The spirit of the Cold War lives on in the hokey, enjoyably florid East-West, which begins in June 1946 with a band of emigrants from the West arriving in Stalin's Russia expecting amnesty and good will only to be executed or sent to forced-labor camps. For propaganda purposes, a Russian-émigré physician (Oleg Menchikov) and his French wife (Sandrine Bonnaire) are spared, but he is boxed in by his "model-returnee" status, and she aches for Paris. Catherine Deneuve turns up as a celebrated French actress who aids the cause of freedom, and the West has never looked so glamorous. Who would have believed that eyeliner and lip gloss and great cheekbones could be this political? . . . DreamWorks' latest animated feature, The Road to El Dorado, has a few sequences with real swoop and glide; a few semi-forgettable Elton John-Tim Rice ditties; some unmistakably Rosie Perez-ish line readings by Rosie Perez, playing a native girl; and enough shimmering gold surfaces to make you believe the Yucatan is an adjunct of Trump Tower.

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• Archive: “Movie Reviews”
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