question: Expertly shot and edited, The Usual Suspects gives the audience a simple plot and then piles on layers of deceit, twists, and violence before pulling out the rug from underneath.

numbered reviews: 1. Nothing is what it seems in this layered, velvety movie (which was shot in handsome wide-screen format) -- the truth keeps shifting -- and nothing matters either.
2. There are plenty of twists in the plot to keep you on your toes throughout the film.
3. Once again, my comprehension began to slip, and finally I wrote down: 'To the degree that I do understand, I don't care.'
4. As entertainment, the film is a lukewarm experience. But as a piece of construction, The Usual Suspects is a slick bit of business.
5. ...an entertaining crime drama; an intricately conceived puzzle play; a fragment of gangster mythology; a parody of cops-and-robbers films; an outright black comedy;
6. One of the most ingenious, unpredictable films in recent memory... and one of the biggest cheats.
7. Singer creates a classy, thought-provoking mystery that is pleasingly old-fashioned and absolutely modern in the sly, slightly self-conscious play it makes with myth and methods of storytelling.
8. If ever a movie got extra points for a strong, unexpected conclusion it's The Usual Suspects.
9. Not to be believed for a NYC second.
10. No one is out of place or out of line here, and that is what makes the final payoff so sweet.


question: Whether you choose to see it as a statement on consumer culture or simply a special effects-heavy popcorn flick, Gremlins is a minor classic.

numbered reviews: 1. I don't find the movie the least bit scary or horrific anymore, but I do think it's entertaining.
2. Gremlins hosts the perfect blend of Capraesque Christmas spirit, humorously tainted by stinging horror and hilarious offbeat comedy.
3. It certainly displays a nasty streak, although that's not one of its problems.
4. A comic horror movie classic.
5. An enchanting yet savagely funny movie, Gremlins belongs alongside Ghostbusters as an enduring mainstream masterpiece from the summer of 1984. Just don't watch it after midnight.
6. The 1984 creature feature in which a Capra-esque idyll is besieged by ravening beasties.
7. Director Joe Dante tells a simple story with anarchic spirit, rabid humour and painstaking puppetry to delightfully messy effect.
8. A subversive parable on the dangers of irresponsible pet care that doubles as an antidote to small-town Americana and Yuletide sentimentality.
9. A wholesome Christmas family flick that veers over to the dark side.
10. There's a mischievous playfulness about Gremlins, and that's its most endearing quality, but I found it grating on me early on and soon turning to mean-spiritedness.


question: It may occasionally be guilty of coasting on pure charm, but To Catch a Thief has it in spades -- as well as a pair of perfectly matched stars in Cary Grant and Grace Kelly.

numbered reviews: 1. This enjoyable mixture of wit, low voltage intrigue and highly charged attraction is really about the appeal of its two great stars and the beauty of its seaside setting.
2. To Catch A Thief (1955) is a Hitchcock-directed, lush, entertaining comedy/thriller concerning jewel heists on the French Riviera. Although the polished caper film
3. The heart of the film hinges on the enjoyable Côte d'Azur romance between Kelly and Grant.
4. Fluff, but made of spun gold, with Grant and Kelly at their glittering best.
5. One of the most lightweight (and not even particularly deceptively so) of Hitchcock's comedy-thrillers; a retreat from the implications of Rear Window into the realm of private jokes and sunny innuendo.
6. It's one of Hitchcock's lightest and most purely enjoyable exercises.
7. Hitchcock and screenwriter John Michael Hayes posited voyeuristic spectacle as the essence of cinema in Rear Window; in To Catch a Thief they validate their thesis with plenty of spectacle to be voyeuristic over.
8. A collection of VistaVision postcards.
9. Colorful, fun Hitchcock pairing Grant and Kelly.
10. ...has the feel of being made while on a getaway vacation.


question: Better than any sequel to a movie of a television show has a right to be, Jackass: Number Two dares you not to laugh.

numbered reviews:
1. The film's candid-camera skits are mostly unoriginal.
2. It's sadomasochism at its drunkest.
3. oddly enduring, crap though
4. A lot more money than when they made their first film. But no more sense.
5. I couldn't look away, and neither could anyone else in the audience I saw the movie with. We hooted and hollered at the screen, captured by a single involuntary impulse.
6. The title tells all. To hell with it.
7. I can't recommend their methods, I will applaud their energy and commitment to this particular brand of stupidity.
8. Like the happy train wreck Jackass has always been, the boys deliver sequences at once stomach-turning and undeniably entertaining...
9. Repetition is the point and the sticking point of Number Two, which is all about self-reference and reiteration.
10. Vomit.There. If that got your attention, and it sickened you, please proceed to another review.