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It's Complicated

(Comedy, R, 118 minutes). Writer-director Nancy Meyers' latest relationship comedy isn't what the name promises at all. It's simple, almost as simple about grown-up romance and heartache as the average Hollywood teen comedy is about youthful love and sex. That said, a simple-minded story can benefit enormously with Meryl Streep on screen for almost an entire movie. Streep offers a charming performance as a divorced woman in an affair with her remarried ex-husband (Alec Baldwin) and a flirtation with a new man (Steve Martin). Too bad Meyers serves up fluff as light as the pastries Jane bakes for a living, a story to make divorced people wish their broken marriages and the ugly aftermath could be as fun and frolicsome as this.

Rating: HH

Info for Parents: Rated R for some drug content and sexuality.

Alvin and the Chipmunks:

The Squeakquel

(Animated, PG, 89 minutes). "Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Squeakquel" offers exactly two big laughs for its kiddo target audience - one involves passing gas, the other a shot to the crotch. Since there's a fair amount of time between these two bits of comic invention, young and old alike have ample opportunity to mull over the movie's head-scratching decisions, which, on further review, still leave us with more questions than answers. Early in "Squeakquel," a rodent-related accident lands Dave (Jason Lee) in a full body cast. Dave puts the rodents in the care of his slacker cousin Toby (Zachary Levi) and instructs that Alvin, Simon and Theodore go to school. They've basically dropped the Chipmunks into "High School Musical" and, God help us, we'd take the warbling of Zac Efron and Vanessa Hudgens' any day.

Rating: H

Info for Parents: Rated PG for some mild rude humor.

Me and Orson Welles

(Drama, PG-13, 114 minutes). In Richard Linklater's adaptation of the historical fiction novel by Robert Kaplow, our view of the great, charismatic director and thespian isn't straight on, but sideways. We see Welles (Christian McKay) from the perspective of an aspiring teenager, Richard Samuels (Zac Efron), who lands a bit part in Welles' 1937 production of Shakespeare's "Julius Caesar."

Rating: HH1/2

Info for Parents: There is smoking, drinking, implied promiscuity, sexual slang and innuendo, and profanity. Not so much for middle-schoolers.

Nine

(Musical, PG-13, 118 minutes). On a scale of 1 to 10, this musical update of Federico Fellini's masterpiece "8 1/2" comes in somewhere around a 5, maybe 5 1/2. Despite stars with enough Academy Awards hardware to start their own metal works, Rob Marshall's adaptation of the stage musical ends up as an amiable but muddled music-video rehash of Fellini's study of a filmmaker adrift in personal and creative turmoil. The crises of a pampered, fawned-over filmmaker (Daniel Day-Lewis) come off as trifling as he meanders from real-life to grand fantasy sequences with co-stars Nicole Kidman, Penelope Cruz, Marion Cotillard, Kate Hudson, Sophia Loren, Judi Dench and Black Eyed Peas singer Fergie.

Rating: HH

Info for Parents: Rated PG-13 for sexual content and smoking.

Sherlock Holmes

(Action, PG-13, 129 minutes). Take it from a lifelong fan of Arthur Conan Doyle: Robert Downey Jr. is so NOT Sherlock Holmes. That's not a hindrance - in fact, it's a big help - as he and director Guy Ritchie bring Conan Doyle's dusty Victorian-age detective into the modern world. Enough of the trappings are left in their action romp "Sherlock Holmes" - the lightning-fast celebrations, the encyclopedic knowledge of London, the compulsive single-mindedness, the vain one-upmanship - to make Downey a reasonably faithful embodiment of the figure Conan Doyle created. And of course, this is Downey, whose career resurgence rests on his ability to make the most unlikely role his own. He doesn't look like the classic Holmes; he plays the man as a scamp, he's after laughs as much as lawbreakers. But Downey does a great Brit, he lives large in the part, and he brings a human spark to cold egghead Holmes that will help pack in huge audiences for a character on the fringes since the Basil Rathbone days.

Rating: HHH

Info for Parents: Rated PG-13 for intense sequences of violence and action, some startling images and a scene of suggestive material.

