Film capsules are written by Lawrence Toppman. If there's no star rating, he hasn't seen the movie. Grades: 4 stars = excellent, 3 stars = good, 2 stars = fair, 1 star = poor.

A respectful, stodgy, miscast version of Robert Penn Warren's political novel, pointlessly updated from the 1930s (where it belongs) to the 1950s. Sean Penn huffs and puffs as Louisiana Gov. Willie Stark, but he never fully inhabits the big (padded) body and big gestures of the man corrupted by power. Britishers and New York/New Jersey types fill most of the roles badly, with Jude Law especially out of place as political adviser/flunky Jack Burden and Mark Ruffalo at sea as an idealistic doctor. 120 minutes.Intense sequence of violence, sexual content and partial nudity.

The third Project Greenlight movie gets a two-day run before going out on DVD next month. It's about bar patrons battling deadly aliens. 95 minutes.

Jet Li says this will be his final martial arts film; if so, it's a fitting valediction. He plays haughty, brilliant Huo Yuanjia, whose recklessness leads to tragedy after he becomes a martial arts champion at the end of the 19th century. Huo grows up spiritually and becomes a leader of a new martial arts movement, becoming a source of pride for China. Though the film has many bursts of combat -- fists, spears, sabers, samurai swords and nunchakus -- what we take away are the grand themes of honor upheld, responsibility to society met and the need to let go of egotism. Ronny Yu directed in powerfully sentimental style. 109 minutes.

The story of the Lafayette Escadrille, young American pilots who volunteered for the French military before the U.S. entered World War I. James Franco heads the cast. 139 minutes.

N A drug-addicted inner-city teacher forms a bond with a girl who plays for his basketball team. After she sees him getting high, he tries to protect her from the neighborhood's genial drug dealer. Ryan Gosling, Shareeka Epps and Anthony Mackie are all first-rate in the leads; director Ryan Fleck certainly captures the life of an addict, although the film is as slow and meandering as it is emotionally resonant. 106 minutes.

A pregnant woman arrives in the rural dunes of Brazil with only her mother for female company. Though she longs to leave, she eventually gets used to life there, and the film follows her, her daughter and granddaughter across the decades. Fernanda Montenegro and Seu Jorge star. 115 minutes.

A high school senior (Justin Long) rejected by college after college "invents" a university online to fool his parents, then discovers students from all over the country want to attend. With Blake Lively and Jonah Hill. 90 minutes.

L.A. cops (Josh Hartnett and Aaron Eckhart) try to solve the 1940s murder of would-be actress Elizabeth Short (Mia Kirshner). Brian De Palma directed this version of James Ellroy's novel; the cast includes Scarlett Johansson and Hilary Swank.

Hit man Jason Statham learns a poison injected into his body will kill him if his heart rate drops below a certain point, so he exacts revenge at top speed. Not screened for critics. 87 minutes.

The story of two talented basketball players: One (Wesley Jonathan) wants to use his UCLA basketball scholarship to go pre-med, while the other (Anthony Mackie) wants to get his GED and win an underground street ball game against his arrogant rival (Philip Champion). 95 minutes.

The latest IMAX movie at Discovery Place is an exploration of some of the planet's most unique, dangerous and colorful creatures, from the Wolf Eel to the Giant Pacific Octopus. Veteran underwater cinematographer Howard Hall ("Coral Reef Adventure") directed; Johnny Depp and Kate Winslet narrated; Danny Elfman wrote the score. The photography is sumptuous, especially when manta rays sweep up plankton by moonlight, though there's an awfully strong emphasis on the fish-eat-fish toughness of their world. 45 minutes.

A boy undertakes a thousand-mile journey to return a bat to Babe Ruth in time for the World Series. This animated movie was being directed by Christopher Reeve at his death; Colin Brady and Dan St. Pierre finished it. Voices include Jake Austin, Brian Dennehy and Whoopi Goldberg.

The Rock plays a coach who wants to instill self-respect in young men at a juvenile detention center by teaching them to compete with first-rate football teams. Look for Rock Hill native Leon Rippy as the administrator who tells him why it shouldn't be done.

