David Rooney

Turning Red is original, funny and tender, an affectionate reminder that adolescence is a time of life not easily tamed, and sometimes the animal inside us demands release.

An accomplished marriage of elaborate style and content.

Told with captivating simplicity and yet richly cinematic, it combines ethnographic and spiritual elements in a haunting love story with classic undertones, affording a glimpse into a little-known culture.

All of a Sudden is an odd but audacious film in the way it favors the thematic over the dramatic. Those not attuned to Hamaguchi’s wavelength may find it overstretched and desiccated. But if you can get on board with its leisurely pace, there’s transcendant beauty in its view that all lives are of value, no matter how diminished.

Michael Dweck and Gregory Kershaw (The Last Race) directed, produced and shot this captivating vérité documentary, which finds humor, charm and poignancy in the crusty eccentrics and their adored canine companions who sniff out the aromatic tubers, usually under the secretive cloak of night.

There’s swaggering confidence in the filmmaking to match that of the title character, along with adrenalized visuals, fine-grained production design and scrupulous attention to casting, down to the background players.

The level of socially accepted discrimination exposed here provokes both heartbreak and anger.

A Thanksgiving family reunion comedy that sparkles with acerbic wit, original characters and genuine heart.

A stirring requiem of rage and resistance.

The resulting film feels highly personal, tender yet unsentimental.

The lustrous textures, boldly saturated colors and lush sounds of The Invisible Life of Euridice Gusmao serve to intensify the intimacy of Karim Ainouz's gorgeous melodrama about women whose independence of mind remains undiminished, even as their dreams are shattered by a stifling patriarchal society.

A sober and yet profoundly stirring contemplation of family, roots, identity and home, which engrosses throughout the course of its two-hour running time.

No less impressive than the narrative mastery here, however, is the technical execution of this bold minimalist experiment.

There's no such thing as a sure bet in career jumps, so the elegant execution, the incisive grasp of character and milieu, and the stealthy but sure arrival of pathos are extremely gratifying.

Blue Moon is a deceptively modest project, but it’s beautifully executed and fascinatingly nuanced despite being quite straightforward in terms of plot.

This is a stirring valentine to a neighborhood and its people that, as the film tells it, stared gentrification in the eye and stood their ground, staying true to their cultural identity.

Alberdi makes her directorial hand virtually invisible, observing her subjects from a discreet distance that allows them to be narrators of their own story while never speaking directly to the camera.

This clear-eyed ethical drama is propelled by a performance of stunning psychological insight and raw feeling from Jasmine Batchelor. But the film is rendered even more affecting by the careful consideration it gives to the impact of her character's fluctuating decision-making, both on the people directly involved and those on the fringes.

Bold, inventive, sustained adrenaline rush of a movie.

This is a film of transporting grace and compassion, cerebral but never cold. It’s no small compliment to say that After Yang seems almost like an American sci-fi movie that Ozu or Kore-eda might have made.

Solemn, searching and at times even poetic in its indignation, this is a sensitively crafted contemplation of corrosive grief, even if the unanswerable questions surrounding the case keep the film somewhat emotionally muted.

Emotionally involving material is the key element to a good human-interest documentary, and Lipitz, a Baltimore native with a background in Broadway producing, has tapped into a great story here of adversity, struggle and elevating achievement.

The zippy pacing, buoyant energy and steady stream of laugh-out-loud moments hint at the joy Burton appears to have found in revisiting this world, and for anyone who loved the first movie, it’s contagious. That applies also to the actors, all of whom warm to the dizzying lunacy.

I’m Still Here is a gripping, profoundly touching film with a deep well of pathos. It’s one of Salles’ best.

Exhaustively informative and powerfully emotional.

The film is non-fiction storytelling of remarkable nuance.

A fascinating contemplation of adolescent sexuality that will be a star-making platform for its young lead, Marine Vacth.

Its untethered, ethereal flow is utterly intoxicating, an immersive experience shaped by the clouds of cigarette and reefer smoke in the air, the smell of goat curry wafting from the kitchen, and above all, the sinuous rhythms of the slow-groove romantic reggae subgenre that gives the film its title.