OK for all ages

The Princess and the Frog

(Animated, G, 95 minutes). Disney has gone back to its roots with a fresh, funny retelling of a classic fairy tale. This isn't the second coming of "Beauty and the Beast" or "The Lion King." It's just plain pleasant, an old-fashioned charmer that's not straining to be the next glib animated compendium of pop-culture flotsam. Updating the Brothers Grimm tale "The Frog Prince" to the Louisiana bayou in the 1920s, the film centers on a waitress (voiced by Anika Noni Rose) whose dream of opening her own restaurant is sidetracked when she encounters a smooth-talking prince (Bruno Campos) transformed into a frog. Directors Ron Clements and John Musker ("The Little Mermaid") deliver a satisfying gumbo of snappy dialogue, lovable characters, bright-hued images and toe-tapping tunes by Randy Newman, all of it spiced up with just the right touch of voodoo peril.

Rating: HHH

Info for Parents: Dr. Facilier and his underworld demons are pretty spooky, and when Tiana and the prince, as frogs, are pursued by hungry gators, it is briefly scary. One animal character dies and has a funeral. Some of the humor is a little crude, but kid-friendly.

OK for 10 and older

Disney's A Christmas Carol

(Adventure, PG, 95 minutes). The time, not just the season, is ripe for a new version of "A Christmas Carol." Unfortunately, our 2009 version is defined only by its technology. Animated in 3-D, Disney's "A Christmas Carol," directed by Robert Zemeckis, suffocates from its design. Despite (or because of) Zemeckis' approach to using performance-capture animation, the film comes off oddly inanimate. Jim Carrey, playing not just Scrooge but the three ghosts who visit him, clearly has the zest and range for the parts. But he - like the rest of the cast, including Gary Oldman, Colin Firth and Cary Elwes - struggles to break through the film's excessive wizardry.

Rating: HH

Info for Parents: There are many scary, spooky scenes, some vertiginous flying with the spirits, and a shot of a 19th-century Londoner taking snuff.

Fantastic Mr. Fox

(Animated, PG, 88 minutes). With George Clooney, Meryl Streep and Bill Murray leading the top-notch voice cast, director Wes Anderson has found an ideal story and medium - stop-motion animation - to bring his cockeyed vision to the cartoon world. In the hands of "Rushmore" director Anderson, Roald Dahl's children's book about a poultry-thieving fox gets loving treatment and a distinct handcrafted style that sets it apart from the sleek computer-generated imagery dominating animation today. Clooney provides the voice of a fox whose capers against three evil farmers bring the mechanized wrath of the human world down on him, his family and a menagerie of neighbors. It's lightweight fun, yet the film succeeds on all levels.

Rating: HHH

Info for Parents: The film may be too intense for under-8s and even a few who are older. The only "strong" language occurs when the animals say "the cuss you are!"

Older 13s

2012

(Action, PG-13, 158 minutes). The end is not near enough for this latest nihilistic disaster flick, directed by end-of-the-world specialist Roland Emmerich. The 2 1/2-hour film hews close to genre standards: the redeemed deadbeat dad (John Cusack), the coming together of different peoples, the toppling of monuments. The cause of destruction this time is neutrinos from the sun that have heated the earth's core and destabilized the planet's crust. The most grounded thing here is the acting.

Rating: H1/2

Info for Parents: There are bloody but nongraphic injuries, and the implication that people are caught in huge gears on the ark. There is rare profanity and drinking.

Avatar

(Action, PG-13, 161 minutes). James Cameron's 3-D epic has all the smack of a Film Not To Miss - a movie whose effects are clearly revolutionary, a spectacle that millions will find adventure in. But it nevertheless feels unsatisfying and somehow lacks the pulse of a truly alive film. The plot is a little like the American frontier circa the 1800s, only transposed to the year 2154 on the faraway moon Pandora, the home of Native American-like, aqua blue, 10-foot tall creatures called the Na'vi. Arriving are imperialistic humans to plunder, and scientists to study. Dr. Grace Augustine (Sigourney Weaver) leads a team that explores in Na'vi bodies, avatars, controlled remotely. A sense of discovery - of Cameron's digital world of Pandora, of the impressive techno-filmmaking - makes "Avatar" often thrilling. The environmentalist and anti-war messages resonate with contemporary troubles, but they also seem odd coming from such a swaggering behemoth of a movie. One senses Cameron's zest lies in the battle, not in peace. With Sam Worthington and Zoe Saldana.

Rating: HH1/2

Info for Parents: There is intense, if relatively bloodless violence, with choppers, missiles, machine guns, killer robots, arrows and spears. There is an implied sexual tryst, remarks that echo racial slurs used on Earth, and some profanity.

