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ALVIN AND THE CHIPMUNKS About the best one can say about this occasionally rancid but mostly just dull film is that it's not as excruciating as Garfield: The Movie, another ill-conceived project that placed CGI animals in the real world. Here, Jason Lee is the hapless human who serves as the sacrificial-career lamb: He plays Dave, a failed songwriter who also has trouble getting close to anyone, including a predictably va-va-voomish girlfriend (Cameron Richardson). But along come our all-talking, all-singing chipmunk siblings – Alvin, Simon and Theodore – to not only help him produce a smash single but also teach him the importance of friendship and family. The requisite villainy rears its head in the form of Dave's old college chum Ian (David Cross), now a record company mogul who decides to work the 'munks into the ground via world tours and the like. The three rodents' lines are spoken by Justin Long, Matthew Gray Gubler and Jesse McCartney, but their voices are so digitally altered that they might as well be lip-synched by Hillary, Barack and Mitt. Then again, that speaks to the whole impersonal tone of the project, which has so little regard for the brand name's nostalgic factor that it updates the concept by briefly putting the trio in rappers' outfits in one scene and allowing Simon to eat Theodore's turd in another. Desperately conceived on every level, this forlorn family film amounts to little more than celluloid roadkill. *

ATONEMENT This year's automatic Oscar entry mostly lives up to its lofty expectations, even if it doesn't possess the sweeping emotion that provided other British period pieces like Sense and Sensibility and The Remains of the Day with their enduring resonance. In this adaptation of Ian McEwan's novel, Keira Knightley plays Cecilia, who finds herself attracted to the family servant's upwardly mobile son Robbie (James McAvoy). But Cecilia's younger sister Briony (Saoirse Ronan) has also developed a crush on Robbie, and she grows jealous of the bond between the lovers. Eventually, Briony uses a family tragedy as a way to get back at Robbie, not comprehending the long-term implications of her actions. Knightley's role doesn't allow her to flourish as she did in Pride and Prejudice (her previous collaboration with Atonement director Joe Wright), which is fine, since this is Briony's story and McAvoy's film. As played by Ronan, Briony comes off as a bad seed writ large, with an IQ that, coupled with her naivety, makes her especially dangerous. It's a memorable performance, yet it's McAvoy who excels the most: We ache for Robbie throughout this tale, and the actor expertly conveys the feelings and frustrations of a man who dared to dream outside his station in life, only to watch as his desires go up in flames. It's a shame that the denouement doesn't completely provide us with the emotional catharsis we require. Providing a clever, bittersweet twist, it affects the head more than the heart, and reveals a certain measure of clinical execution on the part of Wright. It caps the film with a slow simmer, when nothing less than a full blaze will suffice. ***

BEOWULF For the record, this isn't a review of Beowulf. It's a review of Beowulf in Digital 3D, and I have to assume that might make some degree of difference. Director Robert Zemeckis, whose 2004 The Polar Express felt like an animated feature that had been embalmed, again employs the "performance capture" technique with far greater success, overlaying real actors with a cartoon sheen and placing them in the middle of a CGI landscape. In 2D, which is how the film is being shown in most theaters, this runs the risk of looking as soulless as many other CGI works, but in 3D (at select venues), it results in a positively astonishing experience. Tossed coins roll directly toward the camera, spears poke directly out at audience members, and even an animated Angelina Jolie's, umm, assets seem more pronounced than usual. Based on the ancient poem, the script by Neil Gaiman and Roger Avary doesn't always match the movie's visual splendor, but their modifications to the text are more often than not respectful. After the gruesome monster Grendel (snarled by Crispin Glover) wreaks havoc on the castle of King Hrothgar (Anthony Hopkins), the heroic (and boastful) Beowulf (Ray Winstone) arrives to save the day. Yet he finds himself not only having to confront Grendel but also the misshapen creature's mother (Jolie) and, in the climactic pièce de résistance, a fierce dragon. Given the massive advances in 3D technology – and depending on the success of this picture – it's possible that more and more movies will be presented in this format. Anyone up for Shortbus 2 in Digital 3D? ***

