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CONTROL ROOM It's open season on Fahrenheit 9/11, but only the most rabid right-wingers will find comparable offenses in this eye-opening documentary about Al-Jazeera, the Arab news network that's been tagged "Osama bin Laden's mouthpiece" by the Bush administration. Jehane Noujaim (co-director of startup.com) meticulously builds the case that the Arab station is no less but no more jingoistic than our own Fox News Network in presenting its version of the Iraq war and that, in many instances, it's more honest and responsible in presenting what's really going on over there. This is a powerful film that celebrates journalistic integrity as much as it denounces the ways that integrity gets compromised. 
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DODGEBALL: A TRUE UNDERDOG STORY For devotees of dum-dum cinema, here's Dodgeball to placate the lowest common denominator while also allowing discerning filmgoers to slum in style. Oh, sure, writer-director Rawson Marshall Thurber didn't have to look further than his weather-beaten VHS copy of Animal House for inspiration, and some of the jokes not only thud to the ground but then spend a few uncomfortable seconds writhing in agony. But when it has its game face on, the film offers a satisfying number of laughs, characters that we care to follow, and cameo appearances that (in contrast to those in Around the World In 80 Days) are positively inspired. At a time when many ambitious studio films are aiming high and falling short, here's one that delivers on its low-pressure promise.
FAHRENHEIT 9/11 Let's be honest: For better or worse, this will be viewed as a propaganda tool first and a motion picture second, and those with strongly held political views won't be swayed one way or the other by Michael Moore's filmic diatribe against the Bush family (it's Moore's hope that the "undecideds" who brave the film will end up handing the election to Kerry). But is it worth seeing? Certainly -- and not even so much because of its politics, but because of its compassion. As is often the case with Moore, the movie works best when he removes himself from the equation and lets his subjects hang themselves through existing news footage. Still, for all its political pelting, the film is at its most gripping when it simply focuses on the innocent people whose lives have been destroyed either by the heinous terrorists or by the abhorrent policies of this administration. 1/2
GARFIELD: THE MOVIE A film about the fat cat star of one of the least inspired comic strips ever to line birdcages coast to coast? We're talking about an uphill battle, and this doesn't even make it past the footstool. As envisioned by creator Jim Davis, Garfield is an ugly, unseemly beast, and that pretty much describes this film as well. Small children will at least get their parents' money's worth -- they'll squeal with delight at the mayhem perpetrated by the computer-generated cat -- but this will feel like a slow crawl through broken glass for anyone old enough to have mastered the fine art of shoelace-tying. So is there anything positive to say about it? Sure: At least it's not Family Circus: The Motion Picture. Trying to live through a film version of that would exhaust all nine lives -- and then some.
THE NOTEBOOK Every summer seriously needs at least one picture to fill the Bridges of Madison County / Ya-Ya Sisterhood slot (otherwise, we'd choke on the season's sweat and testosterone), and this adaptation of Carolina writer Nicholas Sparks' popular weepie arrives as this year's bit of alternative programming. The story is fairly standard stuff that we've seen before in some variation or another: She's young, beautiful and rich, he's young, handsome and poor, and they're forced to contend with obstacles both personal (her disapproving mom) and public (WWII) in order to keep their love alive. The reason to consider catching this is to watch the terrific performance by Rachel McAdams, whose luminescent work, coupled with her turn as the meanest of the Mean Girls, marks her as a compelling newcomer. 1/2
SPIDER-MAN 2 It was a given that the long-awaited Spider-Man movie, released in 2002 after a 39-year gestation period on the comic book page, would make millions even if its hero had been played by John Travolta sporting his Battlefield Earth dreadlocks. But director Sam Raimi's surefooted adaptation turned out to be a phenomenal success with both audiences and critics, thereby raising the bar for its sequel to a stratospheric level; luckily, they don't screw it up. S-M 2 isn't as accomplished -- or even as enjoyable -- a movie as its predecessor, but it's a more ambitious one, with Peter Parker (Tobey Maguire) coping with personal problems while the villainous Doctor Octopus (Alfred Molina) tears up the town. Despite a few flaws, this offers enough thrills and humor to qualify as sparkling summer entertainment.
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