The Blind Side

(Drama, PG-13, 128 minutes).

This redemption-minded sports flick serves its inspiration straight-up with no twist. Writer-director John Lee Hancock wisely lets the true story of Michael Oher - the African-American teen who found a home and, eventually, football stardom, after being adopted by a wealthy Memphis family - speak for itself. That direct focus delivers a feel-good crowd-pleaser, but it also drains the film of the kind of subtle nuances that might have separated it from other Hollywood Hallmark-like efforts, including Hancock's own "The Rookie." The movie dutifully chronicles the transformation of Oher (newcomer Quinton Aaron) from blank slate to a fully formed young man, emphasizing the involvement of Leigh Ann Tuohy (Sandra Bullock). Bullock brings her trademark spunkiness to the mother hen role, delivering an iron-willed woman who looks past appearances to do the right thing.

Rating: HH1/2

Info for Parents: There is mildly crude language, overt and implied racial slurs, brief nonlethal violence, drinking, drug references, a car crash and a briefly implied marital sexual situation.

Did You Hear About the Morgans?

(Comedy, PG-13, 104 minutes). Did you hear about the Morgans? If so, you might wish you hadn't. This bland fish-out-of-water comedy is unremarkable in every aspect, unless you're one of them thar city slickers who thinks the idea that Sarah Jessica Parker trading in her Jimmy Choos for a pair of cowboy boots amounts to an act of cultural treason. Parker and Hugh Grant play a high-powered Manhattan couple forced to relocate to Wyoming after witnessing a murder. The Morgans are on the outs, but a dose of small-town living puts them on the mend. Too bad the jokes aren't as fresh as the air.

Rating: HH

Info for Parents: There is much mild sexual innuendo, brief nongraphic violence, mild profanity, smoking, and a potentially threatening bear.

Everybody's Fine

(Drama, PG-13, 100 minutes). For those weary of the cuddly Robert De Niro, the gentle uplift of his latest film probably isn't going to be tonic for the soul. Playing a retiree looking to reconnect with his adult children, De Niro does offer a master class of minimalist acting. If writer-director Kirk Jones ("Waking Ned Devine") had allowed his lead actor a bit more room to roam into the dark corners of his character, the movie's fast path toward late-life insight would have felt more earned. Still, De Niro's work possesses such a quiet power that Jones' well-crafted film disappoints only in the sense that it could have delivered more. With Drew Barrymore, Kate Beckinsale and Sam Rockwell as the grown children.

Rating: HHH

Info for Parents: The film has rare, sometimes strong, profanity, references to a lethal drug overdose, subtle sexuality themes, a briefly violent mugging, smoking, an implied heart attack, and themes of grief and loss.

Invictus

(Drama, PG-13, 132 minutes). "Invictus" is a sports film that is more about what's happening in the stands than on the playing field. It's South Africa in 1990 and change - as seen in the first scene of the film - is literally coming down the street. After 27 years in prison, Nelson Mandela (Morgan Freeman) has been released. Clint Eastwood's camera lowers on a motorcade. On one side of the road, an all-white rugby team practices on pristine, green grass. On the other, black youths play soccer across a dirt field. Between the two rolls Mandela - "Madiba" to his followers. "Invictus," too, cuts an unlikely path, choosing to tell the story of South Africa's sea change under Mandela's leadership through the prism of sport. It's the story of a nation's shift, as evidenced by its bleachers. The filmmakers, perhaps sensing Mandela's enormous accomplishment may be too outsized for a simple movie to convey, narrow their sights on Mandela's calculated embrace of the nation's rugby team. It comes off like a case study in leadership, perhaps a bit clinical and limited, but still deeply revealing. There's great pleasure in watching Freeman play Mandela, a part he has chased for years, searching for the right project. It feels like destiny fulfilled, hearing Freeman speak Mandela's halting, humble speech and watching his slow, deliberate movements.

Rating: HHH

Info for Parents: The sports scenes are rough and tumble. There is some profanity, implied racism and threats of violence that don't materialize. OK for teens.

