Splat 2/4 |
Ta Ra Rum Pum (2007) |
"Head-scratching mash-up of zany dance numbers, gooey romance (but no kissing) and random English phrases such as 'awesome,' "bad habit' and 'noisy birthday parties.'" |
Rafer Guzman |
Tomato 3.5/4 |
Tadpole (2002) |
"A sparkling cosmopolitan comedy that plays fast and loose with sacred cows of family values." |
Jan Stuart |
Tomato 1/4 |
Tae Guk Gi: The Brotherhood of War (2004) |
"Alternately brutal and schlocky, and occasionally both at the same time." |
Jan Stuart |
Tomato |
The Tailor of Panama (2001) |
"Rich but uneven." |
John Anderson |
Tomato 3/4 |
Take (2008) |
"Dramatically, however, Take consistently works, and, with such a story, that's an amazing thing." |
John Anderson |
Tomato 3.5/4 |
Take Care of My Cat (2001) |
"Jeong's evocative visuals of the urban landscape and her savvy deployment of appliances only deepens the resemblance such stories have to our own lives." |
Gene Seymour |
Tomato 3.5/4 |
Take My Eyes (2006) |
"The performers are luminous." |
Jan Stuart |
Splat 1.5/4 |
Take the Lead (2006) |
"What the [public school] system and its culturally underfunded student body probably don't need is inspired-by-true-events claptrap like Take the Lead." |
Jan Stuart |
Splat 1.5/4 |
Taken (2009) |
"Neeson's character calls himself a "preventer," because he keeps bad things from happening. Not this time." |
Linda Winer |
Splat 2/4 |
Taking Lives (2004) |
"D.J Caruso's artfully photographed mystery thriller is even better looking than its stars, Angelina Jolie and Ethan Hawke. But even your pet Chihuahua could sniff out the solution." |
Jan Stuart |
Splat 2/4 |
The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3 (2009) |
"Director Tony Scott may not suffer from attention-deficit disorder, but he is convinced you do." |
Rafer Guzman |
Tomato 3/4 |
Taking Sides (2003) |
"Director Istvan Szabo and Oscar-winning writer Ronald Harwood have fashioned a potent drama from Harwood's play." |
Jan Stuart |
Splat 2/4 |
Taking Woodstock (2009) |
"Lee and producer-screenwriter James Schamus aim for comedy but come up with cliches." |
Rafer Guzman |
Tomato 4/4 |
Talk to Her (2002) |
"The Spanish master redefines love in all its weird and surprising permutations with this characteristically eccentric tale involving a lady bullfighter, a male nurse, a ballet dancer and a journalist with hyperactive tear ducts." |
Jan Stuart |
Tomato 3/4 |
Talk to Me (2007) |
"Rescued from hagiography and cliche by tart writing and a spark-plug star performance from Don Cheadle." |
Jan Stuart |
Splat 2.5/4 |
Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby (2006) |
"A whole bunch of great racing footage would've ratcheted up Nights a notch or two -- see Cars for inspiration -- but even the track scenes are ... well, pedestrian." |
Stephen Williams |
Tomato 4/4 |
Tarnation (2004) |
"The results, Cuisinarted but coherent, are an entrancing, egocentric trip into a life so unfavored by fortune its owner would be forgiven for believing in past-life crimes and karmic retribution." |
John Anderson |
Tomato |
The Taste of Others (2001) |
"A glorious comic jewel whose gleaming facets belie the often painful truths that dwell at its center." |
Jan Stuart |
Splat 2/4 |
Taxi (2004) |
"Taxi runs out of fuel after the opening credits." |
Jan Stuart |
Tomato 4/4 |
Taxi to the Dark Side (2008) |
"Gibney assembles a formidable arsenal of talking heads to testify." |
Jan Stuart |
Tomato 3/4 |
Teacher's Pet (2004) |
"A bit frantic, but clever, funny, surprisingly sophisticated." |
John Anderson |
Tomato 3/4 |
Team America: World Police (2004) |
"Sophomoric, vulgar, obscene and brilliant." |
John Anderson |
Splat 2/4 |
Tears of the Black Tiger (2000) |
"Goodness knows there are enough winking genre references in Tears of the Black Tiger to fill an encyclopedia of film, but does anyone care, short of self-congratulating movie critics?" |
Jan Stuart |
Splat 2/4 |
Tears of the Sun (2003) |
"Painfully obvious, yet confusing." |
John Anderson |
Tomato 2.5/4 |
Teeth (2008) |
"The gratuitous and often overly garish mayhem is made more palatable by the assured comedic turn by Weixler." |
Gene Seymour |
Tomato 3/4 |
Tekkon Kinkreet (2007) |
"Far less cartoonish than, say Pirates of the Caribbean 3. And its characters are the most poignant, and convincingly human, of the summer." |
John Anderson |
Tomato 3.5/4 |
Tell Them Who You Are (2005) |
"A fully realized, emotionally moving portrait of a difficult, complex subject." |
Gene Seymour |
Splat 1.5/4 |
The Ten (2007) |
"You really have to be in the mood to get into The Ten's forced goofiness." |
Gene Seymour |
Tomato 2.5/4 |
