BEST IN SHOW -- Actor/director Christopher Guest reunites most of his cast from his 1997 comedy, Waiting for Guffman, for a clever satire of championship dog shows. Guest juggles his comic ensemble deftly. Still, the best laughs belong to Eugene Levy and Catherone O'Hara as the blue-collar owners of a Norwich terrier. -- SR (Rated PG-13.)

ALMOST FAMOUS -- (Grade: A) Writer/director Cameron Crowe coats Almost Famous, his heartfelt tale of teen rebellion, pubescent angst and 1970s Rock history, with sugary nostalgia and sweet sentimentality.

Almost Famous settles its story in 1973 with William (Patrick Fugit) stumbling his way onto an assignment for Rolling Stone magazine to cover the tour of a band called Stillwater. William can't help becoming friends with Stillwater's handsome lead guitarist, Russell Hammond (Billy Crudup), and falling in love with Stillwater groupie, Penny Lane (Kate Hudson). Fugit, Crudup, and Hudson infuse Almost Famous with some much needed heart and soul. It's clear that Crowe loves music too much not to make a movie that's human and personal. --- SR (Rated R.)

BAIT -- (Grade: B) Jamie Foxx has arrived. His smart-mouthed, tough thug performance in Bait echoes faintly of Eddie Murphy's breakout performance in 48 Hours.

Alvin Sanders (Foxx) is having a tough time adjusting to life out of prison. He is unwittingly being used to lure a cop-killing thief (Doug Hutchison) out of hiding, all because he shared a cell with another thief who stole $40 million in gold from the U.S. Treasury. Directed by Antoine Fuqua (The Replacement Killers), Bait is essentially an old-fashioned action movie with a funny actor in the lead. The movie belongs to Foxx and he doesn't disappoint. -- RP (Rated R.)

BEDAZZLED -- (Grade: F) Sex-pot Elizabeth Hurley wiggles her way through an endless series of skimpy costume changes, and yet, director Harold Ramis' Bedazzled still turns out to be a sorry remake of the 1967 Dudley Moore-Peter Cook comedy.

Brendan Fraser looks appropriately geeky as the lovable loser, Elliott Richards. It seems that Elliott will do anything to win the heart of a pretty co-worker named Alison Gardner (Frances O'Connor). Elliott's heartache is the perfect opportunity for a babe-a-licious devil (Hurley) to saunter into Elliott's life and make him an impossible offer: seven wishes for his measly soul. Of course, Elliott accepts.

Fraser stumbles around admirably. It's not his fault that he has nothing funny to say or do. But the biggest embarrassment belongs to Hurley. It's as if Bedazzled felt she had nothing to offer the film other than close-up shots of her ass. -- SR (Rated PG-13.)

BEST IN SHOW -- (Grade: B) Actor/director Christopher Guest returns with another winning, comic mockumentary. This time, Guest reunites most of his cast from his 1997 comedy, Waiting for Guffman, for a clever satire of championship dog shows.

Guest makes an on-camera appearance as Harlan Pepper, a fly-fishing shop owner from a small town in North Carolina, who comes to Philadelphia's Mayflower Dog Show with his bloodhound Hubert. But the best laughs belong to two of Best in Show's more eccentric couples. Gerry Fleck (Eugene Levy) and his blue-collar wife, Cookie (Catherine O'Hara), gush endlessly over their Norwich terrier. Not every joke hits its comic target in Guest's sprawling tale. That's to be expected from a film that's juggling such a large comic ensemble. Still, it's impressive just how funny Best in Show makes rivalry and fierce competition out to be. -- SR (Rated PG-13.)

BLESS THE CHILD -- (Grade: F) Kim Basinger turns out to be a laughable action heroine in this occult thriller about Maggie O'Conner, a blue-collar nurse trying to protect a 6-year-old girl with supernatural powers from devil worshipers. A barrage of gory shocks fails to jump-start the film's Omen-inspired storytelling. In fact, most of the film's special-effects look surprisingly hokey. It's as if Bless the Child can do nothing right. Only Jimmy Smits manages to keep a serious face as a FBI expert on ritual murders. But instead of fighting Satanists, Smits needs to kick Basinger's behind. She's the true villain behind this awful mess. -- SR (Rated R.)

BRING IT ON -- (Grade: C) Bring It On ambitiously wants to put an end to cheerleading stereotypes by showing the blood, sweat and tears these spirited youths give for their craft. If only the script gave us more reason to care.

Torrance Shipman (Kirsten Dunst) is going into her senior year with a good deal of expectation. She wants to be named captain of her suburban San Diego high school's cheerleading squad and then lead the Toros back to the promised land: a third consecutive national title.