CHARLIE WILSON'S WAR It hasn't helped that all recent films about wartime politics have been promoted with all the appeal of a plate of vegetables being plopped in front of an 8-year-old (i.e. "It's Good For You" cinema), so trust canny old lion Mike Nichols to recall how to do it right. Charlie Wilson's War is sterling entertainment punched across with enough glitz to sell it but not too much to bury it. Working from a sharp script by Aaron Sorkin (from George Crile's nonfiction book), Nichols has crafted a winning if occasionally facile work whose level of intelligence is measured by how much each viewer wants to put into it. Minimum-effort audiences, therefore, will be happy to roll with the engaging performance by Tom Hanks, but those digging a little deeper will recognize its merit in sniffing out that snatch of history that might serve as the missing link between the fall of Communism and the rise of Middle Eastern terrorism. Kicking off in the 1980s, it follows blustery Democratic Congressman Charlie Wilson (Hanks) as he becomes interested in Afghanistan's ineffectual attempts to oust the invading Soviet army. Charlie's spurred to get involved at the insistence of his politically savvy friend (Julia Roberts, little more than serviceable), but it isn't until he teams up with a prickly CIA operative (Philip Seymour Hoffman, marvelous) that the ball gets rolling and the Afghans are able to defend themselves. But at what cost to the future? The film doesn't answer its own question, preferring instead to let viewers mull over the response. No Supreme Court tampering is necessary this time around: Charlie Wilson's War is an outright winner. ***

ENCHANTED It's a nice touch having Julie Andrews serve as narrator in Walt Disney's Enchanted. Andrews played the title nanny in the studio's Mary Poppins, which contains the famous phrase "practically perfect in every way." And I can't think of a better way to describe Amy Adams' performance as Giselle, the animated damsel who doesn't long to be a real girl but becomes one anyway. This begins in the style of the classic Disney toon flicks of yore, with the beautiful Giselle, at one with nature and its furry inhabitants, longing for "true love's kiss" from the lips of a handsome prince. She gets her wish when she meets Prince Edward, but his scheming stepmother, Queen Narissa, banishes Giselle to a faraway land, which, it turns out, is our own New York City. Now flesh and blood, Giselle turns to a stranger, a buttoned-up divorce lawyer (Patrick Dempsey), to help her survive in this bewildering city; meanwhile, others arrive in pursuit of Giselle, including Edward (James Marsden) and the evil Queen (Susan Sarandon). Entrusting such a rich premise to the writer of Sandra Bullock's limp thriller Premonition is a dubious tactic, and Bill Kelly doesn't come to exploiting this subject for all it's worth. But that's not to say there aren't moments of genuine inspiration, such as when Giselle calls out to the creatures of NYC for help and instead of the expected rabbits, deer and chipmunks gets rats, roaches and flies. But what pushes the film over the top is the terrific turn by Adams, who really seems like a Disney heroine come to life (as the preening prince, Marsden also displays fine comic chops). Her performance is every bit as enchanting as one dreams it would be. **1/2

THE GOLDEN COMPASS There's been a lot of talk surrounding this movie as it compares to Philip Pullman's original novel – what's been taken out, what's been watered down – but let's remind ourselves of the bottom line: A movie is a separate entity from a book and as such deserves to be judged on its own terms. And on that level, The Golden Compass is an acceptable piece of fantasy fluff, a cluttered mishmash that nevertheless can lay claim to its own scattered charms. An ambitious tale set in an alternate world, this is basically yet another tale about an unassuming youth who emerges as the only person able to vanquish the evil force that's poised to conquer all (Luke Skywalker, Harry Potter, Frodo, etc.). Top-billed Nicole Kidman plays the villainous Marisa Coulter, but the lead is actually Dakota Blue Richards as Lyra, the spunky lass who lands in the middle of a large-scale skirmish that finds the fascistic members of the religious ruling body (with the aid of the aforementioned Mrs. Coulter) fighting all manner of outsiders in an effort to not only hold onto power but insure that they eliminate the notion of "free will" entirely. For all the narrative shortcuts taken by director-adapter Chris Weitz, the movie still works fairly well as a high-flying fantasy tale for the younger set. As for adult audience members, they can enjoy the fine work by Kidman, who's all slinky, silky menace as the purring Marisa Coulter. Whether displaying a false maternal front to the motherless Lyra or slapping around a moody monkey, she's a movie villain worth remembering – in fact, if she were any more evil, she would have to change her name from Marisa to Ann. **1/2

