Good-humored, illuminating and without cant, Oscar-winning director Oliver Stone's documentary "South of the Border" is a rebuttal of what he views as the fulminations and lies of right-wing media at home and abroad regarding the socialist democracies of South America.

Featuring interviews with seven national leaders who all express great affection for their neighbors to the north if not for historical U.S. foreign policy, the film suggests a clear way forward for a continent that has largely shaken off the grip of imperialism and what Stone calls predatory capitalism as opposed to benign capitalism.

Greeted with extended applause at its Venice press and industry screening, the film will fare well internationally and will attract liberal audiences in Stone's homeland. Conservative outrage could also spark wider interest, and it should thrive among educators and have a long ancillary life.

Clips from CNN and Fox News establish quickly the buffoonish tone with which news about South American politics is usually treated with democratically elected leaders invariably depicted as dictators, but Stone also indicts the network news and media institutions including the New York Times.

Following a brief history of the events in Venezuela that led to the presidency of Hugo Chavez, Stone shows how the media in that country altered film of violent demonstrations to show his supporters firing on their opposition and how those images were fed to the rest of the world. He details similar exaggerations in other countries and quotes facts and figures from each region.

His cameras follow Chavez, who was born in poverty, to the place of his childhood and on trips to a cattle farm and a plant that produces flour with help from Iran. On the way there, Chavez tells the director, "This is where we're building the Iranian atomic bomb." There is similar black humor from other leaders with Rafael Correa of Ecuador saying of the U.S. media, "I'd be more worried if they spoke well of me."

The expressed view of the fraternal leaders is that they want independence and equality, and freedom from the International Monetary Fund and U.S. economic control. They all see in President Barack Obama the opportunity for lasting, mutually beneficial change.

Stone is clearly impressed with the leaders he meets, and there are many relaxed scenes, including one in which he gets a great kick out of Bolivian leader Evo Morales showing him the best coca leaves to chew, a benign cure for the nauseous effects of the altitude in La Paz.

By Ray Bennett

The latest name to roll off the French biopic production line that produced Piaf, Sagan and Chanel is that of Serge Gainsbourg, a talented singer-songwriter of the 1950s and 1960s who devoted his later years to blowing musical raspberries. What was heroic about Gainsbourg's life? If anything, his vast consumption of booze and cigarettes. This is a hero for rebellious adolescents, and while "Gainsbourg (vie heroique)" will strike a chord with local sensibilities, non-Gallic audiences may be underwhelmed by this portrayal of an artist whose main claim to world fame is a pop song in which a woman simulates an orgasm.

Writer-director Joann Sfar's background is in strip cartoons, and it shows. He strings together a narrative but fails to construct a plot. The singer's early years as a precocious Jewish child in Nazi-occupied Paris are imaginatively treated, and Eric Elmosnino's impersonation of Gainsbourg in his drink-sodden progress from struggling painter to cabaret performer to aging proto-punk is a highly impressive piece of work.

In fact, the first half of the movie, in which we meet some of France's greatest postwar music hall stars such as Juliette Greco, Boris Vian and the Freres Jacques, is lively and interesting enough. Sfar even invents a Gainsbourg alter ego, a grotesque double in a latex mask who proposes a Faustian deal, prompting the singer to concede that "selling your soul to the devil has its good points."

Then Gainsbourg has an affair with Brigitte Bardot, success and notoriety come knocking and the movie loses its way. Sfar dutifully details Gainsbourg's transgressive highlights, but there is a monotony to alcoholic decline that he is unable to disguise and the end comes as something of a relief.

Production values are high especially Sfar's engaging use of fantasy, blending animation and marionettes. The supporting cast of Yolande Moreau (Frehel), Anna Mouglalis (Greco), Philippe Katerine (Vian) and Lucy Gordon (Jane Birkin) are impeccable, while Laetitia Casta as Bardot is in a role that calls for little acting ability.

But the movie is too much an act of hero-worship for there to be any critical distance. Cliche lurks, and the portrayal of Gainsbourg will reinforce stereotypes of the suave, cynical, self-indulgent French male. Sfar makes no attempt to get behind Gainsbourg's refusal to face up to the addictions that he knew were killing him. A more interesting movie remains to be made examining why the French have built a cult around a man who so clearly harbored a death wish.

