film

TORONTO -- Bill Maher knows that some moviegoers won't want to touch "Religulous" with a 10-foot staff of Moses.

"That's OK. That's any movie. What movie appeals to everybody? Not even everybody went to see Batman."

Drew Barrymore's vulnerable, little-girl voice is perfect for the pampered pooch, Chloe, in "Beverly Hills Chihuahua," a Disney film that is more adventure than comedy.

"Religulous" has the theological depth of a religion documentary by a seventh-grade church dropout, which is exactly what filmmaker Bill Maher is.

A guide to movies from a family perspective:

"Beverly Hills Chihuahua"

-- Rated: PG.

-- Suitable for: Preschoolers and school-age children who can sit attentively through a 90-minute movie.

Greg Kinnear is such a likable guy that he's able to slide damaged characters under the radar so that audiences root for and connect with them before they realize that there's something wrong with them. It isn't that his characters don't deserve sympathy; it's just that viewers need to understand that they have flaws.

In the land of the blind, the visionary director is king.

"How To Lose Friends & Alienate People" is three movies in one.

For starters, it's a hilarious ribbing of celebrity journalism -- think "America's Sweethearts," but funny. Then it's a behind-the-scenes expose about pop-culture power -- "The Devil Wears Prada" redone in the film milieu.

If you liked "Superbad" and "Juno," loved fragile everyteen Michael Cera in both and are aching to see his next seminal high-school coming-of-age comedy, uh, don't.

"Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist" is stupefyingly inane, a movie that will let you down harder than a breakup by text message.

Ed Harris sure has watched his share of John Wayne, Clint Eastwood and James Stewart Westerns.

The star and director of throwback Western "Appaloosa," Harris plays Virgil Cole, a decisive lawman with rawhide skin and a trigger finger that's matched in speed and accuracy only by his mouth.

"BIGGER, STRONGER, FASTER*." (2008. PG-13. MAGNOLIA HOME ENTERTAINMENT. $26.98.)