question: Kevin Bacon's acting is so genuine that it's creepy and director David Keopp knows how to create true suspense.

numbered reviews: 1. A moderately clever genre diversion that wants us to believe it's something more.
2. Never have I seen reality come crashing down in a film in a more literal--and disappointing--way.
3. An ungainly ghostly potboiler that digs furiously away in the same thematic graveyard as this summer's most revelatory sleeper hit, but doesn't unearth anything that's worthy of attention.
4. The more we know, the less we care.
5. Stir of Echoes might have worked just fine a few decades ago, but it now seems too simply schematic to spook us as much as it wants to.
6. There is a definitive moment at which the movie self-destructs, and its sad to see that happen when Echoes was shaping up to be an intensely powerful film.
7. Stir of Echoes is studded with potent fright scenes and built on a rock-solid performance by the ever - dependable Kevin Bacon.
8. This brisk, well-acted supernatural drama can stand on its own as a most effective chiller.
9. In its own smart, spooky way, Stir of Echoes, with Kevin Bacon, is nearly as good as its Bruce Willis predecessor.
10. One of the creepiest films to be released since Se7en.


question: The cast brings After the Wedding's melodramatic script to life, creating a movie that is emotionally raw and satisfying.

numbered reviews: 1. It's a traumatic journey peeling away those layers of secrecy, repression and regret, but the actors are equal to those hyper-emotional demands. After the Wedding is a story told with unsparing honesty and skill.
2. Just when we start to find these people interesting and credible, the plot tosses us something we don't believe for a minute.
3. A rare treat --- don't miss it!
4. May be the strangest and most surprising film you'll see this year, in that its character development runs counter to the expectations aroused by its narrative sequencing.
5. You leave the movie feeling exhausted, argumentative and exhilarated, surely the sign of a powerful film in any language.
6. Bier's not timid about tossing any number of volatile ingredients into an already-simmering pot.
7. An emotional masterpiece whose end is impossible to guess.
8. Initially threatening to turn into the most shameless of melodramas, it instead builds upon its rickety foundation with such dexterity and grace that it eventually emerges as a deeply moving experience.
9. A deeply intimate tale of regret and hope, with characters that will linger in your thoughts.
10. Director Susanne Bier is obviously fond of extreme close-ups (people smoking, people drinking, people licking their lips), especially focusing the camera on the actors' eyeballs too many times to count. I can overlook this annoying little technique becaus


question: As shamelessly manipulative as any Nicholas Sparks production, The Last Song is done no favors by its miscast and overmatched star, Miley Cyrus.

numbered reviews: 1. Sinks in its own excessive melodrama.
2. Just because I'm not a fan of Nicholas Sparks isn't going to stop me from recommending The Last Song to its target audience.
3. The kind of bathetic and overwrought melodrama that Sandra Dee might have rejected a half-century ago for being too schmaltzy for its own good.
4. Even for one not averse to some sentimental uplift in romantic movies, it's all a bit much. In fact, it's much too much.
5. The Last Song is predictable, exactly what you expect it to be.
6. It's understandable why Cyrus would want to show she's capable of more than bubbly effervescence. But by overreaching, she only draws attention to her limitations as an actress while curtailing her own natural appeal.
7. Let's not be too rough on [Miley Cyrus]: It's hard to put one's best foot forward when dealing with a script that's the literary equivalent of cement shoes.
8. "The Last Song" hits the big bong of banality early on, and it never recovers.
9. Any of the novelty in seeing Disney's crowned princess tricked out in combat boots and blue nail polish is negated by the absolute joylessness and lack of charisma Cyrus brings to the role.
10. The Last Song is filled with great heart and chemistry but is ultimately destroyed by its cliches and cheesy moments.


question: Val Kilmer delivers a powerhouse performance as one of rock's most incendiary figures, but unfortunately, Oliver Stone is unable to shed much light on the circus surrounding the star.

numbered reviews:
1. Kilmer is convincing in the lead role, although he never allows the viewer to share any emotions.
2. Not exactly Stone's finest hour, but a worthwhile portrait of 1960s (counter) culture and the self-destruction of an icon.
3. The attempts to plumb Morrison's sensitive side, his (pretentious) philosophical bent and his struggle to channel his considerable talents positively are something of a blur in the trippy kaleidoscope.
4. Whatever reservations one may have about this exhausting, dark-side-of-the-'60s epic, there can be little doubt that Stone has captured a particular, bombs-away brand of rock & roll excess with definitive candor.
5. The film really proves only that Jim was a bad drunk and a worse friend, and that in no way was his life exemplary.
6. Intense biopic full of drugs, sex and rock'n'roll.
7. Val Kilmer gives the performance of his career as Jim Morrison in Oliver Stone's biopic, so it's a shame the surrounding film lets him down.
8. Val Kilmer does, however, pull off a remarkable impression of the troubled vocalist, although he's more convincing on stage than he is in his drunken, drug-fuelled reveries.
9. Stone is not the most subtle of directors, but he has the ability to translate his passion for subject matter (he's an unabashed admirer of Morrison) to the screen with a strong visual flair. That talent in evidence here.
10. After the first hour or so of The Doors, the only door I wanted to see was the one marked ''EXIT.''