Orphanage a Cut Above

Alien-abduction mock-doc delivers lame premise with laughable framing device

(NEWSER) - The Fourth Kind attempts to combine dramatization of true events and fake-documentary alien abductions in Alaska, and falls horribly flat. Here's what critics are saying:

• The ludicrousness of the grainy archival footage, presented as "real," and a lousy performance by Milla Jovovich, whose "notion of serious acting seems to be speaking very slowly in a halting monotone," make it hard to suspend your disbelief, writes Stephen Holden for the New York Times.

Critics yawn over Rob Zombie's horror remake

(NEWSER) - Dimension Films refused to screen Rob Zombie's Halloween II for critics—which is looking like a wise move based on the reviews coming out:

• "Creatively comatose, even by the standards of a sequel to a remake," writes Rob Nelson in Variety. "Zombie's hatchet job on the series he revived so artfully two years ago plays like a violent act of euthanasia upon the huge, brain-dead body of work inspired by the 30-year-old Halloween."

Red-hot sequel showcases del Toro's dazzling imagination

(NEWSER) - Hades' greatest hero is back in Hellboy II: The Golden Army, and most critics agree it's a hell of a ride. Director Guillermo del Toro returns with comic book creator Mike Mignola, ensuring the dynamic sequel is "shot through with the franchise's signature goofiness, sarcasm and good heart," writes Ann Hornaday in the Washington Post. More»

But Nicolas Cage seems to get it: critics

(NEWSER) - Critics agree: Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance is ridiculous. But they're divided over whether the silliness of the sequel, once again starring Nicolas Cage as the devilish superhero, is funny or just bad.

• In the Merced Sun-Star , Roger Moore calls the movie "a profoundly silly mash-up of comic book and quasi-religious 'prophecy' about a motorcyclist who sold his soul to the devil." It beats the original: "This time around, Cage and everybody else on board are in on the joke," and that makes it "almost a great bad movie."

Movie reviews: Rachel McAdams, Channing Tatum can't save amnesia romance

(NEWSER) - In The Vow, Rachel McAdams plays a woman who must learn to love her husband again after amnesia wipes her memory. It's no surprise it was released ahead of Valentine's Day: It's pure mushiness, critics say.

• In the New York Daily News , Elizabeth Weitzman calls the film a "down-the-middle, by-the-numbers fantasy, in which no one is too quirky or interesting or challenging in any way." Still, "there’s no shortage of viewers ready to embrace an old-fashioned, guilty-pleasure romance."