By Bernard Besserglik

Kristin Scott Thomas pulls out fully 100% of the stops available in this fiercely emotional French film from Catherine Corsini, conceived on traditional, almost classical lines: a marital tragedy with something of Zola or Lawrence. It's comparable in some ways to Thomas's recent movie I've Loved You So Long, though pitched at a yet more intense, grandiloquent level. Scott Thomas plays Suzanne, an English-born woman married to prosperous and socially well-connected doctor Samuel (Yvan Attal) in the south of France. Their children having almost grown up, Suzanne has taken it into her head to train as a physiotherapist, a plan to which Samuel has assented with testy ill grace, and grumbles about paying to convert an outbuilding on their property into her treatment suite. Suzanne's consciousness of how disagreeable Samuel is being about this, and how much he appears to resent the new separateness in her identity, coincides with a spark of romance between her and the rugged Spanish workman they have hired: Ivan, played by Sergi López. The affair triggers an explosion of hate from the icily obnoxious Samuel, which in turn fosters a defiant passion in Suzanne. Scott Thomas gives an arrestingly transparent performance: at crucial moments dropping her social mask and revealing a girlish expression of shock, as if stunned by the realisation of what Ivan means to her, how much she is throwing away, and how little it matters. Scott Thomas is a very powerful take-it-or-leave-it presence in the movie. Perhaps you have to be a fan to really like it – but I think this is more than enough to turn waverers into fully paid-up Scott Thomas admirers.

Peter Bradshaw

The vivid, piercingly charismatic presence of Mélanie Laurent, who made her breakthrough in Quentin Tarantino's Inglourious Basterds, is the only reason for paying attention to this cheesy Europudding from the Romanian-born director Radu Mihaileanu. It's a broad comedy of stereotypes whose serious themes are sentimentally mishandled, and saddled with a browbeatingly reverential attitude to high culture in the form of Tchaikovsky's Violin Concerto in D Major. Aleksei Guskov gives a somnolent performance as Filipov, a former conductor of the state orchestra in Moscow. A free-thinking liberal, loyal to Jewish musicians, Filipov was fired along with his associates by the communist regime in 1980 as part of an antisemitic purge. Now, in post-Soviet Russia, he is a mere cleaner in the admin offices, in which lowly position he discovers and conceals a fax (a what?) inviting the orchestra to play in Paris, scheming to round up his old refusenik buddies and travel to Paris passing themselves off as the real thing. Filipov wants one last hurrah with his beloved Tchaikovsky, but also to make contact with the brilliant young violinist Anne-Marie Jacquet (Laurent) for reasons that turn out to be as fantastically contrived and lame as everything else. The money for this secret excursion has supposedly been donated by a vain, music-mad oligarch played by the Romanian actor Vlad Ivanov (from 4 Weeks, 3 Months and 2 Days) – who, in this wacky comedy, takes no revenge for being tied up and humiliated in the final reel.

Peter Bradshaw

Beginning with the sound era, studios and films producers have longed for a way to eliminate the screenwriter from the filmmaking process. By and large, writers are prickly personalities who absorb too much time, demand too much credit and need to be kept clear of the set, where they might interfere with the director, who is, after all, the real auteur of the film.

With "The A-Team," a Fox film derived from a 1980s TV series, this dream now is a reality. The film seems nearly writer-free. Absolutely no time gets wasted on story, character development or logic.

The film lurches from one action sequence to another, with little connection between the sequences. The characters move directly from small to big screen with new actors, of course, but little else changed including their famous catchphrases. So the screenwriting as such has been reduced to storyboards, stunt rigging and visual effects. Of the three writers receiving credit, one is the director, action maven Joe Carnahan ("Smokin' Aces"), and the other is one of the film's actors, Brian Bloom.

Carnahan's reputation among young males for delivering action will mean more than any association with a 25-year-old TV series. So "A-Team" could open with a boxoffice of more than $30 million.

The most amazing thing about the production is that British Columbia is able to supply deserts, docks and cityscapes, so the film seems to jet from Mexico to the Middle East, northern Europe and Los Angeles.

The story's four Special Forces soldiers meet in an inexplicable series of shootouts in Sonora, Mexico. These are Liam Neeson in the George Peppard role of the cocky, cigar-chomping team leader "Hannibal" Smith; Bradley Cooper as "Face" Peck, a man efficient at illicit requisitions when not baring his chest like a male model; pro martial artist Quinton "Rampage" Jackson as Mr. T - sorry, B.A. Baracus, the team's driver and muscle - and "District 9's" amazing Sharlto Copley as a mentally unstable pilot.

The quartet seems to operate free of any military oversight through Iraq, Germany, Switzerland, Lake Tahoe and the Long Beach Harbor. At some point, a false crime is hung on the four so they can go "rogue," which fits the concept behind the Stephen J. Cannell/Frank Lupo TV series. But disconnection from the U.S. military has no apparent impact on supply lines, support personnel or logistical capabilities. Good thing, too, for that would require a writer to figure out where all this backup comes from.

Various people are on the A-Team's tail, including Jessica Biel, who as Face's former flame gives the film its only female sex appeal; Patrick Wilson as an apparently rogue CIA officer; and Bloom, a mysterious military contractor.

All the actors can do amid the explosions and stunts is to develop a comic banter among themselves that isn't about anything other than how unconcerned everyone is over these supposedly life-and-death situations. Because for all the firepower in any sequence, none of the heroes gets more than a bump on the head or clothes that need cleaning.

