General Release

ARMAGEDDON (12)

This deeply stupid film purports to be a tender love story, a meaty action adventure and a global disaster movie in which a meteor is on a collision course with Earth. Its jumble of styles will end up pleasing no one.

BARNEY'S GREAT ADVENTURE (U)

Feature-length exploits for the big, jolly dinosaur. Ideal for the undemanding pre-school viewer, an endurance test for anyone else.

LE BOSSU (15)

Sumptuous swashbucklers are fast becoming French cinema's stock-in-trade. This effort doesn't break much new ground, but is acted and shot with such magnificent braggadocio that its lack of originality is never a problem.

DR DOLITTLE (PG)

The thought of Eddie Murphy functioning within the restrictions of a PG certificate may not be a promising one but in the snappy new film version of Dr Doolittle he shows that his talents are more pliable than they might first have appeared.

EVE'S BAYOU (15)

Rites-of-passage drama set in Louisiana locations which have been devalued by too many Southern Comfort ads. Despite some intuitive observations, this feels for the most part like reheated Fried Green Tomatoes.

FIRELIGHT (15)

Starchy 19th-century melodrama starring Sophie Marceau as a Swiss governess who bears a child for the wealthy aristocrat Stephen Dillane, then devotes the rest of her life to finding the girl.

GADJO DILO (15)

Stephane, a young Parisisan, journeys through rural Romania on a quest for Nora Luca, the gypsy singer whose music he discovered through his father. There is a warmth and humour to the storytelling and an integrity which pushes this film way beyond being mere sentimental travelogue.

THE GINGERBREAD MAN (15)

The routine level of so much in The Gingerbread Man disappoints on every front. Odd fragments remind you that here we have a great director, Robert Altman, marking time. When Robert Duvall's buddies spring him from an asylum in a weird nocturnal dance - then we glimpse the fugitive ghost of another, less formulaic sort of film.

GODZILLA (PG)

The team which cooked up Independence Day is generally very adept at constructing enjoyable adventures. In this case, their light touch has deserted them.

THE HORSE WHISPERER (PG)

Robert Redford's over-long and deeply indulgent film of Nicholas Evans's novel is a textbook lesson in the narcissistic allure of cinema. Redford plays a Montana farmer who specialises in equine psychology. He agrees to help New York magazine editor Kristin Scott Thomas whose daughter has been traumatised in a riding accident.

THE LITTLE MERMAID (U)

After years of churning out sub-standard animated features, this sprightly adaptation of Hans Christian Andersen's story began a string hits for the rejuvenated Disney Studios.

LOCK, STOCK & TWO SMOKING BARRELS (18)

Lock, Stock And Two Smoking Barrels follows the lead of Quentin Tarantino but the film's defining characteristic is its resilient morality. The picture is peopled by thugs, both amateur and professional. Young Eddy, who comes unstuck in a high stakes card-game, falls into the former; but Hatchet Harry, to whom he owes pounds 500,000, is a dangerous old-school pro.

LOVE AND DEATH ON LONG ISLAND (15)

Comedy starring John Hurt and Jason Priestley. it is mainly concerned with the relationship between art and life, and tracing the areas where the two overlap.

LOST IN SPACE (PG)

Yet another cult 1960s television series to get an expensive makeover but the film-makers have remained faithful to the original tone. William Hurt stars as a frosty scientist who journeys with his family into space to save the Earth from environmental destruction.

THE MAGIC SWORD: QUEST FOR CAMELOT (U)

The first full-length product of Warners' new animation division, this looks and sounds, thanks to the inevitable Celine Dion even cheesier than the average Disney effort. But beneath the surface there's an edge of genuine weirdness that will keep parents entertained, if it doesn't scare the children out of their wits.

METROLAND (18)

Seventies suburban morality tale in which Christian Bale plays a man festering somewhere in the commuter belt when his oldest friend thinks that he ought to be out having fun. There are some endearing moments but, on the whole, director Philip Saville shows a dispiriting lack of ambition.

MR NICE GUY (15)

This largely disappointing addition to Jackie Chan's oeuvre has its moments - a fight scene on a construction site is a particular delight. But the combination of comedy and adventure doesn't gel; it may be the first Chan film that wouldn't even look good if you were plastered.

THE OBJECT OF MY AFFECTION (15)

Comedy in which Paul Rudd confounds his flatmate Jennifer Aniston's dreams of weddings and joint burial plots by turning out to be gay.

PAULIE (U)

Once the muse of indie legend John Cassavetes, Gena Rowlands here has the chance to work with a talking parrot. Voiced by Jay Mohr, Paulie is the wisecracking bird who takes a wry look at human foibles in this rather likeable kids' movie.

THE PROPOSITION (12)

Dismal period drama in which feminist writer Madeleine Stowe and priest Kenneth Branagh become entangled after she discovers her fat-cat husband (William Hurt) is unable to father a child. Salacious tosh.

THE REAL HOWARD SPITZ (PG)

The Real Howard Spitz, a sunny comedy about a children's writer (Kelsey Grammer, aka Frasier) who hates children, is director Vadim Jean's most likeable work. Originality may be thin on the ground but the direction is breezy and Grammer has a lovely, grouchy demeanour.

THE SPANISH PRISONER (PG)

David Mamet's intricate little thriller is a playful exercise in twisting a plot until it locks; there is a scientific detachment about the way he explores every permutation of his Kafkaesque scenario. At the same time, however, the movie is also slyly funny.

THE WEDDING SINGER (12)

Shamelessly dumb but very winning comedy about a romantic wedding singer (Adam Sandler) who falls for a waitress (Drew Barrymore), only to find that she's already engaged to someone else.

THE X-FILES (15)

David Duchovny and Gillian Anderson get to reprise their roles as FBI agents Mulder and Scully and, for their first big-screen outing, get a meaty conumdrum to chew on involving a shifty secret government and a deadly virus from outer space. Duchovny and Anderson are most engaging; through little dialogue and even less facial movement they manage to convey great tenderness.

ZERO EFFECT (15)

Bill Pullman is a hoot as Daryl Zero, the world's greatest private investigator, a drop-out who subsists on a diet of tuna fish and amphetamines, pulling on reserves of wit and ingenuity when the time comes to crack a new case.