"Marley & Me" — Aww, look at that cute, fluffy puppy in those "Marley & Me" ads. It almost makes you think you're in for a feel-good comedy about a rambunctious yellow Lab and the family who loves him no matter what chaos he causes. Well, "Marley & Me" is all that, but if you've read the best-selling memoir by John Grogan that inspired the movie, you also know that it has more than its share of hanky moments. Watching all those heart-tugging stories play out on a giant screen, though, we're not talking about just a tear or two welling up — we're talking grown men and women snuffling and sobbing uncontrollably. – Neptune Theatre

"Cadillac Records" — Darnell Martin could have made an entire movie about Muddy Waters. Or Etta James. Or Chuck Berry. Instead, the writer-director has made a movie about all of them, cramming their complicated individual stories into the larger tale of Chicago-based Chess Records, the label that launched those stars and so many others during the 1950s and '60s. The result feels even more cursory and rushed than the average music biopic, a genre that's already difficult to depict without lapsing into self-parody. – Neptune Theatre