Yes, a writer would only gum things up with suspense and character.

By Kirk Honeycutt

It's a measure of the times that the new version of "The Karate Kid" manages to be longer and bigger-budgeted than the original while having lesser impact. Featuring Jaden Smith in the title role and Jackie Chan as his unlikely mentor, the reboot certainly will appeal to younger audiences and nostalgic baby boomers who made the 1984 film (if not its several sequels) a smash hit. But there's no doubt that much of the original's charm has been lost.

The primary difference in this version is that the central character is transplanted by his widowed mother (Taraji P. Henson) not to sunny California but to China. This affords plenty of opportunities for more dramatic culture clashing and highly exotic locations - one can rest assured that the Great Wall makes a cameo appearance.

The plot, with minor embellishments, remains largely the same. Almost immediately upon settling in to his new home, 12-year-old Dre Parker (Smith) finds himself beset by class bullies, especially the vicious youngster Cheng.

During the course of getting beaten up in regular fashion, Dre finds that his modest karate skills are no match for his tormentors' kung fu proficiency. But, much to his astonishment, one particularly brutal pummeling is suddenly interrupted by Mr. Han (Chan), his building's nebbishy middle-aged maintenance man, who dispatches the bullies with an expert display of martial arts prowess.

Thus begins the unlikely friendship, with Mr. Han mentoring Dre in the mysterious ways of kung fu in preparation for a tournament in which the youngster will have the opportunity to face his enemy under more equal circumstances. Unfortunately, Cheng's kung fu teacher is a particularly sadistic sort who has no compunction about instructing his charges to brutally maim their opponents.

Christopher Murphey's screenplay pays suitable homage to its predecessor, with variations like Mr. Han forcing Dre to repeatedly put on and remove his jacket in lieu of the original's car-waxing sequence.

The chief problem with this version is, ironically, the leads. Although Smith (who made a strong impression in his debut, "The Pursuit of Happyness") and veteran action star Chan might have seemed like good casting on paper, they're not suited to their roles.

The genetically blessed Smith (son of Will Smith and Jada Pinkett-Smith, who are among the film's producers) is so preternaturally charismatic and assured that even when his character is being beaten up, he never seems as vulnerable or as likable as Ralph Macchio was in the original.

And though Chan is highly appealing as the quirky sensei, the impact of his performance can't compare to Noriyuki "Pat" Morita's Oscar-nominated turn. When Morita's seemingly meek and unassuming Mr. Miyagi finally displayed his prodigious fighting prowess, it was a delightful surprise. Here, the effect is lost; despite his bad haircut and shuffling manner, from the first minute he appears, one is aware that Chan's Mr. Han is capable of kicking serious ass.

Technical elements are first-rate, with particularly good use of numerous scenic Chinese locations, including the Forbidden City.

By Frank Scheck

In a summer of remakes, reboots and sequels comes "Inception," easily the most original movie idea in ages.

Now "original" doesn't mean its chases, cliffhangers, shoot-outs, skullduggery and last-minute rescues. Movies have trafficked in those things forever. What's new here is how writer-director Christopher Nolan repackages all this with a science-fiction concept that allows his characters to chase and shoot across multiple levels of reality.

This is, in some ways, a con-game movie, only the action takes place entirely within the characters' minds while they dream.

Following up on such ingenious and intriguing films as "The Dark Knight" and "Memento," Nolan has outdone himself. "Inception" puts him not only at the top of the heap of sci-fi all-stars, but it also should put this Warner Bros. release near or at the top of the summer movies. It's very hard to see how a film that plays so winningly to so many demographics would not be a worldwide hit.

Not that the film doesn't have its antecedents. "Dreamscape" (1984) featured a man who could enter and manipulate dreams, and, of course, in "The Matrix" (1999) human beings and machines battled on various reality levels created by artificial intelligence.

In "Inception," Nolan imagines a new kind of corporate espionage wherein a thief enters a person's brain during the dream state to steal ideas. This is done by an entire team of "extractors" who design the architecture of the dreams, forge identities within the dream and even pharmacologically help several people to share these dreams.

Leonardo DiCaprio plays Dom Cobb, a master extractor, who is for what initially are vague reasons on the run and cannot return home to his children in the States. Then along comes a powerful businessman, Saito (Ken Watanabe), who offers Dom his life back - if he'll perform a special job.

Saito wants Dom to do the impossible: Instead of stealing an idea, he wants Dom to plant one, an idea that will cause the mark, Robert Fischer (Cillian Murphy), to break up his father's multibillion-dollar corporation for "emotional" reasons.