Bring It On wants to be an inspirational tale, but by treating the subject with such reverence the filmmakers forgot to make it interesting. -- RP (Rated PG-13.)

THE BROKEN HEARTS CLUB -- (Grade: B) Writer/director Greg Berlanti's debut film follows the highs and lows of a close-knitgroup of West Hollywood friends who also happen to be gay.

Celebrating his 28th birthday turns out to be a crisis for Dennis (Timothy Olyphant). He's not sure if his close-knit group of friends are a benefit or a burden. So it's time for some serious soul-searching. Berlanti uses Dennis' friends as a plot device for putting a variety of character types into the film. The effect is rather clumsy. Still, Berlanti, the co-executive producer of TV show Dawson's Creek, has a way with casual dialogue that keeps the film on a realistic track. By the time Dennis is forced to answer his own questions about friends and friendships, you find yourself interested in hearing his answer. -- SR (Rated R.)

CHARLIE'S ANGELS -- (Grade: B) Three hot women, kicking ass and looking good. That's what Charlie's Angels is billed as and that's what it delivers. Anyone looking for greater meaning in the movie, or hoping to deconstruct it as reflection of our world is missing the point.

If you're willing to sit back and digest the eye candy -- so much eye candy, in fact, that your retinas will get cavities -- Charlie's Angels is pure escapist fun. About the only socially-responsible message to derive from it is not to use guns. The Angels don't. Of course, the Angels don't use bras either.

From the first big fight scene, a slick, Matrix-like karate ballet choreographed to Prodigy's "Slap My Bitch Up," it's clear that the movie is all about visual payoffs. Director McG's photography, while derivative of other recent blockbusters, seems fresh thanks to the stunning cast. Angels Drew Barrymore, Cameron Diaz and Lucy Liu never have looked so good. One can excuse the film for not having a brainy plot or a decent script, but Bill Murray's comic genius is mostly wasted and that's inexcusable.

Expect this film to be critically lambasted. But no one expected this to be Sophie's Choice. It's more like Mission Impossible on estrogen. -- RP (Rated PG-13.)

COYOTE UGLY -- (Grade: D) Action producer Jerry Bruckheimer fails to capture the Flashdance spark with this tale about sexy barmaids at a New York City bar called Coyote Ugly.

Newcomer Piper Perabo is 21-year-old Violet Sanford, an aspiring songwriter who peels away her stage fright and most of her clothes as a "coyote." Talk of Violet's drama would be foolish. Coyote Ugly is all about its gyrating barmaids and their wet leather outfits. Coyote Ugly isn't the worse film of the summer. Still, it's superficial enough to make T&A; look boring. -- SR (Rated PG-13.)

DIGIMON; THE MOVIE -- (Grade: C) Back in my day, cartoons were simple. Cat chases mouse. Superhero whomps evil genius. I don't know if today's kids are smarter than we were or if cartoon makers just throw more information at them, but "children's movies" like Digimon are baffling.

Follow this (if you can): The DigiDestined kids embark on a mission to conquer a dark force that puts both the DigiWorld and the real world in great danger. The DigiWorld, by the way, is a cyber-world most people can not see. Only the DigiDestined kids, who lead secret double-lives, can do it. Helping them along the way are Digimon, the pets they hatched from computer-generated eggs. But the Digimon digivolve into monsters, begin wreaking havoc and then the film turns into a big digimess.

And people thought Fantasia was drug-induced? -- RP (Rated PG.)

DINOSAUR -- (Grade: B) Disney's first shot at in-house computer animation is impressive. Computer animation blended with digitally enhanced live backgrounds make you believe that you are watching dinosaurs roam the earth.

Aladar (voice of D.B. Sweeney) is the hero of this 65-million-years-ago tale. He's an Iguanodon raised by lemurs after his egg has its own spectacular adventure. Fallout from an asteroid forces Aladar and friends to hit the road with a pack of dinosaurs in search of a new home. Its cutting-edge technology aside, Dinosaur tells a trademark Disney tale about an orphan searching for his true family. The film's story might be familiar but its prehistoric creatures come to life in ways you'd never imagine. -- SR (Rated PG.)

DISNEY'S THE KID -- (Grade: B) Disney's The Kid is a heartwarming comedy that thrives on Bruce Willis and his wise-guy charms.

Willis dives headfirst into the role of a rude, obnoxious, arrogant image consultant Russ Duritz. He huffs and puffs in comic fashion as a stressed-out workaholic in a power suit and headset. The problem is 40-year-old Duritz is beginning to see hallucinations of himself as a chubby, geeky 8-year-old boy, Rusty (Spencer Breslin). A climactic clash between childhood innocence and adult priorities swerves into X-Files territory.

