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Capsule reviews by Thomas Delapa (T.D.) or Ingrid Vogelfanger (I.V.), as indicated.

All the Pretty Horses. Yee-haw. That stampede you hear is all those folks running away from Billy Bob Thornton's newfangled Western disaster. Based on the book by Cormac McCarthy, it's a listless, sagging saga about a young 1950s cowpoke (Matt Damon) who rides down Mexico way with his pardner (Henry Thomas) for jobs breaking horses for an aristocratic landowner. At night, with coyotes yelping in the distance, Damon romances a pretty senorita (Penelope Cruz) who dreams about him. Thornton's muddled idea, I guess, is to crossbreed the Western with the art film, a risky venture under any circumstances. Cinematographer Barry Markowitz treats the arid vistas with reverence and awe befitting a Remington composition. Whatever the purpose, Thornton left his cast stranded somewhere back on the trail. Rated PG-13. At Colony Square, Twin Peaks and United Artists.-T.D.

Barenaked in America. You'll learn more than you'd ever want to know about the eclectic Canadian pop band Barenaked Ladies in this threadbare documentary by actor Jason Priestley. Priestley treats the band like they're the Beatles, offering up extended interviews that disintegrate into tedium. We go backstage to watch lead singer Ed Robertson on the toilet (ha-ha). The question the film seems to ask is whether or not a Canadian novelty band can make it in America. Of course they can, and they're so great they even can make cool music videos too. OK, so the band has had a couple of catchy hits, but if I had a million dollars to spend on a movie, I wouldn't waste it on these guys, clothes or no clothes. Not rated. At Boulder Theater.-T.D.

Best in Show. Christopher Guest, late of Waiting for Guffman, turns his comic attentions to American dogophilia in a mock documentary that alternately wows and whimpers. Pet owners, er, guardians, from around the country gather in Philadelphia for the annual Mayflower Dog Show, to compete for the coveted "Best in Show" tag. There are all kinds of canines, from poodles to toys to terriers, and among the kooky humans going to the dogs are a married pair from Florida, an outrageously gay duo from New York, a drawling Southerner with bloodhound and a snippy yuppie couple who both could use a Prozac biscuit. Guest's style is nothing to sit up and howl at, as the film is a spotty hodgepodge of gags and skits, some dog-eared. Fred Willard nearly steals the Show as the dog show's crass announcer, acting as the sorely needed straight man among all the stupid human tricks. With Catherine O'Hara, Eugene Levy and Parker Posey. Rated PG-13. At Denver's Mayan.-T.D.

Billy Elliot. Remember Gene Kelly's exuberant "Gotta Dance" number from Singin' in the Rain? That might have been the operating inspiration behind this British import about a boy's stormy struggle to take up dancing in his hardscrabble England coal town. I dare not take such a lofty comparison too far. Director Stephen Daldry's film is as synthetic as they come. Billy (Jamie Bell), age 11, is an untrained dancer with talent. But he has to hide his inclinations from his father and brother, both coal miners left impoverished and angry by a lengthy strike. Dad has insisted that Billy take lessons in the manly art of boxing. Billy is mainly interested in a girls' ballet class being taught by the chain-smoking Mrs. Wilkinson (Julie Walters). When Daldry isn't pummeling his audience with a grating rock soundtrack, he's sneaking in sucker-punch dramatic scenes that come out of nowhere. There are two pseudo-stories here, and, like the saying goes, two wrongs don't make a right. Along with Billy's "gotta dance" flights are his father's and brother's plights on the coal-mine picket line. Rated R. At Chez Artiste.-T.D.

Cast Away. Casting aside, one way of criticizing Cast Away is to see it as a long commercial for Federal Express. It isn't enough that Tom Hanks stars as a FedEx manager who's marooned, Robinson Crusoe-style, on a desolate island. The courier giant's identity is so intrinsic to the plot that you must guess that this production was being paid as much by the company as by the studio. Hanks' Chuck Noland is a driven, workaholic company man whose comeuppance comes when his plane crashes into the Pacific during a violent storm. He washes ashore on a rocky island as the sole survivor. Cast Away is both risky and rigorous as it follows Chuck's survivalist struggles, and Robert Zemeckis continues to be a director who smoothly handles effects-enhanced dramatics. But what galls me about this film is that Zemeckis finds yet another way to shill for FedEx, using its logo as the mystical key to Chuck's escape. For all of its buoyant moments, Cast Away is sunk by crass commercialism. Stamp this pre-packaged ad "Return to Sender" and cast it aside. With Helen Hunt, again. Rated PG-13. At Colony Square, Twin Peaks and United Artists. -T.D.

