This is a movie in which you rarely know where you are or who's doing what to the next person.

Drawn out and dishonest in equal measure, Sam fights it out with "The Majestic" for the title of worst "important" movie of the year.

Murky, pretentious and torturously inert.

Dead-carcass spinoff of Jay Ward's animated TV favorite.

A race-car drama full of flashy but empty images and a soundtrack that makes you feel as if you're being shaken on a motel rumblebed.

You keep waiting for there to be more, but there never is -- other than the fact that it all gets gorier and uglier as the dyspeptic look on Jones' face progresses from a four- to a six-a-day scotch-and-peppermint schnapps hangover.

Gere has never seemed more squirrelly.

Kid's tone is off 100% of the time. The young actors are irredeemably bland, and two of the adults (Michael Des Barres' bank president, James LeGros' Storm Trooper-like security guard) are hammy enough to make James Brown seem controlled.

The trouble with indulging Taking Lives is that it's taking your time.

No comedy this vile should be brazenly foolish enough to give itself this title. [25 November 1998, p. 3D]

Suspense takes a vacation in sequel. [13 November 1998, p. 6E]

A little soon for any movie this millennium to reunite overacting Matthew Lillard, underacting Freddie Prinze Jr., feigning mousy Linda Cardellini and the more obviously lip-glossy Sarah Michelle Gellar.

Here's a late-August dog-days atrocity from the "aren't farts funny?" school of filmmaking.

Icky and incompetent (special effects aside) in equal parts, this groaner makes 1994's "The Mask" look like something you'd study in a film graduate course at NYU.

When the cast starts wondering where the roadkill is, someone says, "Follow the smell." Good tip: That's how you'll know where Wax is playing.

A pitiful update that saddles poor Cedric the Entertainer with the unenviable task of taking over Jackie Gleason's premier creation, Ralph Kramden.

Wow, dudes. Pu-trid. (1989 February 20, p.4D)

The movie's biggest drawback is a failure to deliver what's promised.

That sound you hear is from jet engines gassing up, about to zoom Underclassman to DVD-ville.

Geared to 16-year-olds who can't name the governor of their state, this movie ought to be closed down by the health department.

As an artsy but minimally bohemian type, Russo maintains her dignity, an extraordinary accomplishment.

Why would a distributor suddenly yank an animated family film from its intended wide December opening until mid-January? Could it be that the advance word of mouth wasn't very good-winked?

There's nothing sleazier than sleaze that fails to titillate, and this drab blight on a hot cast is as sleazy as a preordained hit ever gets. [07 Apr 1993 Pg. 08.D]

Remarkably, the plot has much in common with "Hellboy II: The Golden Army," yet that bundle of fun has enough vision to make even its Barry Manilow interlude seem appropriate.

An air of self-congratulation hangs over the empty tank of gas called Jawbreaker, as if writer-director Darren Stein just can't wait to dazzle us with the gaudy visuals he's soldered onto a standard-issue black-comedy script.

Hopped-up Falling Down is a technically proficient grabber that exploits white-male angst while adeptly juggling two stories filmed in contrasting styles. Slick, maybe facile, and with a nasty streak, it is nonetheless 1993's first consistently engrossing movie. [26 Feb 1993, p.1D]