THE car chase, that staple of so many Hollywood films, came of age exactly 30 years ago in Peter Yates's Bullitt. The pursuit up and down the hills of San Francisco became the model for many a future film. Over the years, chases got a little faster, the number of cars smashed up increased, as hero and villain, or hero and cops, hurtled through the streets of some city otherwise strangely denuded of cars. But the car chase remained immutable, enjoyable, and preposterous, there to thrill and get the plot out of a hole of its own making. Occasionally it was played for laughs, but mostly it was simply an excuse for heart-in-the-mouth thrills when all else had failed.

The sole reason for bothering to see Ronin, John Frankenheimer's impenetrable thriller, is its amazing car chases: arguably the biggest and best ever, even although they could never have taken place, since today's traffic would not permit such frenetic speeds.

A mysterious woman, Natascha McElhone, enlists the services of five trained killers - Robert De Niro, Sean Bean, Jean Reno, Stellan Skarsgard, and Skipp Sudduth. Rendered obsolete by the end of the Cold War, they will take on anything, even something as dodgy as this. She wants them to acquire a briefcase belonging to some unnamed gang. They set about their task, fall out, and start seeking it as individuals, while Ms McElhone, who appears to be Irish (or may just be pretending since her accent is terrible) gets bossed about by Jonathan Price, who may also be Irish, or not (his accent is even worse). Skarsgard ends up with the case, its mysterious owners, who may be Russian and have something to do with an ice show, start chasing him, as do the other killers. Meanwhile Price kills anyone silly enough to let him.

Ronin is the name by which Samurai warriors whose lord had been killed were known. Having failed to protect him, they became outcasts, or Ronins. Just what that has to do with De Niro, Reno, Skarsgard, et al is anyone's guess, but then what the film's about is anyone's guess, as is what is inside the briefcase. We never learn, although De Niro appears to have something to do with the IRA. Deep meaning is hinted at, but all we get is De Niro sleepwalking through his role, looking as if he is in search of a facelift, and Reno being terribly Gallic. The only one doing anything remotely like acting is Skarsgard, who at least makes his villain interesting.

One can see why De Niro took the role; his high street cred - as opposed to his art-house status - is negligible, and there was the bonus of filming in beautiful French locations. But the role is a waste of his talents and time. Nor is Ronin a particularly productive use of Mr Frankenheimer's time, although his recent films have been pretty dire and his glory days are well in the past. Stunt co-ordinator Joe Dunne, veteran racing car driver Jean-Claude Lagniez, and editor Tony Gibbs are all to be congratulated. Ronin is a pig's ear, but traces of a silk purse can be seen.

John Dahl, who made those marvellous tales of adultery and deception, Red Rock West and The Last Seduction, springs a surprise with his latest film, Rounders. It is about poker and those peculiar people, poker players. Matt Damon is Mike McDermott, a New York law student so obsessed with poker that he loses his $30,000 stake in one game with the local Mister Big of the card table, Teddy KGB (John Malkovich), a renegade Russian accustomed to always winning. When Mike's best friend Worm (Edward Norton) gets out of jail he is faced with the need to pay off his outstanding gambling debts, which have been taken over by Teddy KGB. Worm, a sleazebag, is incapable of telling the truth even to Mike, who, as thick as he is pretty, believes in him and ends up standing surety for his debts without the wherewithal to do so. If Mike cannot come up with the money, Teddy KGB will break everyone's legs. Malkovich's

Russian accent is as hilarious as his behaviour, and in his long list of over-the-top performances, this one is by far the best.

Mike gets good advice from an ancient judge, Martin Landau, and a fellow player (John Turturro), and the heave-ho from his girlfriend, Jo (Gretchen Mol), who cannot put up with his forever playing poker when he should be studying for his law exams. Worm goes to the dogs.

Dahl clearly wanted to paint a portrait of a world of men obsessed, one with rules and language all of its own. Damon fails to create a believable character, either as poker player or law student, while the to-ing and fro-ing of the card games remains as impenetrable to the non-poker player as the language the players use. Norton is so good at being a sleazebag that one never cares about Worm's predicament.

IT IS a small mercy that Les Miserables is not the film of the long-running musical, but yet another version of the Victor Hugo novel filmed countless times, notably in 1935, with Frederic March; 1952, with Michael Rennie; and 1956 with Jean Gabin in the role of the hapless Jean Valjean. This time Liam Neeson, a good solid hero figure, is Valjean, while Javert, the relentless policeman who hounds him, is played by Geoffrey Rush, bidding fair to become one of the best character stars in the business. Lavishly mounted, and directed by Bille August with a sure sense of period, it is a decent addition to the list. But glum.

In Jeroen Krabbe's Left Luggage, set in Antwerp, Scottish actress Laura Fraser plays Chaja, a nice Jewish girl whose parents have buried their Holocaust memories. Hired by a Hassidic family to be nanny to the youngest child (Adam Monty), she comes up against a Jewish past she knows nothing about. It is a thoughtful piece, but the polyglot accents of the international cast are a pity. Fraser has been made to use RADA English which contrasts horribly with the vowel sounds of the others. It would have seemed much better filmed in one tongue, dubbed where the actors could not cope, and then shown with English subtitles.