Chocolat. Don't go expecting another Cider House Rules from director Lasse Halstrom. This one's a chocolate mess. In a small village in 1950s France, a visitor (Juliet Binoche) brazenly sets up shop with her illegitimate young daughter, intending to sell speciality chocolates to the townfolk. The recipes are based on ancient Mayan formalas, and their effects range from euphoria to aphrodisia. Outraged and full of religious fervor, the Comte de Reynaud (Alfred Molina) whips up a campaign to run the woman out of town. This is a sour attempt to play to a fashionable modernism that gets kicks out of making fun of old-fashioned religious rituals. With beady eyes, moustache and black suit, Molina is the bitter villain. All sugary smiles and dressed like she's headed for a Dior show, Binoche is the heroine of the phony fable. Her late-arriving lover is played by Johnny Depp. He's a guitar-playing Irish gypsy who floats up by barge to sample the chocolates and help Binoche rock the boat. With Lena Olin. At Crossroads Commons and Denver's Esquire.-T.D.

Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon. Here's a bit of a hint to help you with Crouching Tiger: Imagine martial arts and The Matrix mated with Farewell My Concubine. Director Ang Lee's highly-heralded Eastern opus is certain to amaze general audiences with its high-flying fight choreography. But if you subtract the mumbo-jumbo mysticism, what you have left is a Jackie Chan movie. Without the humor. I've always supected Lee of being a middle-brow director masquerading as Merchant-Ivory; this is proof. Short on story, long on surreal stunts, the film is set in a vaguely ancient China where martial arts experts can literally fly over their foes. John Woo veteran Chow Yun Fat appears as Li Mu Bai, a powerful warrior. He gives up his sword to a nobleman, but it's stolen by a masked thief. And who is this masked man? It's none other than the teenaged princess Jen (Zhang Ziyi), who's rebelling from society's male-dominated sex roles. As you might guess, Crouching Tiger is another entry in the fairy-tale feminism sweepstakes. I'll admit the duel between Jen and her rival is zestier than a steaming bowl of Kung Pao chicken. Lasting for good ten minutes, it's a battle royale of swordplay and somersaults. Rated PG-13. At United Artists, Chez Artiste and Denver's Mayan.-T.D.

Dracula 2000. As its practically staledated title indicates, this Wes Craven-produced Nosferatu makes the billioneth stale take of perhaps the most overdone story in the history of cinema. With Craven's Scream editor Patrick Lussier as director this time, the two attempt to postmodernize this age-old tale the same way they did Craven's own films in the Scream trilogy. The cast is young, hip, sarcastic and way on to how vampire stuff should go down. The look of the film is hyper-fashionable both in special effects and the way the cute cast decorates the set. Mixed with the religious and mythical overtones of Dracula lore, this slick tone falls into flatness and embarassing-to-watch cheesiness. Though the film does assert some fairly inventive explanations behind standard vampire rules-the silver bullet, stake through the heart, etc., it does not possess enough soul and passion to make the story felt. Though Dracula has been done way too many times to possibly ever be revived, a resurrection will not occur through Craven's flip cultural excavating. With Omar Epps, Gerald Butler, Danny Masterson and Christopher Plummer. Rated R. At Colony Square, Crossroads Commons and Twin Peaks. -I.V.

Dude, Where's My Car? Casablanca it ain't. At Colony Square, Crossroads Commons and Twin Peaks.

The Emperor's New Groove. This refreshingly light Disney feature resembles more the delirious pace and unapologetically wacky plotlines of the old Chuck Jones Warner Bros. cartoons, than the staid "epics" of current Disney animated blockbusters. It feels as if director Mark Dindal made this film somehow under the radar at the Disney lot out of sheer joy, silliness and comradery with the comic voices in the film. David Spade, who voices the Emperor, is allowed to take his dry wit to successful extremes, while complimented perfectly by John Goodman as his goofy sidekick Pacha and Eartha Kitt as his hilarious nemesis Yzma. Apparently uninterested in being a giant of computer animation or even silver-screen-size plots or drama, this film seems to aspire to the simplicity of old days on the small screen. Unexpectedly, in a movie theater one feels the relaxed pleasure of waking up early on Saturday morning just to laugh out loud at T.V. With the voices of Wendie Malick and Patrick Warburton. Rated G. At Colony Square, Crossroads Commons and Twin Peaks.-I.V.

