephants is the pairing of Reese Witherspoon and Robert Pattinson (ignore the ten year age gap) in a love story based on the best-selling novel by Sara Gruen. Sadly, passion and romance are two ingredients missing fr...

The makers of Waterworld, the current holder of the "most expensive film" title, have put a good portion of the money where the viewing public can see it -- on the screen. This production, with its massive explosions, amazing stunts, and breathtak...