Ratings based on a four star system
ALL ABOUT STEVE
Rated PG-13
1 1/2 stars
There’s nothing wrong with this movie that a rewrite couldn’t fix, as long as the rewrite involved a different writer, a different character and a different story. Bullock plays Mary, a daffy optimist who can’t take a hint. She’s great with words and lousy with people, pouring her life into her job as a crossword-puzzle constructor. Her folks set up a blind date between Mary and a hunky CNN cameraman (Bradley Cooper), who then spends the rest of the movie crisscrossing the country on assignment while Mary follows.

EXTRACT
Rated R
3 1/2 stars
The box office has already declared “The Hangover” the winner, but this is the funniest American comedy of the summer. Written and directed by Mike Judge, this bookend to “Office Space” features the excellent Jason Bateman as a small businessman trying to dodge a lawsuit following a mishap at his factory while also trying to arrange an affair for his wife (Kristen Wiig) so that he can have his own dalliance with a clean conscience. Also featuring Ben Affleck and Mila Kunis, Judge’s sly, wry film showcases some first-rate, off-the-cuff ensemble acting.

THE HURT LOCKER
Rated R
3 1/2 stars
Vivid, assured and extremely suspenseful, director Kathryn Bigelow’s latest (and strongest) film takes moviegoers by the collar and throws them headlong into one horrifying life-and-death situation after another. Jeremy Renner plays a soldier in Iraq running toward the explosives while everyone else is ducking and covering. He’s a bomb tech whose job entails disarming one Improvised Explosive Device (IED) after another, day after day. Time will tell if this politically neutral war movie is a classic, but it’s certainly a formidable experience.

MY ONE AND ONLY
Rated PG-13
3 stars
Set in the early 1950s, “My One and Only” is a minimally factual account of George Hamilton’s improbable upbringing. It stars Renee Zellweger as the young actor-to-be’s mother, a reckless, madcap figure of glamour. Director Richard Loncraine’s diversion has more on the ball than it initially lets on: For a while it’s dominated by Zellweger’s archly conscientious attempts at period style. Gradually, however, the actress leaves the play-acting behind her and settles into her role.

PAPER HEART
Rated PG-13
3 stars
A clever hybrid of a film that swings between comedy, documentary and puppet re-enactments with the slightest push from its stars — Charlyne Yi and Michael Cera — as variations on themselves. This romantic fable begins with the notion that Yi doesn’t believe in fairy tales when it comes to love. She confronts her state of disillusionment with a search for what love means to all types of people. But “real” life, in the form of Cera, who suddenly emerges as possible boyfriend material, complicates everything.

POST GRAD.
Rated PG-13
3 stars
In this minor but agreeable romantic comedy, a college graduate (Alexis Bledel) moves back in with her folks (Michael Keaton and Jane Lynch) and tries to decide between the hunk next door (Rodrigo Santoro) and her lovesick pal (Zach Gilford). The material may be formulaic, but the spirit of the piece is friendly, and we’re reminded of what the hugely talented Keaton is capable of.
— Associated Press

TAKING WOODSTOCK
Rated R
3 stars
Director Ang Lee has never made a bad film, and the genial comedy “Taking Woodstock” certainly doesn’t break his streak. Based on a memoir by Elliot Tiber, the movie is a mosaic — many characters, drifting in and out of focus — stitching the story of how the peace-and-music bash fell together as it bounced in the haphazard planning stages from its originally scheduled Wallkill, N.Y., location to a cow pasture in White Lake.
— Associated Press

WORLD’S GREATEST DAD
Rated R
3 stars
Writer-director Bobcat Goldthwait’s film about the human need for reinvention and revisionism stars Robin Williams as a high school English teacher with a repellant teenage son. Goldthwait is interested in mining the human condition, but he can’t resist premises that will repulse his target grown-up audience. Still, “Dad” proves unexpectedly moving in its portrait of a middle-age man leaving childish things behind.
— Associated Press