The Family Man. To the contemporary Christmas movie, It's a Wonderful Life lives on as the Rosetta stone, if not the Holy Grail. Almost every other recent yuletide drama seems patterned after the 1946 Frank Capra favorite. Now make way for The Family Man, which puts Nicolas Cage on the holiday hotseat. He plays Jack Campbell, a Wall Street wizard who gets a glimpse at his what-might-have-been life had he married and moved to the 'burbs. Jack sees how the other half lives-especially the spicy wife (Tea Leoni) he left behind. They have two tots and-here's the deflating part-Jack is a tire salesman. We know the drill by now for these parallel-lives fables. But in the movie's amusing middle, director Brett Ratner and Cage get their nails under the skin of middle-class suburbia. Taking a breather from his macho action roles, Cage gives a lively impression of a guy totally at odds with his new, diapers-and-day-care lifestyle. The Family Man's finale is nothing short of dysfunctional. Jack wants both his real and fantasy lives giftwrapped in a nice, tidy package, and the filmmakers endeavor to give it to him. Rated PG-13. At Colony Square, Crossroads Commons and Twin Peaks.-T.D.

How the Grinch Stole Christmas. Jim Carrey and director Ron Howard make Christmas come a few weeks early for audiences shopping around for entertainment cheer. Zesty and thoughtful, The Grinch just may steal the hearts of tots and grown-ups alike. Howard and his writers expand the fable by Dr. Seuss, adding a flashback revealing what turned the Grinch into such a grouch. Thankfully they don't trim the spirit of the story, though they do spike it with a few off-color gags. Much, but not all, of the film is carried on the hairy, green-skinned shoulders of Carrey. Rick Baker's marvelous facial makeup allows Carrey a stocking full of delightful expressions under the layers of latex. The anti-Grinch is little Cindy Lou (Taylor Momsen), Whoville's kindliest kid. What she lacks in acting talent, Momsen makes up for with an adorably angelic face and a curlicue Who hairdo that looks like it would fall down without scaffolding. "Maybe Christmas doesn't come from a store" is only one of the pleasant messages to be unwrapped in this candy-colored family film. Rated PG. At Arapahoe Village, Colony Square and Twin Peaks.-T.D.

The Little Vampire. You know desperation has set into the kiddie flick when bloodless writers have to sink their teeth into vampires for a story concept. Tony (Jonathan Lipnicki), an American boy in Scotland with his parents, saves the life of little Rudolph the red-eyed vampire (Rollo Weeks), and they become the best of friends. Rudolph's unfiendish family only drinks the blood of cows, and have been on a 300-year search for the cure that will turn them back into humans. The morbid premise is ticklish to say the least, but the filmakers don't help matters by including a tasteless running gag about vampiric cows. I can't wait for the darling kiddie version of the little boy who befriends Jack the Ripper and decides that history has given him a bad rap. Rated PG. At Basemar Twin.-T.D.

Miss Congeniality. Rule No. 28 of discriminating filmgoing: Beware of movies bearing stars who are also acting as producer. The combination of marquee ego and behind-the-scenes power can be an insidious combination. The perpetrator here is Sandra Bullock, who headlines as a tomboy FBI agent forced to go undercover as a contestant in a Texas beauty pageant. As the irrepressible, beer-swigging slob Gracie Hart, Bullock almost carries the comedy with her sass, snorts and pratfalls. But director Donald Petrie does Miss a disservice by surrounding Bullock with TV-style mugging (especially from Candice Bergen and William Shatner as the pageant organizers) and a dumb plot involving a mad bomber. You also have to believe the Bullock would have anything to be embarrassed about in showing off her figure in an evening gown. The Oscar-winning Michael Caine, who I doubt would turn down a part in a kitty-litter commercial, appears as a fashion specialist who makes over Bullock from butch into babe. With Benjamin Bratt. Rated PG-13. At Arapahoe Village, Colony Square and Twin Peaks.-T.D.

