Catch and Release (2007)

Drama Rated PG-13

Written and directed by Susannah Grant (the screenwriter of Erin Brockovich), this is the rare chick flick that defines its heroine on her own terms, not in terms of the husband or boyfriend she wants or has. Appropriately, the movie opens with the loss of a man. After her fiance is killed in a skiing

Smokin’ Aces (2007)

Action/Adventure Rated R

Hollywood seems to think every eighth-grade class needs its own Pulp Fiction, and so the graduates of 2007 get Smokin’ Aces, a grating exercise in trendy nihilism designed to appeal to the amoral adolescent in all of us. The setup is simple enough to inspire a video game – a bevy of contract killers converge

Transformers (2007)

Action/Adventure Rated PG-13

“…like watching a car compactor at work in a junkyard.

Stick It (2006)

Drama Rated PG-13

It’s appropriate that Stick It even has a title that sneers, for watching the movie is like spending an hour supervising detention. Missy Peregrym plays a former gymnastics star who has rebelled into the tomboy world of bike tricks. After her latest stunt, a judge orders her to attend a strict gymnastics academy. The gimmick

Haven (2006)

Drama Rated R

Haven wants to be one of those interwoven, multiple-plot dramas, but the problem is the movie seems to decide that about halfway through its running time. After spending quite a bit of time following a shady businessman (Bill Paxton) who flees with a bunch of dirty money and his daughter (Agnes Bruckner) to the Cayman

Finding Forrester (2000)

Drama Rated PG-13

There’s a healthy respect for the craft of writing in this story of a reclusive author (Sean Connery) who mentors an underprivileged but talented teen-ager (Rob Brown) in the Bronx, but things turn arch and silly fast. Director Gus Van Sant gives in to all of the treacly contrivances he avoided in the similarly themed

All the King’s Men (1949)

Drama Rated NR

A piercing, if not very subtle, adaptation of Robert Penn Warren’s Pulitzer Prize-winning political novel about the rise and eventual corruption of a man of the people. Broderick Crawford is a blowzy, booming force as Willie Stark, a man who means well at the start of his political career and still believes he means well

Jet Li’s Fearless (2006)

Action/Adventure Rated PG-13

A highbrow martial-arts picture in the tradition of Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, Jet Li’s Fearless has lofty ambitions but lacks the necessary talent. Li stars as real-life martial-arts legend Huo Yuanjia, who fought for the pride of China against foreign challengers at the turn of the 20th century. As it follows Yuanjia from childhood to

Rocky (1976)

Drama Rated PG

“Stallone struck a deep, lasting chord with this fountainhead of clichés…”

Flyboys (2006)

Action/Adventure Rated PG-13

There is a reason it isn’t called Flymen. Flyboys, which follows James Franco as an American volunteer who pilots a fighter plane for the French in World War I, is thoroughly adolescent. That’s fine during the exciting – albeit computer-assisted – dogfight scenes, but not so good for the rest of the film. Here it’s