The Movies

1 How the Grinch stole Christmas

$18.5 million 4 weeks in release $195.5 million to date

PLOT Big-budget revision of the famous story, with the Grinch disrupting the Whos' holiday cheer.

MESSAGE Everyone deserves a Merry Christmas.

CAUTION Rated PG for some crude humor.

$16 million 1 week in release $16 million to date

PLOT Action-adventure about a rescue mission on K2, the world's second highest peak.

MESSAGE Extreme elements can tap man's urge for survival.

CAUTION Rated PG-13 for bad language and intense life-and-death situations.

$10.41 million 1 week in release $10.41 million to date

PLOT An engineer's wife hires a professional hostage negotiator when Third World thugs take her husband captive.

MESSAGE Kidnapping is big business in the post-Cold War world.

CAUTION Rated R for violence, bad language, and some drug material.

$7.5 million 3 weeks in release $77.4 million to date

PLOT The sole survivor of a train wreck faces a bizarre explanation of why he was unscratched.

MESSAGE Not everybody is a hero and not every hero knows his calling.

CAUTION Rated PG-13 for disturbing and violent content (including a child pointing a gun at his father) and a crude sexual reference.

$7 million 1 week in release $7 million to date

PLOT Swords and sorcery inspired by the once-popular game features a group of characters trying to foil an evil wizard.

MESSAGE Those with special abilities shouldn't be able to dominate others.

CAUTION Rated PG-13 for fantasy action violence.

M. Night Shyamalan may wind up as the 21st century's version of Alfred Hitchcock. Last year's Sixth Sense was an unexpected smash hit and this year's Unbreakable is a suspenseful follow-up. Bruce Willis plays a security guard who boards a train to Philly and is the sole survivor when it wrecks. He's completely unharmed and doesn't know why. An eccentric comic book art dealer (Samuel L. Jackson) enters his life, claiming the answer is that he is a real-life superhero. Mr. Shyamalan makes a risky move by creating a movie like this with little action, choosing instead to focus on the plot and characters. The Willis and Jackson characters are juxtaposed: One survived a horrific crash, while the other has a genetic ailment that makes his bones brittle and easily breakable. As with his previous effort, Mr. Shyamalan hides clues about the resolution throughout the movie-although this one does not hinge as much on a twist ending. Numerous people have tried making stories about the comic book world crossing over into normal society; this is one of the better efforts.