102 Dalmatians. Basically a repeat of the original remake (oh yes, Disney's down to sequels of remakes of their own films) this film is allotted more adult themes and violence in keeping with the current studio theory of entertain-the-parents-as-much-as-the-kids children's entertainment. Busting way past its G rating, 102 Dalmatians has people falling through glass and being shoved into active ovens, and more abuse towards Cruella's long suffering manservant than should occur in front of the kids. Glenn Close returns as Cruella De Vil, but with obviously more room to turn Cruella as closely into Norma Desmond as possible. She even has Anthony Powell, her dresser for Desmond, make Cruella's outlandish gowns. Close's frightening, violent and adult-humored Cruella definitely comes out the star-it's just the puppies' picture concept that got smaller. My recommendation is to rent the original, animated 101 Dalmatians for the kids. My recommendation for any adult who needs more over-the-top-psychotic roles with Glenn Close is a time out in the corner. With wasted appearances by Gerard Depardieu as a fat sight gag furrier and Eric Idle as a talking parrot. At Colony Square and Nederland Community Center.-I.V.

Proof of Life. The last time I didn't groan during a Meg Ryan movie was seven years ago in Sleepless in Seattle. Yet time after time since, in any number of films the studio powers that be continue to believe that Meg can be made over into Meryl Streep. The latest to vainly try is director Taylor Hackford. Ryan plays the wife of a U.S. oil engineer (David Morse) who's kidnapped and held for ransom by South American peasant army. Russell Crowe co-stars as Terry Thorne, a tough "kidnap and ransom" expert who's called in to negotiate with the peasant army that kidnaps the husband. Along with the script, Crowe must have memorized his press clippings to prepare for the role. Crowe is all business, all man, the strong, silent type. It's like watching the Rock of Gibraltor act. It could be that Hackford cast Crowe in an attempt to balance Ryan, who flies into histrionics any chance she gets. Ryan signals us for her emotional scenes by flailing her arms, shaking her head and darting her eyes offscreen (maybe she's getting directions from her hair stylist). With Pamela Reed and David Caruso. Rated R. At Colony Square and Crossroads Commons. -T.D.

Quills. The infamous Marquis de Sade has been reinvented by director Philip Kaufman as free-speech martyr, an artist who suffered for his right to write anything he pleased, no matter how nasty. Based on a play by Doug Wright, who also penned the script, the film takes up Sade's life in the 1790s, during his imprisonment in the Charenton mental asylum outside Paris. The filmmakers have no qualms about distorting the facts to suit their purpose, an artistic license that comes back to haunt them in the ruinous final act. After many dim roles since his Oscar-winning performance in Shine, Geoffrey Rush returns with a rush as the snarling, lecherous Marquis. The Abbé Coulmier (Joaquin Phoenix), the asylum's humanistic director, allows Sade to write as a way to "purge" himself of his wicked ways. Despite the setting, this is a vivid, exacting production in Jacqueline West's costumes and Martin Childs' dank, gothic interiors. Quills is at its pinpoint best when Kaufman lets the Marquis and the Abbé spar in tart discussions about the nature of man. But Quills runs out of ink well before it's over. What Kaufman and Wright do to their characters after such a provocative beginning is, well, sadistic. With Kate Winslet. Rated R. At Denver's Mayan.-T.D.

Red Planet. No, you're not seing double. This is the second Hollywood mission-to-Mars movie this year. Welcome aboard the Mars I spaceship in the year 2025, a dire time in our future when global warming-mostly caused by congressional hot air and SUVs-makes it necessary for humans to cast out for new worlds to inhabit and despoil. Humanity's best hope is to find out whether or not Mars can sustain life. Leading the expedition is Commander Bowman (Carrie-Anne Moss), tough and brave, but still a woman underneath the spacesuit. She leads a crew that includes a scientist (Val Kilmer) who's created AMEE, a mobile navigational robot that just happens to be equipped with "military mode" feature. Before you can say "Houston, we have a problem," director Antony Hoffman hurls more disasters at the crew than Buck Rogers faced in a lifetime. First a solar flare causes the landing crew to crash. Then AMEE blows a fuse and starts attacking the survivors. Then flesh-eating bugs make a dinner call. And so on and so forth until Kilmer sends an SOS to Moss using a 50-year-old radio left on the planet. His red-faced message: Please help, we're marooned on Mars with neither a spaceship nor a script. Rated PG-13. At Basemar Twin.-T.D.