Meanwhile, you meet the other team members - Arthur (Joseph Gordon-Levitt), Dom's longtime point man; Eames (Tom Hardy), the forger; Yusuf (Dileep Rao), the chemist; and Dom's father-in-law (Michael Caine), who is not on the team but the professor who taught Dom to share dreams.

Dom's late wife, Mal (Marion Cotillard), haunts his own dreamworld like a kind of Mata Hari, intent on messing with his mind if not staking a claim to his very life. He doesn't let on about this, but Dom's new architect, Ariadne (Ellen Page), figures it out - which makes her realize how dangerous it is to share dreams with Dom.

A good deal of the first hour is spent, essentially, selling the audience on this sci-fi idea. As you witness an extraction that fails and then Dom's recruitment of his new team around the world, the movie lays out all the hows, whys, whos and what-the-hells behind "extractions."

If you don't follow all this, join the club. It will perhaps take multiple viewings of these multiple dream states to extract all the logic and regulations. (At least that's what the filmmakers hope.)

Something else might come more easily on subsequent viewings: With incredibly tense situations suspended across so many dreams within dreams, all that restless energy might induce a kind of reverse stress in audiences, producing not quite tedium, but you may want to shout, "C'mon, let's get on with it."

This is especially true when the hectic action in one dream, a van rolling down a hill with its dreamers aboard, causes a hotel corridor to roll in another, producing a weightless state in the characters. Even Fred Astaire didn't dance on the ceiling as much as these guys do.

Probably what "sells" this tricky movie is the actors. In his second consecutive movie to question reality - "Shutter Island" came earlier this year, remember - DiCaprio anchors the film with a performance that is low-key yet intense despite hysterical chaos breaking out all around him.

Page too displays sharp intelligence and determination in the face of this absolute jumble of reality. Especially surprising is Murphy as the mark; you find yourself genuinely sympathetic to a guy who just wanted to catch a little shut-eye and finds his mind kidnapped.

It also is nice that Nolan strives to keep CG effects to a minimum and do as many stunts in-camera as possible. This photo-realism certainly helps to keep the dream realities looking more plausible.

Credit cinematographer Wally Pfister with so neatly blending the real and surreal without any hokey moments. Ditto that for production designer Guy Hendrix Dyas and the various stunt coordinators and effects teams. Meanwhile, editor Lee Smith does a Herculean job of juggling those different realities.

Sometimes originality comes at a cost though: At the end, you may find yourself utterly exhausted.

By Kirk Honeycutt

After a decade-plus absence, the toys are back in town, and boy are they a sight for sore, 3D-beaten eyes.

"Toy Story 3" might not carry that eye-popping dazzle of 1995's milestone original that put Pixar on the map, but, in the absence of groundbreaking innovation, there's a greater depth that isn't solely attributable to those now-ubiquitous goofy glasses.

Playing with more darkly complex emotions than the previous two installments, incoming director Lee Unkrich (co-director of "Toy Story 2" and "Monsters, Inc.") and screenwriter Michael Arndt ("Little Miss Sunshine") manage to add nice substance without noticeably weighing down the beloved characters.

Speaking of which, in addition to all the familiar faces, there's no shortage of entertaining new arrivals to this particular playdate, most notably the seemingly gregarious Lotso (effectively voiced by Ned Beatty), a jumbo pink plush teddy with something bitter and unpleasant festering beneath his strawberry scent.

In a season filled with underperformers, expect "Toy Story 3" to finally rise to the occasion, handily extending Disney/Pixar's deserved winning streak.

Shamelessly hitting empty-nesters where they live, the new adventure finds an all-grown-up Andy (John Morris) heading out for college and his mom (Laurie Metcalf) forcing him to first sort through his stuff.

After a perilous brush with the garbage truck, Woody, Buzz and company find themselves ensconced at a day-care center where they're at the mercy of terrifying preschoolers.

But there turns out to be an even more sinister force behind all the chaos, as personified by the aforementioned Lotso, a bear bearing a grudge bigger than his belly.

As with last year's "Up," there's nothing cheap or showy about the 3D here, which has been incorporated to heighten and enrich the vibrantly lit animation.

Despite striking trademark emotional chords, "Toy Story 3" takes full advantage of its main attraction - those larger-than-life toys.

Returning along with Tom Hanks' and Tim Allen's now-iconic Woody and Buzz in the toy box are Mr. and Mrs. Potato Head (Don Rickles and Estelle Harris), Jessie (Joan Cusack) and Hamm (John Ratzenberger).

Welcome additions, aside from Lotso (who could have escaped from a Tennessee Williams play), include a preening, short-shorts-wearing Ken (a terrific Michael Keaton), a pompous, theatrical Mr. Pricklepants (Timothy Dalton) and the truly disturbing (in a tragic way) Big Baby.

It might no longer be the sparkling new thing on the block, but "Toy Story 3" still has a few fresh tricks up its warm, fuzzy sleeve.

By Michael Rechtshaffen

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