I AM LEGEND Will Smith may be the only one receiving star treatment for this apocalyptic sci-fi yarn, but he's hardly the one who runs away with the film: Abbey delivers a terrific performance that probably deserves an Oscar. Granted, there's the small technicality that Abbey's a dog – a German shepherd, to be exact – but still ... Abbey (and Kona, also listed in the credits as playing Samantha; perhaps Abbey's stunt double?) is a wonderfully expressive animal, and once the canine's screen time decreases in the picture's second half, the rapport between man and his best friend – a reassuring motif in a movie about a world that otherwise has gone to hell – dissipates to make room for the usual testy relations between frightened humans as well as their attempts to ward off the evil entities that reside in the darkness. I Am Legend is based on Richard Matheson's novel of the same name, and while it's not the first version of the time-honored tale (other takes starred Vincent Price and Charlton Heston), it's certainly the best. As Robert Neville, the scientist who appears to be the sole survivor in New York after a virus has wiped out most of humankind, Smith brings the right mix of vigor and vulnerability to the part, and director Francis Lawrence maintains tension as long as Neville (and moviegoers) can't size up the shadowy menace. But once the bloodthirsty creatures show themselves, they're disappointingly conventional (at least by CGI zombie standards), and the film has trouble continuing its momentum through a lackluster final half-hour. Still, Abbey makes this worth seeing. Not to mix animal kingdom catchphrases, but this dog is the cat's meow. **1/2

JUNO Ellen Page (Hard Candy) is pure perfection as the title character, a spunky and verbose teen who finds herself pregnant after a dalliance with sweet classmate Paulie Bleeker (Superbad's Michael Cera). After careful research, she decides on the adoptive parents: Vanessa (Jennifer Garner), a tightly wound businesswoman who wants a child in the worst way, and Mark (Jason Bateman), a TV jingle composer who tends to live in the past. But Juno's idea of how everything should proceed doesn't exactly pan out, and her sarcastic front falters in the face of fear and uncertainty, revealing the child underneath. Perhaps because it's written by a woman – and a former stripper at that – Juno is already receiving the sort of knee-jerk backlash that tellingly was never foisted upon Judd Apatow's similarly themed Knocked Up. Yet Diablo Cody's script is more balanced than Apatow's: The laughs are plentiful in both, but Cody places more emphasis on the emotional fallout, with Juno and Bleeker awkwardly trying to express their feelings for each other and Vanessa's anxiety almost palpable as she worries that Juno might change her mind about handing over the baby (Garner is excellent in her best film role to date). Cody's dialogue may not always be believable (how many 16-year-old girls reference Dario Argento, let alone Soupy Sales and Seabiscuit?), but its intelligence and quirky humor qualify as music to the ears of moviegoers tired of witless banter. And speaking of music, the soundtrack is a keeper as well, with eccentric tunes that complement the action. Kicking up a fuss (much like Juno's unborn child), this is one of the year's best releases. ***1/2

THE KITE RUNNER There have been exemplary movies imported out of the Middle East and the surrounding region for well over a decade now, which is perhaps why this U.S.-born-and-bred adaptation of Khaled Hosseini's bestseller by European-raised, Hollywood-sanctioned director Marc Forster (Finding Neverland) never exudes the raw, authentic power that such a story demands. Set in Afghanistan, The Kite Runner initially centers on the friendship between well-to-do but wimpy Amir (Zekeria Ebrahimi) and the family servant's son, loyal and courageous Hassan (Ahmad Khan Mahmidzada). Hassan is forever protecting Amir, but Amir fails to do likewise when a local bully rapes young Hassan. This incidence causes a rift in their relationship, a development that turns even more rancorous before Amir and his father (excellent Homayoun Ershadi) bolt for the United States to escape the Soviet invasion. Told in flashbacks and flash-forwards, the movie explains how an adult Amir (Khalid Abdalla) comes to terms with the ghosts from his past, specifically by traveling back to his homeland to settle his affairs with Hassan – a trek that ends up pitting him against the Taliban. Alas, the harshness of the material frequently finds itself neutered by a schematic storyline brought down by an absurd climactic coincidence, all-too-obvious CGI effects in the kite-flying scenes (are we watching a movie or a video game?), and a monotonous performance by Abdalla, who saps all the energy out of crucial scenes. Well-meaning but rarely hard-hitting, The Kite Runner never quite manages to take off. **