Remember the Titans. Denzel Washington stars in a bogus, ridiculous drama that allegedly tells the true story of how a racially integrated high school football team from Virginia found brotherhood, harmony and a championship in 1971. The reigning auteur of idiocy, Jerry Bruckheimer produced this jock-idolizing drivel that flagrantly fumbles the facts. Washington plays a righteous black head coach who takes over the team of a white legend (Will Patton) because of a school-board desegregation mandate. Overcoming racial tensions with his drill-sergeant style, Washington quickly transforms the team into a lean, mean football machine. Blacks and whites on the team embrace each other as equals, and even sing along to Temptations songs together. But outside the gridiron, bigotry rages, which threatens to sack both Washington's coaching career and the team's winning streak. There's nothing to remember about this movie except that it's forgettably fraudulent. Rated PG-13. Basemar Twin.-T.D.

Rugrats in Paris. I hate to be the prude, again, but as with the first Rugrats movie I am apparently the only reviewer who finds the Rugrats' mix of media savvy "for parents humor" and bodily function "for toddlers humor" offensive and disturbing instead of "cutting edge." What is cutting edge about rushing adulthood into children's entertainment and pop culture referencing to appear hip and clever? The well-reviewed opening sequence sends up The Godfather (for the parents), but since it's a cartoon for children, the baby finds his hobby horse's head in his bed instead of a real one. The usual booger, excrement, sexual and violent imagery follow under infantile masks (for the kids). Rated G. At Colony Square.-I.V.

Space Cowboys. Clint Eastwood's 22nd film as a director is a space-age adventure that puts the stress on science over fiction. At least until the last reel, when the movie drastically changes course and turns into a bum steer. As the film opens, Houston has a problem. A Russian communications satellite is just weeks away from crashing into Earth. Only one man knows how to fix it, and that's Eastwood's Col. Frank Corvin, retired. He agrees to right the satellite on the condition that NASA lets him assemble his old test pilot team and man the shuttle themselves. Made in close cooperation with NASA, Cowboys has an old-fashioned, folksy appeal. To play his comical cronies, Eastwood roped veterans Tommy Lee Jones, Donald Sutherland and James Garner. Eastwood deliberately prolongs the build-up to the launch with one flight simulation after another. I only discovered why after his cowboy crew saddles up and blasts off into space. The ensuing drama has all the gravity and surprise of a walk on the moon. Earth to Eastwood: If I wanted to see the end of Armageddon again, I would have rented it. Rated PG-13. Basemar Twin.-T.D.

State and Main. If you're up for light, low-impact satire on Hollywood, you'll find it at the intersection of David Mamet's State and Main. Set in a folksy, Frank Capra-style small town of Waterton, Vt., it's the story of the chaos that comes in the wake of an invasion of a horde of Hollywood types who've come to shoot a movie. Before anyone yells, "Action!" both the stars and the locals are acting up. From a dim-bulb star (Alec Baldwin) who has a weakness for teen nymphs, to the manipulative director (William H. Macy) and the screenwriter (Philip Seymour Hoffman) who's searching for artistic purity, Mamet roasts anyone within camera range. The only one beyond reproach is a perky bookstore clerk (Rebecca Pidgeon), the sort of a character so sunny and wonderful that she could only exist in fiction. As always, Mamet effortlessly gives us droll, snappy dialogue, delivered by a first-rate cast of regulars like Macy and Pidgeon. From the man who gaves us such caustic dramas as American Buffalo and Glenngarry Glen Ross, you'd expect something with more of an edge. Once the shooting stops, the difference between this film and, say, The Player or Truffaut's Day for Night is like the difference between night and day. With Sarah Jessica Parker and David Paymer. Rated R. At Denver's Esquire.-T.D.

Unbreakable. On the heels of his The Sixth Sense, director M. Night Shyamalan has made a movie so tediously slow and pretentious that you can almost feel your life ebbing away while watching it. Hoping that lightning strikes twice, Shyamalan again casts Bruce Willis in another story of the supernatural. He plays David Dunn, a Philadelphia security guard who miraculously survives a train wreck while everyone else on board dies. The other lead is Samuel L. Jackson as a mysterious art dealer who thinks comic books are profound. He also suspects that Dunn may be...immortal. For unintentional comic relief, there's Jackson in unruly Afro, purple suit and glass cane, looking like a cracked James Brown. If we didn't have enough problems today, now we have to face the prospect of an immortal Bruce Willis. Will that mean that he'll be making Die Hard XXVII well into the next century? Don't fret. Jackson convinces him to use his new talents in the service of good. And that doesn't mean just helping little old ladies cross the street. Willis isn't equipped with X-ray vision, but he does have a sixth sense for sniffing out bad people. Rated PG-13. Rated PG-13. At Colony Square.-T.D.

