She's a nonagenarian who, when dressed in black, looks a little like a bobble-head with a pipe-cleaner body. But, at the age of 91, entertainer Carol Channing has amazing energy and a rare spirit for life.

Like Steven Soderbergh's Contagion and Fernando Meirelles' Blindness, Mackenzie's cataclysm comes in the form of an unexplained epidemic. But Mackenzie's view of this event tends to be more microcosmic.

Mayor Jon Gnarr Kristinsson -- better known as comedian Jon Gnarr -- relaxes in a rocking chair in a comfy sitting chamber, just off the conference room that's part of his suite of offices in Reykjavik City Hall.

Talk about mysterious islands -- the one in Journey 2: The Mysterious Island features an ensemble that includes Michael Caine, Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson -- and Luis Guzman. That's some bizarre casting.

Together, Washington and Reynolds make a watchable team -- and make the occasionally exciting Safe House more watchable than it deserves to be.

An Oscar nominee as best documentary, Undefeated is a sports film that's less about football than it is about a coach, his players and the journey they take together. And it's a terrific trip.

This nearly four-hour documentary by Barak Goodman, a long-time "American Experience" producer and director, is a smear job, though more the death-by-a-thousand-cuts approach than a straight-ahead takedown.

In some ways, War is the bromance version of Mr. and Mrs. Smith, which could have been by McG but, instead, was by Doug Liman, who is like McG with a functioning brain.

In a sense, this is a movie about what it means to be a man and how one defines masculinity. Yet the script is too thin, doodling in the criminal subplot as a way of pulling Jacky out of his insular existence.

Almost 20 years later, there has yet to be a film noir that out-Fargos the Coen brothers' Fargo. Jill Sprecher's Thin Ice takes a run at it.

Life doesn't seem to get much colder than it probably is during a winter in Barrow, the Alaskan town at the center of Andrew MacLean's On the Ice, a tale of living and dying on the edge of the world.

While there are shows that make me laugh on a regular basis (from Curb Your Enthusiasm to The Big Bang Theory to Hot in Cleveland), there are many, many more that don't.

The plot itself feels as generic as a History Channel reenactment, involving arms deals, terrorists, a kidnapped undercover agent -- and, of course, the ass-kicking SEALs, who do their work with quiet assurance and a noteworthy lack of bravado. At least it's not in 3D.

Hippie jokes, bathroom jokes, free-love jokes, a naked guy running around: It doesn't get much more premeditatedly wacky than this. The desperation shows in Wanderlust, but the laughs never turn up.

The Hollywood studios don't matter anymore to serious movie lovers. They've given up on making anything but expensive tent-pole movies or genre exercises that come with stars and a restrained budget.

So which is it? Did The Artist win because it was the safe, least-challenging, most-reassuring choice? Was it chosen because it was a nostalgic gimmick?