Screenwriter Audrey Wells' knack for storytelling makes the film into something more than another dumb Disney farce. The relationship between Duritz and the 8-year-old Rusty is rich. When Willis flashes his knowing smirk, The Kid leaps to life. -- SR (Rated PG.)

THE EXORCIST: THE VERSION YOU'VE NEVER SEEN BEFORE -- (Grade: B) This re-release of William Friedkin's Director's Cut offers an opportunity for some moviemade memory games. Much of The Exorcist is familiar, although 11 minutes of extra footage promises a new jolt or two. The six-track digital sound and additional sound effects give an audible boost to the film's famous scares. Now, the growls and groans from behind little Regan's bedroom door come at you from every direction. -- SR (Rated R.)

GONE IN 60 SECONDS -- (Grade: F) Things never looked this bad. Nicolas Cage's distinct presence and charisma are squashed by the dull road play of this film. To save the butt of his brother, "Memphis" Raines (Cage) is pulled back into the grand theft auto business. With the help of an old mentor (Robert Duvall) and his car-thieving posse, Memphis must complete an impossible task: steal 50 high-end cars in three days.

Unfortunately, this challenge never becomes more than a collection of action sequences and explosions. You never feel like you've learned the secrets of grand theft auto and not one stunt falls into the how-did-they-do-that? category. There is never one adrenaline-pumped moment. The result is the most boring tire-squealing ever put on film. -- SR (Rated PG-13.)

HOLLOW MAN -- (Grade: D) Egoistic scientist Kevin Bacon tests an invisible serum on himself. The vanishing act makes him angrier, more violent and exceptionally horny. Of course, he has to be stopped. Director Paul Verhoeven unloads plenty of special effects, explosions and gore into his Invisible Man update. It's all for naught. Hollow Man fails to build any suspense out of its teen-age games of leering voyeurism. Ultimately, this Invisible Man is fixated on putting his hands up a woman's skirt.

Elisabeth Shue's curvy scientist turns into an unexpected movie heroine. She's the one surprise in a movie filled with predictability. Snazzy effects turn the disappearing layers of Bacon's body into a visceral experience. Inevitably, Hollow Man's last act dissolves into a cliché slasher manhunt. Verhoeven has made an expensive, straight-to-video thriller. -- SR (Rated R.)

INTO THE ARMS OF STRANGERS: STORIES OF THE KINDERTRANSPORT -- (Grade: B) Archival footage, dramatic recreations and live interviews come together for a heartfelt documentary about the Kindertransport. One of the forgotten stories of World War II, the Kindertransport was a relief mission that allowed 10,000 Jewish children to escape Germany, Austria and Czechoslovakia for foster homes in Britain. Veteran documentarian Mark Jonathan Harris pushes aside the vast historical landscape of World War II and stays focused on this one particular story. He knows that it's the film's interviews with Kindertrasport survivors that deliver its message of hope and survival best. -- SR (Unrated.)

THE LEGEND OF DRUNKEN MASTER -- (Grade: B) Jackie Chan's triumphant 1994 film, a sequel to a film made 16 earlier, still stands tall as a buoyant and free-spirited martial arts actioner. Recently watching a new print of Drunken Master II (renamed The Legend of Drunken Master) complete with an English dub, I was reminded that Chan qualifies as the most childlike of the screen action heroes.

Real-life folk hero Wong Fei-hung (Chan), armed with boxing style that works better when he's drunk, battle British thives and their Chinese henchman who are planning to smuggle treasures out of Manchuria. Chan was 40-years-old when he made Drunken Master II. Still, you wouldn't know it by the way he flips through the film. -- SR (Rated R.)

THE LITTLE VAMPIRE -- (Grade: B) German author Angela Sommer-Bodenburg's best-selling series of children's books receives a light-hearted adaptation courtesy of director Uli Edel (Body of Evidence). Unlike recent family films that seem focused on merchandise tie-ins, The Little Vampire sets its priority on telling a fun and fantastic tale.

Nine-year-old Tony Thompson (Jonathan Lipnicki) is having a hard time finding friends in his new Scotland home. That is, until he befriends a boy vampire named Rudolph (Rollo Weeks). Before long, they're sharing an adventure to find a magic pendant that will save Rudolph's family of vampires.

Lipnicki, complete with his trademark, thick glasses and lispy voice, makes an able boy hero. But it's character actors Richard E. Grant and Alice Krige who get to steal the show as Rollo's vampire parents.

