Italian Job, The (2003)

Action/Adventure Rated PG-13

A heist movie with heart, thanks to a strong emotional center and an amiable cast. The thieves in this remake – including Mark Wahlberg, Edward Norton and Charlize Theron – banter like the cast of Friends, while their latest job is less about money than avenging the murder of their patriarchal leader. There’s a serviceable

Ballistic: Ecks Vs. Sever (2002)

Action/Adventure Rated R

Brainless, idiotic action – and somehow still not any fun. Antonio Banderas and Lucy Liu play a pair of disgruntled spies, but Thai director Wych Kaosayananda gives the movie’s countless fireballs most of his attention. In the end, it’s hard to decide what’s sillier: the nonsensical back story that explains Banderas’ character or the sight

Jurassic Park III (2001)

Action/Adventure Rated PG-13

“The wonder of the first movie is long gone, but a few thrills still remain.”

Chocolat (2000)

Drama Rated PG-13

A simple fairy tale about tolerance unfolds when the newcomer to a 1959 French village (Juliette Binoche) scandalizes the locals by selling chocolates during Lent. This is the kind of nice, cuddly movie you feel like petting – and Academy members felt like nominating for multiple awards – but it’s not much more than that.

Meet the Fockers (2004)

Comedy Rated PG-13

Dustin Hoffman, joining the Meet the Parents franchise for this sequel to that 2000 family farce, actually puts forth an effort, and his eager amiability only makes coasting castmates Ben Stiller, Robert De Niro and Barbra Streisand look all the more uninspired. He’s like the one kid in gym class who takes Frisbee golf seriously.

Below (2002)

Horror Rated R

“It’s just the wind,” goes the attempt at reassurance in your average haunted-house story. In Below, a clever horror flick set aboard a World War II submarine, the men tell each other, “It’s just the water.” Ably directed by genre specialist David Twohy (Pitch Black), Below combines the paranoid claustrophobia of a submarine movie with

Men in Black II (2002)

Action/Adventure Rated PG-13

When a movie’s strongest quality is a fantastic, original concept, a sequel can be something of a self-defeating proposition. And so Men in Black II – in which mysterious government agents Kay and Jay (Tommy Lee Jones and Will Smith) reunite to monitor the extraterrestrials secretly living among us – is occasionally fun but never

Darkness Falls (2003)

Horror Rated PG-13

Though it never lives up to the ghost story that serves as its prologue – about a vengeful spirit who attacks kids the night they lose their last baby tooth – Darkness Falls remains serviceably creepy throughout. The main story follows one of the ghost’s former victims – now a predictably disheveled adult – as

One, The (2001)

Action/Adventure Rated PG-13

In a generic science-fiction future – you know, the kind full of stark fluorescent lighting and bulky armored cars – a cop (Jet Li) fights his evil double from a parallel universe. Li’s a man of considerable martial arts talent, but you won’t see much of it here. The One has the stiff, dingy look

Dark Water (2005)

Horror Rated PG-13

Another Americanized version of a horror film from the Japanese Ring factory, this is one of those unsettling thrillers that could be taking place entirely within the main character’s head. Jennifer Connelly stars as a recently divorced mother trying to prove that she can raise her young daughter on her own. When a few highly