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Humiliation, sexual tension and a mysterious, knife-wielding possible maniac with a grocery sack over his head are the uninvited guests that join four young actor friends during a boozy weekend retreat at an isolated cabin in "Baghead," written and directed by "mumblecore" auteurs Jay and Mark Duplass (whose best-known previous film, "The Puffy Chair," screened in 2006 at the Memphis Brooks Museum of Art). Full story »

You should hate these smug American yuppies chatting gaily about golf, tennis and boating over red wine on a sun-splashed Spanish afternoon. You're also free to abhor the painters, poets and musicians who populate Barcelona and spend their days idly debating the merits of love and art -- when they're not wrapped up in making them both, that is. Full story »

Capsule descriptions and starred mini-reviews by The Commercial Appeal movie writer John Beifuss. Full story »

"The Dark Knight" continues to obliterate box office records, crossing the $300 million mark in just 10 days.
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At first glance, “The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor” looks like another slam-bang action movie. Opening Friday, it stars the likable Brendan Fraser as intrepid explorer Rick O’Connell, who comes out of retirement to take on an ancient Chinese ruler (Jet Li) who has risen from the dead with his army of animated terra-cotta warriors. Full story »

ABBA songs are, of course, evil in musical form. Full story »

Words don't really do justice in attempting to describe the wondrous array of misfits and monsters Guillermo del Toro has concocted in "Hellboy II: The Golden Army." Truly, his is a world you have to experience for yourself to appreciate it fully -- if you dare, that is. Full story »

As a surly and homeless antihero of a superhero known as Hancock, Will Smith flies through the air with a drunkard's wobble, like a helicopter with a bent rotor. Full story »

It's certainly easy to take potshots at "The Children of Huang Shi." It's another film in which a white person proves to be the savior of the members of an apparently less fortunate race. It's solemn and old-fashioned. And its lead couple -- Jonathan Rhys Meyers and Radha Mitchell -- don't exactly blaze with star power. Full story »

WALL-E the robot may be battered and obsolete, but "WALL-E" the movie is a marvel of state-of-the-art technological achievement -- perhaps the most brilliantly designed, beautifully executed and technically accomplished feature yet from Pixar Animation Studios, the company responsible for more than a decade of computer-generated milestones, from "Toy Story" in 1995 to "Ratatouille" in 2007. Full story »

It's true that I frequently wax grumpy about "MTV editing," spastic camerawork, digital trickery and the other currently fashionable filmmaking tools that too often sacrifice visual coherence for momentary sensationalist impact. Full story »

In the tradition of "Young Tom Edison," "Young Winston" and "Young Mr. Lincoln'' comes "Mongol," a movie that could have been titled "Young Genghis Khan." Full story »

Missed it by that much. When secret agent Maxwell Smart (Don Adams) uttered that catch phrase on the much-admired spy-spoof sitcom of the 1960s, "Get Smart," he usually was referencing a thrown knife, tossed bomb or falling object that had missed its target by inches. Full story »

Is "The Love Guru" a trial balloon for a new comedy franchise or for Mike Myers' post-movie stardom career as the next Dr. Phil? Full story »

Capsule descriptions and starred mini-reviews by The Commercial Appeal movie writer John Beifuss. Full story »