Young Mike Sullivan hides in the back of his father’s car one night, to find out what it is he really does. Knowing peripherally that his family ows its living to crime, what he sees forces full realization upon him: his father Michael (Tom Hanks) is a killer. Unfortunately, young Mike is now also a witness to what happened. Connor Rooney, son of the local boss John Rooney (Paul Newman), was the one who loosed the first shot, and he doesn’t trust Mike to keep his mouth shut.

What follows is a powerful tale of father-son relationships, loyalty, and revenge. It’s an astonishingly beautiful film, shot with exquisite care and attention to every last detail of its 1930s setting. But I thought that the sheer precision of its beauty made the characters seem distant. It was almost like a museum piece: meant to be admired, but not touched. I appreciated the emotion of the story, but I didn’t feel it as strongly as I felt I ought to have. But it that’s the film’s biggest flaw, it’s a relatively small failing.

After stepping in to fill a space in their poker game, full-time nerd Andy Stitzer (Steve Carell) finds himself taken under the wing of his new best buddies. They have learned that he is still a virgin, and they make it their mission to get him laid. Andy reluctantly goes along with their plans and schemes, while at the same time starting a relationship with the woman who runs the shop across the road from his (Catherine Keener), and trying to stop her from finding out how awkward he is about the whole sex thing.

With a setup like this, it is inevitable that there will be a truckload of embarrassing and cringeable scenes, but they are never all that bad, and they’re more than matched by the funny bits. I also found that the film actually got funnier as it went along. The supporting characters–Andy’s well-meaning buddies–are changed by their friendship with Andy as much as he is by them, which leads to richer and more amusing situations later on. The script balances these characters well, though, never allowing them to overwhelm Andy as the central figure and the source of all the biggest laughs. And for a film that looks like it’s going to be all about casual sex, it ends up being much more about friendship, love and commitment.

Antwone Fisher, a young Navy seaman, overcomes his violent tendencies and abusive childhood to find a side of himself he has kept hidden for years. It has a touch of the Good Will Hunting about it, with Denzel Washington playing a psychiatrist who is somewhat repressed himself, helping the promising kid recognize his own greatness, and learning a valuable lesson in the process himself. But the story isn’t so much about embracing your opportunities as about taking control of your self, and realizing that although your past can shape you, it doesn’t define you.

This is Denzel Washington’s directorial debut, and the only point where he sets a foot wrong is right at the very end, where he gives his own character an awkward “you helped me more than I helped you” speech. Yuck. It’s Derek Luke who steals the show, though. His performance as Antwone Fisher, from repressed anger to awkwardly romantic, is extraordinary.

Alex Hitchens (Will Smith) is the “Date Doctor”. He helps men find–and create–the right opportunities to meet and hit it off with women they would otherwise be too shy or awkward to ask out. He does this quietly, though, without any publicity. All his business comes from referrals. So when the woman he himself falls in love with is a newspaper gossip columnist…it’s easy to see where this will eventually lead.

The first hour of the film is very sweet. Hitch helps a timid, clumsy accountant break the ice with a rich heiress he is madly in love with, and the two of them stumble towards romance. At the same time, Hitch and Sara (the columnist) go out on a couple of dates that, despite all of Hitch’s experience as a professional smoothie, turn out disastrously.

But the fatal misunderstanding that causes the reversal of fortune, despite being obvious, felt contrived in much the same way that How To Lose A Guy In 10 Days did. The resolution then drags on for almost another hour, which is far too long for a romantic comedy of this nature. It loses a lot of its initial charm by being wordy without saying much, and by trying to juggle too many balls at once. The parallel doctor and patient plots are fun, but the balance between them isn’t right.

Nevertheless, this is Will Smith at the top of his game again: smooth, funny, and with bags of easygoing charm. Eva Mendes and Kevin James provide quality support as Sara and the bumbling accountant. The chemistry between Smith and Mendes is good, but not electrifying. Overall, Hitch is entertaining enough, but it doesn’t rise to be anything better.

It’s an undeniably beautiful film, lovingly shot with some extraordinary fight and battle scenes. But…

I’m getting tired of Tom Cruise’s earnest, indefatigable, one-man-who-pulls-through-in-the-end schtick. This was one performance too many for me. Also, I found the film’s constant heavy hammering on the themes of honour and loyalty really tiresome. By the end of the film I was longing to see more of the everyday lives of the rebel villagers, and less of their warriors’ desire to die a glorious death in battle. There are more subtle ways to tell a story about honour.

Finally, the race thing bothered me: the fact that it’s a white man who eventually redeems the honour of the Samurai. I understand why the characters were chosen to work that way, in order to make it fly as a big-budget Hollywood epic, but I found it ugly and patronising nevertheless. I would much rather thave watched this film if it had been a Japanese production, with the focus on Ken Watanabe’s character Katsumoto instead. In fact, you could remove the Tom Cruise character altogether, and you’d end up with a stronger story. The tragedy would be greater, and the emotional impact would be more honest.

Even for a kids’ film, this is unforgiveably bad. Imagine, if you will, a pale shadow of the already excrable Spy Kids 3D, with none of the humour or strength of plot, and you’re probably giving it the benefit of the doubt. The 3D effects are poorly done, pointless, and repetitive. The acting is….no, the acting isn’t. The only thing it has going for it is that Alex seemed to like it–at the time.

It makes Robert Rodriguez’s achievement in making Sin City seem even more extraordinary, and even more like a one-off.

There are two main reasons I didn’t like Ocean’s Twelve. First of all, it’s entirely pointless. It has no heart, drifting instead between several plot lines that do tie together, but not in anything you’d call a climax. There is a “big” heist they have to execute, but is far from central to the film. Most sequels at least try to be bigger and better than their originals; this one lacks even that ambition.

Secondly, the use of cinematic shorthand to tell the story really bugged me. There are lots of knowing glances, and histories alluded to with a nod and a wink. It lends the illusion of depth to the characters, but when the credits roll, do you actually know anything about them? No. This shorthand extends to many key sequences in the film itself, which are not shown as part of the action, but instead revealed after the fact in flashbacks or conversations.

As an ensemble star vehicle, it is appropriately self-indulgent and deliberately harmless to each participant’s position on the Hollywood status ladder. But as a heist or a con movie, or even as a crime comedy caper, it is utterly flaccid.

Sometimes you fancy a film that will challenge your assumptions, and sometimes you just want some raw comic book carnage. In the latter case, you could do worse than to flip on AvP. But you could do a whole lot better, too.