The Little Vampire takes its time to develop characters and tell its story. The payoff is a child-friendly movie that captures a little boy's fascination with monsters and all things that go bump in the night. -- SR (Rated R.)

MEET THE PARENTS -- (Grade: B) Robert De Niro plays Jack Byrnes, an ex-CIA operative who faces off against his daughter Pam's (Teri Polo) anxious boyfriend Greg Focker (a twitchy Ben Stiller) in the funny and fast-paced screwball comedy Meet the Parents.

Director Jay Roach (Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery) finds the perfect comic foil in Stiller. It's impressive how he fumbles everything he touches in such believable fashion. But the true comic kingpin behind Meet the Parents is De Niro himself. Never has one dramatic actor turned his deadpan expression into such a rich comic asset. Meet the Parents is the first movie comedy to figure out how to make Robert De Niro's tough-guy personality seem funny. -- SR (PG-13.)

NURSE BETTY -- (Grade B) Director Neil LaBute's comedy driven drama, Nurse Betty, is an unlikely chick flick.

Betty (Renee Zellweger) is a soap opera-addicted waitress, married to a domineering car salesman, Dal (Aaron Eckhart). She witnesses his murder at the hands of the two hit men (Morgan Freeman and Chris Rock) which initiates her mental escape into an alternative reality. Believing she's a nurse, Betty takes off for L.A. Unknowingly, she also runs off with a trunk full of drugs and the hit men close behind.

Nurse Betty is a fun film that is worth seeing. It offers some good laughs and Zellweger, Freeman and Rock are excellently cast. -- Michele Howard (Rated R.)

NUTTY PROFESSOR II: THE KLUMPS -- (Grade: D) Eddie Murphy's comic spunk can't salvage this lifeless return of mild-mannered Professor Sherman Klump. This time, Sherman's laboratory shenanigans involve a youth serum invented by his pretty fiancée, Janet Jackson. Sherman is still tubby, but his devilish alter ego Buddy Love (also Murphy) receives little screen time. In this sequel, Murphy stays busy playing all of the family Klump. Murphys make-up effects comedy loses steam after a barrage of Viagra jokes. This Klump family reunion needed to be more than just a one-joke show about male impotence. -- SR (Rated PG-13.)

OMNIMAX FILM FESTIVAL -- Past Omnimax favorites return in honor of the Museum Center's 10th anniversary. For people who never caught a film like Everest, this Omnimax fest offers plenty of second chances. Robert D. Lindner Family OMNIMAX Theater, Cincinnati Museum Center, Queensgate. 513-287-7000. -- SR (Unrated.)

THE ORIGINAL KINGS OF COMEDY -- (Grade: B) A typical Spike Lee joint takes the issue of racism, wraps it in a joke and blows it up in your face until everyone in the theater is fairly uncomfortable with it.

Four black comics -- Steve Harvey, D. L. Hughley, Cedric "The Entertainer" and Bernie Mac -- toured the country with their stand-up comedy show. Harvey is comic gold as the emcee. His bits about how black people would have reacted on the Titanic and his "devotion" song are priceless. The other comics' material, bemoaning the death of "old-school" music and abusive grandparents, overlap too much to sustain momentum. Undoubtedly, this film won't pull in a large white audience. It's too bad, because good jokes are fun for everyone. -- RP (Rated R.)

PAY IT FORWARD -- (Grade: D) Sentimental goo stops a winning performance by Kevin Spacey dead in its tracks. Spacey plays Eugene Simonet, a teacher with a scarred face and embittered demeanor who gives his junior-high class a challenging assignment: They must make the world a better place. Trevor McKinney (Haley Joel Osment from The Sixth Sense) is the young student who takes his teacher's word to task. His chain-letter-like plan is to offer three random acts of kindness to three strangers. In return, they must do the same.

Helen Hunt is overly melodramatic as Trevor's alcoholic mom, Arlene. Still, I blame the script more than Hunt's performance. Everything she says feels like it was pulled out of a soap opera script. Based on Catherine Ryan Hyde's novel, it's safe to assume that director Mimi Leder (Deep Impact) imagines Pay It Forward as a human drama that tackled big questions about the human psyche. Instead, what we get, is a wet pile of sentimental drivel. -- SR (Rated R.)

THE PERFECT STORM -- (Grade: C) One hundred and twenty feet of rising sea is the climactic star of The Perfect Storm, a real-life adventure set on a storm-battered swordfishing boat.

Fans of Sebastian Junger's book already know the story. Capt. Billy Tyne (George Clooney) and his six-man crew of the Andrea Gail - Bobby Shatford (Mark Wahlberg), Dale "Murph" Murphy (John C. Reilly), Alfred Pierre (Allen Payne), Bugsy (John Hawkes) and Sully (William Fichtner) - prepare to leave Gloucester, Mass., for a rich fishing area off the coast of Newfoundland. Hoping to end his streak of bad luck with a profitable trip, Tyne never imagined the Andrea Gail would run into the storm of the century.

