2006: Lady in the Water

The film about a mysterious elf from the wet realms who needs help from an unlikely assortment of landlings, in which M. Night Shyamalan does his usual spiel, suffers a little from slowness, but more from the fact that the screenplay fails to make us care about said lady. Exposition, baby! (5.5)

2007: The Golden Compass

Though it could have done with a bit of work on the screenplay to make the whole thing a little more stringent, compact, focused, and also to put a little more weight on expository elements, this fantasy film about a teenage girl fighting the prevailing totalitarian powers (not unremindful of religious organizations in general and the catholic church in particular), is engaging, clearly shows the audience where all the money went and, most importantly, has shitloads of talking animals in it, including what appears to be a ferret. A talking ferret, oh readers! Just the right thing for a rainy Sunday afternoon. (7)

1958: Dracula (a.k.a. Horror of Dracula)

The first film to star Christopher Lee as the Count is too trashy to be reasonably good and not trashy enough to be so bad it's good, but still a decent bit of afternoon entertainment. (6)

1903: Alice in Wonderland

The fragment of the first-ever film version of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland (more info) is a bit weak in terms of overall narrative structure, the growth-shrink scene is too long and, worst of all, the cheshire cat is badly miscast! (5)

2009: The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus

Terry Gilliam's film about an old carnie who made a deal with the devil suffers a little from banana-peel type humour and underuses the plot device of the imaginarium, a world created by the imagination of the person inside - when a posh elder lady enters the imaginarium, we see shoes, shoes, shoes, ha, ha, ha. Even so, it's nice enough while it lasts, but entirely forgettable. (6)

2009: Where the Wild Things Are

Spike Jonze's film about the mildly unruly boy Max's adventures in a land of benevolent monsters manages some moments of beauty and is otherwise professionally done (although Jonze should have cut down on the shaky camera in my view), but my enjoyment of the film was marred by observing how right down to the last stain on Max's face the product was painstakingly geared towards the target audience - not young boys, mind you, but the kinds of parents that don't allow plastic toys in their homes and will no doubt reach the conclusion that this is the kind of film young boys ought to like. The boys themselves, one imagines, would rather watch Transformers 2. (6)