Watching Possession is a bit like hearing a disinterested high-schooler read one of Shakespeare’s sonnets: The words are there, but the passion is missing. Gwyneth Paltrow and Aaron Eckhart both give oddly miscalibrated performances as modern scholars researching an affair between two historical literary figures, but it’s most likely writer-director Neil LaBute who is responsible

A road-trip movie that never leaves its writer-director-editor-producer-star’s bloated head. Vincent Gallo plays a motorcycle racer who travels across the country to reunite with his tragically separated girlfriend (Chloe Sevigny). It’s a dull journey – this is the kind of movie that makes you afraid to check your watch for fear of what you might

You know the sort of harried, harangued and yet utterly unflappable housewife who is often referred to as a saint? Prize Winner canonizes one. Adapted by writer-director Jane Anderson from Terry Ryan’s memoir about her mother, the movie recounts how the late Evelyn Ryan (Julianne Moore) supported her 10 kids in the 1950s by writing

If it weren’t for its unique setting – namely the upper echelons of the hip-hop recording industry – Brown Sugar would be indistinguishable from the countless conventional romantic dramas Hollywood churns out. Taye Diggs and Sanaa Lathan are charming enough as the central couple – childhood friends who have gone on to careers in the

Before it collapses under the weight of its own strained concept – that Bruce Willis’ narcissistic image consultant is visited by his 8-year-old self to learn what really matters in life – this hits on a few moments of knowing charm (the little boy cannot believe his older counterpart doesn’t remember the momentous day an

The central plot – about a struggling novelist named Byron (Andy Garcia) who becomes an upscale gigolo to support his young family – is as ludicrous and labored as it sounds, and would be a total loss if not for two supporting performances taking place at the movie’s edges. Mick Jagger brings elegance, wit and

Based on the true story of a British widow (Judi Dench) who ran a nude revue during World War II, this spends a lot of time arguing against misplaced shame, so why is the movie ashamed to be a simple character comedy? Director Stephen Frears’ picture begins that way – hilariously so – but soon

More giggling goes on here than anyone over the age of 12 – or male – should have to endure. Otherwise, this movie debut of Britney Spears should please her two main audiences: young teen girls and the creepy men who ogle them. As a standard road-trip flick, Crossroads is predictably, harmlessly insipid, but worse

The self-righteous Mona Lisa Smile is set in 1953, and it should have come out in 1954. The movie thinks it’s blazing new trails in the name of feminism, when the path it walks thankfully has long been charred. Julia Roberts plays a free-thinking women’s college instructor bent on teaching her students there’s more to