Ten Canoes (2007) |
"It's common enough to describe a film as being like no other you've ever seen but in this case it may literally be true." |
John Anderson |
Splat 2/4 |
Tenacious D in: The Pick of Destiny (2006) |
"Less rocking on and better jokes would have made Tenacious D seem more than just tenacious." |
John Anderson |
Splat 2/4 |
Tennessee (2009) |
"As a Texas waitress, Carey is convincing -- more so than the film itself." |
Rafer Guzman |
Splat 2/4 |
The Terminal (2004) |
"The film is so flaccid and pedestrian one can hardly believe it comes from the director whom a majority of Americans would presume is the best this country has." |
John Anderson |
Splat 2/4 |
Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines (2003) |
"T3 is so petrified by its predecessors' conventions that it moves a little like the Terminator himself, with monstrous rigidity and stiff-legged deliberation." |
John Anderson |
Tomato 3/4 |
Terminator Salvation (2009) |
"Skynet, Schmynet -- the future is here." |
Rafer Guzman |
Tomato 4/4 |
Terror's Advocate (2007) |
"Jacques Vergès had defended a lot of people, and it's his Zelig-like journey through the politics of the postwar 20th century that is the contentious subject of Barbet Schroeder's unwieldy, unforgettable film." |
John Anderson |
Splat 1.5/4 |
The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (2003) |
"It's so caught up in concept and layout that it frequently forgets to push the jolt buttons." |
Gene Seymour |
Tomato 3/4 |
Thank You For Smoking (2006) |
"These days, if one has to settle for rueful laughs honestly earned, then one can do a whole lot worse than Thank You for Smoking." |
Gene Seymour |
Tomato 3/4 |
The Cats of Mirikitani (2006) |
"Mirikitani makes you realize why the elderly are revered in some cultures, and not ours." |
John Anderson |
Splat 1/4 |
The Clone Wars (2008) |
"The Lucas universe once held a special magic, but The Clone Wars makes that feel like a long time ago in a theater far, far away." |
Rafer Guzman |
Tomato 3/4 |
The Counterfeiters (2008) |
"[Director] Ruzowitzky wisely knows he doesn't have to be overly emphatic in orchestrating the tension of both the moral conundrum and the always uncertain fate of the inmates." |
Gene Seymour |
Splat 2.5/4 |
The Day the Earth Stood Still (2008) |
"The film fizzles in the second half, when flashy effects replace coherent storytelling, and everyone goes all weepy over the innate decency of humanity." |
Rafer Guzman |
Splat 2.5/4 |
The Duchess of Langeais (2008) |
"The Duchess of Languor might be more evocative. Faithfully lifted from the pages of Honore de Balzac, Jacques Rivette's overlong, resplendently decorative drama takes on the phlegmatic air of its character." |
Jan Stuart |
Splat 2/4 |
The Polar Express (2004) |
"Watching the dead-eyed population of Polar Express and their supposedly 'natural' movements made me think more of Gollum in "The Lord of the Rings" than anything associated with Christmas." |
John Anderson |
Tomato 4/5 |
The Royal Guard (2007) |
"This stirring dramatic feature by Kashmiri director Vidhu Vinod Chopra marries its varied elements -- modernity and classicism, current-day India and its feudal past, contemporary corruption and blood tradition -- in a coherent and propulsive fashion." |
John Anderson |
Tomato 2.5/4 |
The Signal (2007) |
"The Signal is a well-oiled example of that oxymoronic Tarantino phenomenon: the arty grindhouse picture." |
Jan Stuart |
Tomato 3/4 |
Then She Found Me (2008) |
"Gaunt, grim and wound as tight as a ukulele's string, April Epner (Helen Hunt), the elementary schoolteacher undergoing the mother of all midlife crises in Then She Found Me, is a stern challenge to an audience's collective sympathy." |
Gene Seymour |
Tomato 4/4 |
There Will Be Blood (2007) |
"The watershed achievement of both Day-Lewis' and Anderson's careers." |
Jan Stuart |
Tomato 3/4 |
The Thing About My Folks (2005) |
"The Thing About My Folks is a crowd-pleasing, tear-tugging film about relationships that should have wide appeal and widespread resonance." |
John Anderson |
Splat 2.5/4 |
Things We Lost in the Fire (2007) |
"[Director] Bier is graceful, observant of small details, but her efforts to mine a greater meaning through the camera than Loeb has put on the page is a fruitless endeavor." |
John Anderson |
Tomato 2.5/4 |
Thirteen Conversations About One Thing (2002) |
"Even if the working parts in Conversations aren't all up to snuff, the movie does succeed in leaving you attentive and prepared for any stirring in the outside world that will affect your day." |
Gene Seymour |
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