This slow, atmospheric story about the rise and fall of TV's Superman mixes two genres uneasily: a '40s-style film noir about a lowly, dogged private eye (Adrien Brody) seeking truth and the '50s drama about George Reeves (Ben Affleck), an actor who seemed to be flying high but crashed in success-mad Hollywood. Diane Lane stands out as a movie mogul's wife who may have killed him, but the filmmakers are inconclusive. Shouldn't they provide some solution, however speculative, to the mystery of Reeves' alleged suicide? 125 minutes.

A fifth-grader (Luke Benward) challenges a bully and ends up accepting the dare of the title to change the balance of power at school. Writer-director Bob Dolman adapted Thomas Rockwell's novel. 98 minutes.

A lowborn magician in 19th-century Vienna (Edward Norton) dares to love a duchess (Jessica Biel), though she's betrothed to a mad ruler (Rufus Sewell). Norton's fine, and Paul Giamatti's in good form as a police inspector monitoring the case, but the film is all atmosphere: The long buildup yields too small a payoff, and an unbelievable one at that. 110 minutes.

In 1976, 30-year-old bartender Vince Papale walked out of the economic depression of South Philadelphia and onto the field at Veterans Stadium. His triumphant story is now a fine, conventional sports biography full of uplift, like "The Rookie" and "Miracle" (also from Disney). Director-cinematographer Ericson Core gives it grit by setting it against the depressed cityscape: Papale becomes a symbol of hope for unemployed pals. Mark Wahlberg is just right as the troubled Everyman. 105 minutes.

A remake of the Italian movie "L'ultimo bacio," about a restless man who discovers his long-time girlfriend is pregnant and casts his eyes on a younger woman. This version stars Zach Braff, Jacinda Barrett and Rachel Bilson and was directed by Tony Goldwyn.

Six members of the dysfunctional Hoover family bond while driving from New Mexico to Redondo Beach, Calif., to take the daughter (adorable Abigail Breslin) to a beauty pageant. That description doesn't do justice to the dark comedy, bizarre situations and hard edge of this film, which satirizes unsavory preteen pageants and (unlike most Sundance favorites) doesn't get soft and gooey at the core. The ensemble cast includes Alan Arkin, Steve Carell, Toni Collette, Paul Dano and Greg Kinnear; the sure-handed first-time directors are Jonathan Dayton and Valerie Faris. 100 minutes.

Martial artist Tony Jaa ("Ong Bak") stars in this sequel, playing a fighter who must go to Australia to retrieve his stolen elephant. There he battles a gang led by an evil woman and two deadly bodyguards. 109 minutes.

A guy (Channing Tatum) trashes an arts school, is ordered to do community service by cleaning up his vandalism and falls for a ballet dancer there (Jenna Dewan). 98 minutes.

Another of Will Ferrell's sloppy, casually funny comedies about a man-boy who hits bottom before achieving his dreams, this one a NASCAR driver whose egotism alienates his trophy wife (Leslie Bibb) and longtime pal (John C. Reilly). Ferrell wrote the screenplay with director Adam McKay, who teamed with him on the equally careless "Anchorman." As before, they've interspersed laugh-out-loud segments with dry, repetitive material, but they don't seem to know the difference. 110 minutes.

A remake of the 1973 film about a British detective who goes to an island cut off from the modern world to investigate a disappearance among pagan worshippers. The policeman is now an American (Nicolas Cage) and Ellen Burstyn is the head of the pagan clan. 97 minutes.

This intimate, optimistic movie is an atypical project for director Oliver Stone. Nicolas Cage and Michael Peña play Port Authority policemen who went into the building after the Sept. 11 attacks and were trapped by collapsing concrete; the film follows their points of view as they wait for rescue and the moods of their families, which range from confusion to rage to thwarted hope. (Maria Bello and Maggie Gyllenhaal play wives at home.) The effort to pull McLoughlin and Jimeno from the rubble becomes a metaphor for the nation's attempt to pull itself out of mourning afterward. 125 minutes.

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