The Twilight Saga: New Moon

(Romantic thriller, PG-13, 130 minutes). As every Stephenie Meyer fan knows, this is the one where studly vampire Edward Cullen (Robert Pattinson) dumps human girlfriend Bella Swan (Kristen Stewart) for her own safety, and she turns to old chum Jacob Black (Taylor Lautner) for solace, unaware that he's a werewolf, and therefore Edward's sworn enemy. Fans will turn out in blockbuster legions, but here are a few of the many things wrong with director Chris Weitz's adaptation: It's really two half moons, or two halves of a movie that don't quite fit. Mopey teenager Bella has all the luster of, well, a mopey teenager. The real rivalry is whether werewolves or vampires can behave with greater preposterousness and pretension. Finally, "New Moon" is boring, eternally so. The soap-opera melodrama of Stewart, Pattinson and Lautner's performances provides some unintentional laughs. Yet Stewart is on screen almost all the time, and her Bella is just a drag to be around. With her flat speech and listless presence, it's unfathomable how two different sets of monsters could fixate so completely on her.

Rating: H1/2

Info for Parents: "New Moon" is full of subtle sexual innuendo, but never shows more than a desire-filled kiss. The werewolves are huge snarling beasts, and the vampires are yellow-eyed when aroused. The fights are loud and fast, but generally not graphic, though there is an implied neck-snap beheading, a few bloody gashes and a woman with facial scars from a werewolf claw. There are subtle suicide references. OK for teens.

Mature high-schoolers

Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans

(Drama, R, 122 minutes). It's post-Katrina New Orleans and there are snakes in the water - none bigger than Terence McDonagh (Nicolas Cage), an exceptionally corrupt detective, who slinks through town snorting coke, smoking heroin, harassing women and brandishing a .44 Magnum stuffed in the front of his pants. "Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans" is a kind of remake of Abel Ferrara's 1992 cult classic "Bad Lieutenant," which was set in New York and starred Harvey Keitel in a similar role. Director Werner Herzog has summoned the sensational spirit of the original while making something fresh and gloriously insane. Cage dives headlong into the madness, and it's plain fun to see the actor give himself so fully to a character after several years of mostly forgettable action movies. The film keeps closer to the original's plot than one might want of a movie by a highly skilled director. And the ending feels like a forced, extra dose of Herzog mania. But it has a pulse, and it's a marvel to watch.

Rating: HHH

Info for Parents: Rated R for drug use and language throughout.

Brothers

(Drama, R, 110 minutes). Jim Sheridan's remake of the acclaimed 2004 Danish film "Brodre," has aspirations for "Deer Hunter" territory - a minor-key examination of the cost blue-collar families pay for war. Where "Deer Hunter" was epic in its reach, "Brothers" never really leaves the front yard. While Captain Sam Cahill (Tobey Maguire) is held prisoner by the Taliban in Afghanistan, his wife (Natalie Portman), thinking he's dead, befriends Sam's brother, Tommy (Jake Gyllenhaal). When Sam returns, damaged from a traumatic experience, his rage boils over. It's a simple story and "Brodre" had a lyrical quality, a poetry lacking in Sheridan's sleeker, more sentimental film. "Brothers" can't preserve the intimacy of the original, and the loosened characters slide into cliche despite noble intentions.

Rating: HH

Info for Parents: It has scenes of intensely implied wartime violence and torture, though the camera cuts away at moments of injury. Post-traumatic stress disorder, suicide and possible family violence are key themes. There is gently implied marital sex, marijuana use, occasional strong profanity, smoking and drinking. Not for under-17s.

Precious: Based on the Novel "Push" by Sapphire

(Drama, R, 109 minutes). Director Lee Daniels assembles some of the unlikeliest ingredients - Mariah Carey, Mo'Nique, and a lead actress plucked from an anonymous casting call - to create a wondrous work of art. The film isn't easy to watch and will test your tolerance for despicable behavior as a long history of physical abuse and incest unfolds involving an illiterate, obese Harlem schoolgirl. Yet "Precious" - both the film and its grandly resilient title character - will steal your heart. Daniels crafts a story that rises from the depths of despair to a place of genuine hope. Gabourey Sidibe offers a phenomenal screen debut as Precious, who makes an utterly believable and electrifying rise from an urban abyss of ignorance and neglect. The normally lowbrow Mo'Nique delivers an Oscar-worthy performance as Precious' viper of a mother, while great support is provided by Paula Patton, Lenny Kravitz and Carey in a small but honest role. This is great American cinema.

Rating: HHHH

Info for Parents: There is strong profanity, drug use and drinking.

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