Black was already the world's biggest little kid, and he might be the only actor who could have made this movie such nimble fun.

The movie is much like a really long beer commercial - but a really dark one.

Stirring as it frequently is, The Way Back is a good movie that should have been a classic.

The hopelessly dated 1968 play "The Boys in the Band" yields a surprisingly sprightly and multifaceted documentary, Making the Boys.

Bateman has rarely had the opportunity to play a snarling lawman, but with his cool aviators and his bristling putdowns he's perfect, too.

May serve as a useful way to introduce teens to what World War II in Europe was like.

Writer-director John Gray, who created "Ghost Whisperer" on TV, is a son of Brooklyn whose love for the borough is as thick as a pint of Guinness, and he keeps finding fresh ways to present familiar plot points.

Director Susanne Bier's chilly morality play is slow to get started, but once established, its three parallel stories comment provocatively on one another.

Picture Monty Python writing an unusually odd "Twilight Zone" episode directed by surrealist Luis Buñuel. Or just empty your mind of all sense: This is Rubber.

As for Grant, who hasn't been this sharp since "Love Actually" six years ago, he is once again the prime minister of cute comedy.

An open- and-shut case, but that doesn't mean it can't also be an entertaining one.

First-time writer-director Adam Reid has a lightly endearing touch as he allows the actors plenty of space to be warm without being cute.

Camp often means a lack of feeling and generalized disdain; not so in Spork, which has as much heart as "Sixteen Candles."

Director Matthew Vaughn, who did last year's delightful "Kick-Ass," doesn't do witty this time around, but he does keep up a spiffing pace while making the action blaze.

The loose feel and sense for random comedy (as when a bore suddenly starts lecturing Coogan about the geological details of the cliff he is standing on) are spiffy.

As Popper himself notices, his and the penguins' saga gets so endearing that it could have been narrated by Morgan Freeman.

Pity the crowds expecting another cute comedy like "Date Night" who wind up at Crazy, Stupid, Love. It'll be like asking for a burger and getting served escargot.

How dark is this comedy? It's a big hit in Ireland.

The movie is more a situation than a narrative, and it's repetitive and depressing. One interrupter -- a murderer who did 14 years in prison -- says of the program, "In essence, it's just a Band-Aid." At best: One of his colleagues gets shot in the back for his peacekeeping effort.

Gentle, tender and very French, The Hedgehog is cinematic poetry -- too bad about that prosaic plotting.

So this bourgeois-bohemian movie is, in a way, as serene in its obliviousness to the exterior world as its man-child subject. It's not essential, but it is endearing.

Harks back to a 1960s idea of what a horror film should be.

Footloose won me over early, with a sequence in which the hero gets all heavy metal while restoring his badass ... VW Bug.

Killing Bono begs to be remade with A-list stars but, given Neil's history of near-misses, probably won't be.

Take a stroll down London Boulevard if you enjoy surly, smart, hard-edged British crime movies like "Sexy Beast" and "Croupier."

The magical mystery that is Paul McCartney may never be solved, but for fans (the line forms behind me), the new documentary The Love We Make includes some memorable displays of his world-conquering charm.

There are several adorable musical numbers that make excellent use of Adams. Segel's dancing is . . . well, he reminded me of a huge star: Big Bird.

I'm not, finally, sure what Leigh is saying - but she is a filmmaker with a voice.