MARGOT AT THE WEDDING It's long been a pet peeve to hear when someone dismisses a movie simply because they found the central character to be unlikable. Unless the complainant was planning on inviting said character over for tea, it shouldn't matter if the person's unlikable so long as he or she is interesting. But Margot at the Wedding solves the problem: Here's a character both unlikable and uninteresting, meaning there's no room for debate. Writer-director Noah Baumbach's first film since The Squid and the Whale, this is the sort of talkfest that used to serve as bread and butter for European auteurs like Ingmar Bergman and Eric Rohmer back in the 1970s. Yet those masters used dialogue – always witty, often lacerating – as road maps into their characters' psyches, as a way for audiences to understand what made them tick. Here, Baumbach merely uses words as weapons, as a means for his people to tear each other down without ever letting us see beyond the surface cruelty and understand why these folks have a need to draw first (and second, and third) blood. As Margot, a miserable woman who hopes to talk her estranged sister (Jennifer Jason Leigh) out of marrying a layabout clod (Jack Black), Kidman delivers a fearless performance that asks for little mercy. But because she's not supported by Baumbach, her Margot remains a one-note cipher, a bullying beauty whose poor treatment of everyone around her is never delineated beyond some vague chitchat pertaining to daddy issues. For all its supposed dramatic heft, Margot at the Wedding ultimately proves to be as weighty as cake frosting. **

THE MIST The Mist marks writer-director Frank Darabont's third adaptation of a Stephen King property, and because he's not shooting for Oscar gold this time around (the previous titles were the reasonably enjoyable but grotesquely overrated pair, The Shawshank Redemption and The Green Mile), he's able to ease up on the pedal of self-importance and deliver a "B"- style genre flick, albeit one offering some evaluations of human nature in between all the bloodletting. Owing a nod in the direction of John Carpenter's The Fog, this concerns itself with a group of people who are gathered at the local supermarket when a mist envelops the entire area. It soon becomes clear that something evil resides in the fog – oh, about the time that a bag boy gets shredded by a monstrous tentacle – and the shoppers decide that they should remain indoors rather than venture out into the parking lot. It's here that Darabont's script reveals its cynical roots, as a religious zealot named Mrs. Carmody (Marcia Gay Harden) converts many of the frightened survivors to her mode of thinking, a path that leads to a Jim Jones-like environment and at least one human sacrifice. Propelled by Harden's scary performance, Mrs. Carmody is a genuine threat, and she validates Darabont's contention that times of crisis are as likely to turn people against each other as they are to unite them against a common enemy. His pessimism extends to other areas of the script: It's not always easy to figure out who will survive, and the ending will keep viewers' tongues wagging as they exit into the parking lot – one hopefully not blanketed by a similarly impenetrable mist. ***

MR. MAGORIUM'S WONDER EMPORIUM If the Hasbro toy company elects to issue an updated version of its popular board game Clue, it can dispense with Colonel Mustard in the billiard room with the lead pipe as one of the murder scenarios. Readily available to replace it is Mr. Magorium in the wonder emporium with the gag reflex. Suffering from a fatal attack of the "cutes," this family-aimed fizzle marks the directorial debut of Zach Helm, who caught everyone's attention last year with his innovative script for Stranger Than Fiction. Helm's screenplay here, though, is as lackadaisical as his previous one was inspired, with Dustin Hoffman cast as a kindly 243-year-old man who decides it's time for him to graciously depart from this earth (his reason being that he's down to his last pair of comfortable shoes). He hopes to leave his magical toy store in the care of his assistant Mahoney (Natalie Portman), but she doesn't think she can handle the responsibility, even with the shop's workaholic accountant (Jason Bateman) and a lonely little boy (Zach Mills) around to assist her. The G-rated film combines Peter Pan's message – the "Clap your hands if you believe in magic" spiel – with Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory's stuffed-to-the-gills set design, but with no dramatic tension (where's Kevin Spacey as an obvious villain when you really need him?) and a visually drab shop that remains cluttered rather than captivating, the end result is a bland confection that features an atypically bad Portman performance. And, perhaps most critically, with no playthings on the order of Buzz or Woody to enliven events, this proves to be one toy story that's easy to skip. *1/2

