An oft-told tale.

It's all pretty dumb, but if you're in the mood for this sort of thing, you won't have a bad time. [9 April 1999, Friday, p.F]

As Cruel Intentions progresses, you may come to realize that if a bomb suddenly blew up everyone on screen, you wouldn't particularly miss anyone.

Lacks the energy and urgency of its source material.

Meant to be appreciated solely for its gleaming surfaces.

Some of its parts are nifty, but the sum of these parts is nothing.

I didn't believe it, and I don't think the people who made The Family Man did either.

Somehow lacks lightness and weight. This is a movie that tries to work a bloody suicide attempt and a murder into a comedy of manners, with almost everything registering in the same narrow spectrum of inconsequence.

In Uptown Girls Murphy is like a puppy in traffic; you're confident she'll reach the curb but only because the cars are swerving, not because her moves are so deft.

Never Been Kissed features a fierce tug of war between the charm of Drew Barrymore and the stupidity of the script.

Why Paltrow, who was accepting a best actress Oscar four years ago, would take this clumsily written role is anyone's guess.

The comedy part of the equation is awfully mild, however. This is a movie that aims for warm smiles rather than belly laughs.

Feels like a demonstration reel for toys, action figures and future DisneyQuest installations.

Zucker gives the movie an ebullient spirit, but he also keeps everything at the same loud pitch throughout.

The main problem is the director-star's choice to play so far beneath his intelligence for so long. Stiller lacks the physical gifts and projected sweetness of, say, Jim Carrey in "Dumb and Dumber," and unlike Peter Sellers in the "Pink Panther" movies, he can't keep a straight face.

Lead actors seeming like they're taking it easy is one thing. But a filmmaker trying to construct a smart romantic comedy actually must do some work.

You leave feeling like you've endured a long workout without your pulse ever racing. The exercise ultimately is product placement, with Bond the biggest product of them all.

Chan and Wilson's easy camaraderie remains eminently watchable, but the rough edges from last time out are missed.

This Australian production pairs two always-watchable actors, Guy Pearce and Rachel Griffiths, yet never compels us to feel a thing.

Isn't likely to satisfy the gamers' appetite for action. It also probably isn't heady enough for the science-fiction crowd, and it's too remote for those who simply wish to be immersed in a head-spinning fantasy world.

Jonah may resemble an 83-minute Sunday school lesson, but at least it's a playful, colorful one, with spunky peas and tomatoes, chirpy kids' tune-- and bright animation that may not rival "Monsters, Inc." or "Shrek" but gets its points across.

Just a vehicle for Carrey to do his hyperactive shtick. He has some entertaining bits, such as his rain-drenched meltdown in which he victimizes some stunned innocents, but he’s working so strenuously that at times he’s hard to watch.

For such a rich visual movie, "Reloaded" tells far more than it shows; the pivotal scenes involve people explaining things to Neo. Too many plot turns resemble detours, and even the ever-amusing Smith feels like a red herring in the scheme of things.

Manages to leave the impression that it was funny even though most of its jokes don't score.

The movie can't quite embrace its characters or their scene; Wahlberg even cracks a joke over the end credits that heralds the late-'80s ascendance of hip-hop, which, of course, spawned Marky Mark and the Funky Bunch.

Waste in the health care system is deplorable, but waste on the movie screen isn't so great either.

Some stunts and jokes are genuinely clever.

Plays like a drawn-out outline of a better movie; no one got around to fleshing out the details or providing some soul.