Michael Apted (USA/Britain)
1943. Allied convoy steaming across North Atlantic. German U-boats lying in wait. Unless the Nazi's Engima code is cracked right quick - kaboom. Alas, the real enigma here is why the Brits managed to screw up the sort of period piece they normally do so well. Perhaps it's just that code-breaking isn't exactly an action-packed activity, and neither director Michael Apted nor screenwriter Tom Stoppard have found an effective way of disguising that unfortunate truth - in short, they haven't figured out how to dramatize number-crunching. Instead, the script meanders off on various paths, romantic and otherwise. The muddle that follows is animated only by Jeremy Northam's scene-stealing cameos, and by Stoppard's occasional flights of cruel wit, invariably in tangential remarks like: "Drowning herself was Virginia Woolf's greatest contribution to English literature". It's never a good sign when the asides are the best part of the picture. - R.G.

(Fri. Sept. 14, 6:30 p.m., RTH; Sat. Sept. 15, 9:30 a.m., Uptown 1)