U Turn

As the first Oliver Stone movie to gleefully dispense with sociopolitical significance, U-Turn is an overdue event, a chance for Stone to apply his hypnotic acid-trip-of-the-soul wizardry to something sexy and lowdown.

The stylistic fun Stone has in dramatizing this crime of passion thoroughly revitalizes the well-worked genre.

Penn turns in a crisp, unfussy comic performance, Lopez vamps like a scorpion in heat, Nolte sustains a pretty good John Huston impression, and Thornton is mighty peculiar as the mechanic from hell.

It's a disappointing ride.

It's so empty emotionally it's difficult to see what the point is, unless it's the celebration of emptiness, an aim that has become so familiar recently it hardly seems worth the trouble everyone has gone to.

Stone has stretched this rubber band past the point where it should snap into parody, but it still holds the shape of a rubber band.

With the exception of 1988's lacerating Talk Radio, U Turn might be the most forgotten film in Oliver Stone's canon -- a shame, since it offers sinful pleasures for those willing to take the ride.

It's a feast for the senses, as long as you have a strong stomach.

This long, strange trip is fun but aimless.

Viewers who don't need depth and can ignore technique overkill along with social critique nonsense, should enjoy the bumpy ride offered by 'U Turn.'

One of Stone's best narrative, and thought-provoking, efforts to date.

A bad trip flick.