In The Good Girl Jennifer Aniston gets a make-under that would make her Friends character weep, but she finally proves her acting mettle away from the ditzy-but-glamorous Rachel type. A low-key drama from the writer and director duo behind Chuck and Buck, The Good Girl places Aniston's bored shop-girl Justine at the centre of a soul-destroying life in a sleepy Texan town. Like a modern Madame Bovary, Justine's life is stuck in a rut-her marriage is dull and her job at the Retail Rodeo even duller-when a new colleague Holden (Jake Gyllenhaal) offers her an escape. A tortured soul who's obsessed with The Catcher in the Rye and thinks nobody understands him, Holden is a typical, angst-ridden young man. But to Justine he's intriguing and romantic and their shared sense of dejection soon leads to an affair and a short-lived liberation from their daily lives. Aniston could never pass as dowdy but she does a very convincing turn as the crestfallen Justine, using subtlety and dry humour rather than melodrama to convey her quiet desperation. John C Reilly as her permanently stoned husband and Tim Blake Nelson as his creepy chum are both superb alongside her. Even the smaller roles are furnished with some memorable moments: Justine's colleague makes outrageous tannoy announcements to zombie-like customers at the Retail Rodeo. Funny, strange and touching by turns The Good Girl, has its awkward moments but as a quirky slice of life it gets most things right. On the DVD: The Good Girl offers a feature-length commentary from director Miguel Arteta and writer Mike White that takes a while to get going but does provide some insight and humour. [+]

Summer Catch combines sports movie with teen romance across class boundaries and sticks in some less than effective bawdy comedy to make up the weight. Playing in a local summer baseball league is the last chance at a professional sports career Ryan (Freddie Prinz Jr) has after he gave up an earlier chance in order to attend his mother's funeral. The threats to his success include the rivalry of other young players, the temptation to just have fun offered by teammate Brubaker (Matthew Lillard) and his growing feelings for Tenley (Jessica Biel). Ryan also has his own demon-an obsession with failure. Occasional outcroppings of psychobabble and melodrama stop this ever finding a satisfactory tone of its own-the scenes on the baseball diamond are often the most interesting. The scenes of sexual comedy largely waste such interesting young actors as Marc Blucas, Christian Kane and Brittany Murphy, all of whom do what they can with unprepossessing material. This is a film for Freddie Prinz Jr fans more than anyone else. On the DVD: Summer Catch on DVD offers a collection of deleted scenes that indicate just how much more uncertain the film's tone was before editing; the commentary by actors Prinz and Biel and director Mike Tollin shows that they at least all had a fairly good time making it. The visual aspect ratio is widescreen anamorphic 1. 85:1 and the DVD has Dolby 5:1 digital sound. [+]

Opposites attract in Fools Rush In, a conventional but refreshingly unpredictable romantic comedy. New York nightclub designer (Matthew Perry, from television's Friends) is in Las Vegas to supervise the construction of a new project when he meets a fiery Mexican beauty (Salma Hayek). It's lust at first sight, and their one-night stand takes an unexpected turn when she shows up three months later to announce that she's pregnant. They're determined to do right for each other, so they get married in a Vegas chapel with an Elvis impersonator as their witness. Then comes the hard part-trying to figure out if they're actually compatible. The plot complications are mostly familiar, but Perry and Hayek throw some bright sparks as their initial bliss turns to more realistic concerns for family and future. Along the way there's some sharp dialogue and a few good laughs to give this all-too-human comedy an enjoyable spin. -Jeff Shannon, Amazon. com.

Produced in a time when films were both literally and figuratively black and white, Made for Each Other was unique in its effective blending of the comedic, the dramatic and, as perhaps some would insensitively say, the melodramatic. Beautiful Carole Lombard and likeable James Stewart are Jane and John Mason, a couple who meet, fall madly in love, marry and quickly have a baby. But while they-and the audience-are confident that they are meant for each other, life intercedes and the couple must meet with disapproving in-laws, job stress, financial challenges and, finally, a devastating illness. Lombard and Stewart-and the genuinely good people they portray-are utterly compelling and charming. Say yawningly what you will about tradition but the Masons' path is one that many, if not most, go down. And unlike the wonderful but wholly fantasy world of peer Preston Sturges, director John Cromwell's universe is, like real life, full of ups and downs. It's an accessible, sensitive portrayal. He gives the audience characters they want to see succeed, and to see stay together in the process. It may be a tale of triumph of the human spirit but its ultimate sentiment-one that celebrates the kindness of strangers-is thoroughly sweet, though in no way saccharine. Look for a great supporting cast, including a blustery Charles Coburn as John Mason's boss and Lucile Watson as Mason's interfering mother. [+]

In Venus Beauty the carefully unattached existence of working girl Nathalie Baye is suddenly upended when a lovesick hunk Samuel Le Bihan introduces himself: "My name is Antoine and I love you". Set in a cute glass storefront with a neon pink and blue façade that could have sprung from a Jacque Demy musical, this bittersweet romantic drama was written for the arresting Baye, who plays a middle aged "girl" in a uniquely French beauty shop in Paris that specialises in facials, body treatments, massages, and emotional confession. Her co-workers, young, sweetly guileless brunette cutie Audrey Tautou and gloomy twentysomething Mathilde Seigner, are like a glimpse into her past lives, one full of hope and giddy optimism, the other turned resentful from disappointment. She clings to the girly camaraderie and workaday auto-pilot of her job while her "patronne" (the incomparable Bulle Ogier) nudges her toward responsibility. Writer/director Tonie Marshall has a marvellous feeling for the women who work and visit the place, though her soulful bohemian artist Le Bahine is defined by little more than good looks, shaggy charm, and a kind of reckless attraction. The film is at its best with the women: the easy by-play and guarded emotions of the shopgirls, the often uncontrolled outbursts of the offbeat and oddball clients, and especially the haunted and lonely Baye, who warily creeps out of her shell for another chance at intimacy. -Sean Axmaker, Amazon. com.

Some critics complained that City of Angels could never compare to Wim Wenders's exquisite German film Wings of Desire, which served as the later film's primary inspiration. The better argument to make is that any such comparisons are beside the point, because Wings of Desire was a much more deeply poetic, artfully contemplative film, whereas City of Angels is an enchanting product of mainstream Hollywood. Meg Ryan stars as Dr Maggie Rice, a heart surgeon who is grieving over a lost patient when an angel named Seth (Nicolas Cage) appears to comfort her. She can see him despite the "rule" that angels are invisible and Seth's love for Maggie forces him to choose between angelic immortality and a normal human existence on earth with her. Featuring heavenly roles for TV veterans Andre Braugher and Dennis Franz, the film liberally borrows imagery from Wings of Desire, but it also creates its own charming identity. Cage and Ryan give fine performances as lovers convinced they are soul mates, and although the plot relies on a last-minute twist that doesn't quite work, this earnest love story struck a chord with audiences and proved to be one of the surprise hits of 1998. -Jeff Shannon.