Vertical Limit. Only a distracted critic could imagine that Vertical Limit is anything but a movie-and a poor one at that. It stars Chris O'Donnell as a mountain climber who must mount a rescue team when his sister is stranded near the top of K2, the world's second highest peak. The sister is on an expedition being financed by Elliot Vaughn (Bill Paxton), a Texas tycoon who's concocted the climb as a publicity stunt. In no time, an avalanche buries them, and the survivors are stuck in a crevasse with water and time running out. Limit can't even boast of authentic scenery, since it was shot in New Zealand. Director Martin Campbell shovels a blizzard of crises and disasters into the plot, thus forcing the daredevil rescue by O'Donnell's team. I dare go out on a precipice when I pitch the idea to you that Vertical Limit is an icy allegory about none other than our wannabe president, George W. Bush. Standing in for him is Vaughn, the cocky billionaire who brags that he intends to "take care of business, Texas-style." And what happens when he ascends the snowbound peak (i.e., the White House)? He falls in a big hole and has to simply wait helplessly until the rescuers arrive. And his daddy is nowhere in sight. Rated PG-13. At Arapahoe Village, Colony Square and Twin Peaks.-T.D.

West Side Story (1961). The film version of the smash Broadway musical by Jerome Robbins and Leonard Bernstein by way of Shakespeare not only swept the 1961 Oscars, but equally swept audiences off their feet. Richard Beymer and Natalie Wood (both dubbed in the songs) are the star-crossed lovers, updated to a New York City of rival Anglo and Puerto-Rican gangs. Directed by Robert Wise, it's long, loud and somewhat tacky, but you'd be hard-pressed to come up with a better score east or west. From "Tonight" to "Maria" and the rousing "America," this Bard borrowing is a song-and-dance bonanza. With Rita Moreno. At Nederland Community Center.-T.D.

What Women Want. It's not what women want. It's what superstar Mel Gibson wants, which here means a comic vehicle to show that he can be sensitive, self-deprecating and still cute. As playboy Chicago advertising man Nick Marshall, Gibson explores his feminine side when an electric shock anoints him with ability to hear women's thoughts. First he uses his new talent to manipulate a woman (Marisa Tomei) into bed. At the same time he discovers that most of his co-workers think he's a Sears Tower-sized jerk. He tries to turn a new leaf, playing Daddy Warbucks to his bratty daughter (Ashley Johnson). If this crass, crowd-pleasing film demonstrates anything at all it's that Gibson is no comic. King Kong could give a more subtle performance. But no matter. Director Nancy Myers goes for all the cheap laughs, and the film supplies a humdrum romance involving Jack and his insecure work rival (the ultra-ubiquitous Helen Hunt). She reveals to him the kind of man women really do want-and darned if he doesn't look a lot like Mel Gibson. Rated PG-13. At Arapahoe Village, Colony Square and Twin Peaks.-T.D.

You Can Count On Me. Today you can count on your fingers the number of meaty lead roles available for women; Laura Linney sinks her teeth into one of them in this quirky, closely-observed debut drama written and directed by Kenneth Lonergan. She plays "Sammy" Prescott, a divorced mom raising her boy Rudy (Rory Culkin) in a small town in upstate New York. Out of the blue, her wayward brother Terry (Mark Ruffalo) returns home, and immediately upsets her household. Sammy contributes to the confusion by plunging into an affair with her married boss (Matthew Broderick), while keeping another lover on hold. Linney, who could act the slacks off most Hollywood actresses, bares a countless numbers of emotions as she reacts and adds to the chaos swirling around her. Lonergan lends droll dialogue for ammunition, and a subtle, sad theme about how unreliable and irresponsible people can be. The victim here is little Rudy, who's exposed both to his mother's flightiness and his uncle's recklessness. Though you can count on Linney's sensitive performance, the film as whole doesn't hold together. Lonergan is better at creating characters than he is crafting a balanced story. Rated R. At Denver's Chez Artiste and United Artists.-T.D.