NO COUNTRY FOR OLD MEN The Coen Brothers have always been known for genre-hopping, and their adaptation of Cormac McCarthy's novel smacks of both a contemporary Western and a crime thriller. But may I add the classification of monster movie to the mix? As I watched Javier Bardem's seemingly unstoppable Anton Chigurh shuffle his way through the picture, killing left and right without remorse, I realized that it's been a long time since I've seen such an unsettling creature on the screen. No Country for Old Men is a delirious drama that often echoes such classics as Psycho, Touch of Evil and Chinatown, not only in its intricate and unpredictable plot structure but also in its look at an immoral world in which chance and fate battle for the upper hand and in which evil is as tangible a presence as sticks and stones. Chigurh spends the film, set in 1980 Texas, on the trail of Llewelyn Moss (Josh Brolin), a cowboy who stumbles upon the aftermath of a drug deal gone wrong and walks away with $2 million in cash. The cat-and-mouse chase between Chigurh and Moss is enough to propel any standard narrative, yet tossed into the mix is Ed Tom Bell (Tommy Lee Jones), a weary sheriff who, baffled and deflated by the wickedness that has come to define his country, nevertheless trudges from crime scene to crime scene, hoping to save Moss and stop Chigurh. This isn't the first great movie certain to have its ending criticized even by many who enjoyed the rest of the picture (Apocalypse Now also springs to mind), yet love it or hate it, accept it or debate it, it's perhaps the only proper conclusion for a movie as uncompromising as this one. ****

SWEENEY TODD: THE DEMON BARBER OF FLEET STREET Sweeney Todd is an adaptation of Stephen Sondheim's 1979 Broadway smash, but it hides its stage roots so thoroughly that it often feels like a piece created exclusively for the screen. There's no trace of the often limiting theatricality that has marred other stage-to-screen transfers, though that's hardly a surprise given that Tim Burton remains one of our most visually adept filmmakers. In refashioning Sweeney Todd for the movies, he and scripter John Logan have created a big, bold musical that functions as an upscale slasher film: It's bloody but also bloody good, with the gore tempered by the melancholy love stories that dominate the proceedings. Johnny Depp delivers a haunted performance as a barber who returns to London after 15 years in prison to exact his revenge on the judge (Alan Rickman) who ruined his life; he's aided in his efforts by lonely widow Nellie Lovett (Helena Bonham Carter). As partners-in-crime, they're matched beautifully: He slits the throats of all who sit in his barber's chair, while she grinds up the corpses to use in her popular meat pies. Burton's decision to stylize the film to within an inch of its life (his most theatrical flourish is to retain a Grand Guignol sense of the melodramatic) was a sound one, resulting in a visual feast that dazzles even through the setting's necessary grime. And while neither Depp nor Carter are classically trained singers, both are just fine belting out Sondheim's tunes. More importantly, they provide this rousing musical with the emotional heft necessary to prevent it from merely becoming an exercise in Gothic chic. ***1/2

WALK HARD: THE DEWEY COX STORY The poster for Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story states it's "From The Guy Who Brought You Knocked Up And Superbad," but really, it feels more like it's "From The Guy Who Brought You Anchorman And Talladega Nights." Yes, Judd Apatow is one of the co-writers (sharing scripting duties with director Jake Kasdan), but that savory mix of satire and sentiment that worked well in his two summer hits is largely missing here; instead, we get the broad laughs and easy targets more at home in films headlining Will Ferrell. That's not a bad thing in itself – Talladega Nights was pretty funny – but the problem with Walk Hard is that genuine laughs are few and far between. A send-up of music biopics like Walk the Line and Ray, it spends so much time dutifully tracking the clichés inherent in these types of films – and then offering mostly predictable comic riffs on these clichés – that a certain by-the-numbers stagnation begins to settle in. Still, that's not to say that some moments don't connect: A sequence involving The Beatles demands to be seen if only for the opportunity to catch Jack Black cast as Paul McCartney(!), and I love the string of scenes in which Dewey (John C. Reilly) gets introduced to increasingly harsher drugs. And for a soundtrack that's meant to send up actual country, rock and R&B hits, the songs are a surprisingly durable bunch that will doubtless play just fine away from the movie theater while blaring from an iPod or car CD player. If you're going to return that Christmas sweater for something else, it's not a bad way to go. **