Despite his all-American looks, The Perfect Storm and Clooney aren't a good fit. The Perfect Storm's human drama and working-class heroes are reduced to a single special-effect shot. With a miscast Clooney at the helm, it's an unfair fight. -- SR (Rated PG-13.)

REMEMBER THE TITANS -- (Grade: C) Beware of films that immediately spell out their claims for authenticity. When the words "Based on a True Story" flash across the screen -- as is the case with director Boaz Yakin's 1970s football drama, Remember the Titans -- there is something conniving about its blatant attempt to come across as earnest and true.

The story begins in 1971 at newly integrated T.C. Williams High School in Virginia and it's Coach Herman Boone's (Denzel Washington) job to calm racial tensions, as well as win football games. Washington's powerful lead performance as the tyrannical coach gives the film a much-needed emotional boost. Anyone else and the film would have been forgettable. -- SR (Rated PG.)

THE REPLACEMENTS -- (Grade: B) Keanu Reeves shines as the ragtag leader in the easygoing comedy The Replacements. A professional football players' strike forces substitutes to finish the season for the Washington Sentinels. Leading the subs is quarterback Shane Falco (Reeves). If they win three of their last four games, they'll make it to the playoffs and some of the subs might earn a post-strike spot on the team.

The idea of blue-collar Joes taking pro football back from the spoiled players is a winning fantasy. It's impossible not to laugh at the antics of The Replacements' wannabe football stars and their grizzled coach Jimmy McGinty (Gene Hackman). -- SR (Rated PG-13.)

SCARY MOVIE -- (Grade: D) Two separate scripts, Scream If You Know What I Did Last Halloween and Last Summer I Screamed Because Friday the 13th Fell on Halloween collide in director Keenen Ivory Wayans ultra-gross send-up of the Scream genre. A couple of outrageous gags breathe some much needed farce into Wayans' cookie-cutter parody. The jokes are of the bodily fluid variety. The most admirable thing about Scary Movie is its unashamed enthusiasm for pushing the boundaries of taste, but it's not long before the gags grow further and further apart. -- SR (Rated R.)

URBAN LEGENDS: FINAL CUT -- (Grade F) Campy comedy tales priority over bloodletting as the latest batch of handsome scream teens gather together for this awful sequel to 1998's Urban Legends. Its story begins in film-within-a-film fashion. A nightmare aboard a commercial jetliner turns out to be a student production at Alpine University's film school. This time, a novice director (Anson Mount) looks to be the man behind the carnage. Of course, the goal of a movie like Urban Legends: Final Cut is to keep audiences guessing.

Basically, the whole movie-within-a-movie hijinks makes Urban Legends: Final Cut seem more derivative than ever. -- SR (Rated R.)

WHAT LIES BENEATH -- (Grade: D) Harrison Ford and Michelle Pfeiffer lend marquee pizzazz to this haunted house suspenser, What Lies Beneath. But the film's greatest mystery lies with a stumbling climax that best resembles a cheap slasher movie.

Dr. Norman Spencer (Ford) is a respected university researcher who's seldom home. His wife Claire (Pfeiffer) gave up her career to become a housewife and raise their daughter. Now, with the daughter off to college, Claire is beginning to hear unexplained noises in the old, lakeside house.

What Lies Beneath is filled with all the scary movie essentials: creepy music, dark lake waters, fog, a spacious house. So it's disappointing how it dissolves into a banal fit of domestic violence. The emotional breakdown of a married couple is a worthy backdrop for a supernatural thriller, but What Lies Beneath cheats audiences with its slasher-movie sensibilities. It's a cheap payoff for a movie boasting this kind of talent. -- SR (Rated PG-13.)

THE YARDS -- (Grade: D) Neither Mark Wahlberg nor Joaquin Phoenix can breathe life into this lumbering urban drama.

After Leo Handler (Wahlberg) applies for a job with his uncle's (James Caan) subway train repair company, his old friend Willie (Phoenix) persuades him to enlist as a company enforcer.

Writer/director James Gray (1994s Little Odessa ) follows in the gritty footsteps of his debut film. Unfortunately, The Yards is a derivative spin on the 1970s dramas it tries too hard to emulate. What's left is an interesting premise incapable of standing on its own. -- SR (Rated R.)

personals | classifieds | cover | news | columns | music | movies | arts | dining | listings | classifieds | mediakit | home