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• Ghost Rider: Spirit Of Vengeance  -

  D+ The team behind Crank and Gamer fail to bring the fun to this limp sequel to a limp comic-book movie. 

• This Means War -

  D Two CIA operatives square off in the battle for Reese Witherspoon’s heart. 

• Undefeated  -

  B A documentary about the reversed fortunes of a down-and-out Memphis football team awaits its inevitable Hollywood adaptation. 

• Bullhead -

  A- A Belgian nominee for Best Foreign Language Film delves into the sinister world of “hormone mafias.” 

• Thin Ice  -

  B Greg Kinnear, Alan Arkin, and Billy Crudup lead a fine cast in a Kenosha thriller that recalls the Coen brothers’ Fargo.  

• Michael -

  B Michael Haneke’s casting director borrows from his mentor for his debut feature about a pedophile who’s keeping a 10-year-old in his basement. 

• All Things Fall Apart -

  D+ As a cancer-stricken football star, Curtis “50 Cent” Jackson attempts his most challenging role to date. Bad idea. 

• BuzzKill -

  D A struggling writer has his fortunes changed by a serial killer in this insufferable indie fluff. 

• Cirkus Columbia -

  B- No Man’s Land director Denis Tanovic returns to the former Yugoslavia with symbols in tow. 

• On The Ice -

  B+ Eskimo noir. As chilling as it sounds. 

• Putin's Kiss -

  B- A diehard teenaged Putin supporter finds her coming-of-age coincides with misgivings about him.

• The Secret World Of Arrietty -

  A- The latest from Studio Ghibli may not be Miyazaki, but it continues the label’s commitment to gentle storytelling and beautiful imagery. 

• The Vow -

  C An accident forces a young married couple (Channing Tatum and Rachel McAdams) to start the wooing process from scratch. 

• Safe House -

  C+ A quarter-century after his Oscar-nominated role as Stephen Biko, Denzel Washington returns to South Africa as a decidedly shadier character.

• Rampart -

  B Woody Harrelson teams up again with Oren Moverman (The Messenger) for a take on the same LAPD corruption case that inspired The Shield. 

• Chico & Rita -

  A- A “what’s that?” nominee for Best Animated Feature turns out to deserve the slot. 

• Return -

  B+ Linda Cardellini plays a returning soldier in a familiar drama boosted by excellent performances. 

• Journey 2: The Mysterious Island -

  D+ The Rock takes over for Brendan Fraser in an island adventure that invokes Jules Verne just enough to insult him. 

• The Turin Horse  -

  A The reputed final film from Hungarian master Béla Tarr pivots on the incident that marked Friedrich Nietzsche’s break from sanity.  

• In Darkness -

  B+ Director Agnieszka Holland (Europa, Europa) follows a sewer worker and petty thief as he makes his way through a Nazi-occupied Polish city. 

• The Miners’ Hymns -

  A- In this compilation, multimedia artist Bill Morrison’s stunning new experimental film about coal miners joins a handful of his other shorts. 

• Perfect Sense  -

  B- Ewan McGregor and Eva Green star in an apocalyptic romance that handles the apocalypse better than the romance. 

• Chronicle -

  B+ This is why teenagers cannot have nice powers. 

• W.E.  -

  D Madonna presents a history lesson via softcore perfume commercial.  

• The Woman In Black -

  C The revived Hammer Films attempts to revive the haunted house movie, cheaply.

Sort By: date grade name

• The English Patient / Cold Mountain -

  B+ Are Anthony Minghella’s romantic epics middlebrow Oscar bait or the second coming of David Lean?

• Essential Killing -

  B- A wordless Vincent Gallo plays a Taliban fighter on the run in this peculiar survival adventure.

• Simon -

  B- When the co-writer of Woody Allen classics like Annie Hall and Manhattanstepped out on his own, his work took a turn for the quirky. 

• DVDs In Brief: February 22, 2012 -

  - Our weekly DVD review round-up.

• Wings / All Quiet On The Western Front  -

  A- Two early Best Picture winners about WWI stand the test of time. 

• The Fugitive  -

  A- Director John Ford and Henry Fonda collaborated on a Graham Greene adaptation that’s one of Ford’s least-seen gems. 

• Wainy Days: Seasons 1-4 -

  B Four seasons’ worth of webisodes around one very good joke proves satisfying—so long as you don’t watch them all at once. 

• DVDs In Brief: February 15, 2012 -

  - Our weekly DVD review round-up

• Good Morning, Vietnam / Dead Poets Society -

  C+ Robin Williams struggles to balance his comedic and dramatic sides in two different films.

• CSI: Crime Scene Investigation, “Grave Danger”  -

  B+ A two-part episode directed by Quentin Tarantino makes a case for auteur television.