Desson Thomson

Watching this masterwork allows you to return to the filmmaking sensibility of the 1960s, when epics looked like epics.

In this final installment of a glorious trilogy (which includes the films “Blue” and “White”) he has saved his greatest for last.

Masterfully arranged for color, texture, decor and camera fluidity, The Conformist is more like a symphonic poem than a movie. (Review of 1994 Release)

After watching Vertigo at the Uptown, I was awestruck.

Rules would have been just another good movie if not for its masterly visual design. With it, however, the black-and-white film enters the realm of immortality.

Grim, yes, and great viewing.

This movie -- which is equally appealing to children (those of adventurous, non-freak-outable spirit), Japanese animation (anime) fans, and any surviving acquaintances of Timothy Leary -- is so full of invention, you might want to take a breather now and then.

It doesn't matter how many times you see these images. They're always exciting.

Observed mostly from Remy's rat's-eye view, Gusteau's kitchen is a memorable world-in-miniature with its vivid old-fashioned stoves, bright, brassy pots and general air of frenzied industry; never did sliced red onions or simmering soup look so fresh and real.

As rich and fun as it was in post-Depression 1937 -- yes, 1937. And the seven dwarfs (Doc, Happy, Sneezy, Sleepy, Bashful, Grumpy and Dopey) are every bit as charming as they "Hi-ho" to work at the diamond mine.

To TV-raised minds, Paradise spends more time than it needs to get where it's going. But in its own terms, the movie has flashes of oldtime magic. It's a precious piece of time past -- and time kept.

Brilliant and brutal, funny and exhilarating, jaw-droppingly cruel and disarmingly sweet...To watch this movie (whose 2 1/2 hours speed by unnoticed) is to experience a near-assault of creativity.

Screenwriter Walters and director Hoffman superbly replay the mood of Tremain's lively, well-written novel.

This heavy-hitting fist lands with calculated deliberation. Despite Spielberg's obviously genuine commitment, "Schindler's List" feels strangely controlled -- more than impassioned. It's officially artistic, an engineered project of pride, Little Stevie's growing-up project, rather than an organically brilliant masterpiece.

Robocop is one weird and entertaining hybrid of camp and sci-fi shoot-'em-up.

It hasn't aged so much as triumphantly metastasized. [20th Anniversary Release]

On one level, Yi Yi is classic soap opera, with a suicide attempt, a wedding ceremony, even a brutal 11 o'clock news murder, all in the mix. But Yang's direction is so admirably restrained, it lends rich heft to everything.

Manchurian, with its fatalistic, dreamlike quality, comprises two of [Frankenheimer's] finest hours. [Re-release]

Awash in heart-rending emotions and gorgeous images, this is a movie to lose yourself in.

Magnificently nonchalant about its magic.

One of the most pleasurable movies of the year.

This movie is not only a thrilling experience, it closes the book on a truly satisfying trilogy.

If it were the last videotape available in the only video store in the remotest corner of Alaska, I'd take one last slug of Jack Daniels and start walking directly into the howling snows.

Its themes of passion, heartbreak and the inexorable passage of time are eternal.

There's no doubt about the film's sheer power and taut originality.

Keeper is nonfiction in name only. Unabashedly subjective and dramaturgically conscious, it squeezes reality until the drama collects. Luckily for filmmakers Joe Berlinger and Bruce Sinofsky, this reality was juicy stuff.

If 8½ seems stuck in the early 1960s, it's only superficially so. Somehow, the movie is more than the dated crisis of a naval-contemplating artist. It's about the inability in all of us to make sense of our lives, put it all together and come up with something meaningful.

His (Tarkovsky's) pictures, and his sounds -- such as the symphonic drip of raindrops in a wooded pond -- tell more than just the immediate story; they rejuvenate the mind.

It's a brilliant concept, one of Allen's finest. Love the concept, baby. But the execution is, well, average.

Reveals itself detail by searing detail.

Apocalypse Now Redux, which contains about 50 minutes of extra footage, is Coppola's final artistic assault. This is the one where he honors his vision -- or clears his name, whichever way you look at it. Does he do it? Perhaps the first thing to get out of your mind when watching this "Apocalypse," or the 1979 version, is worrying about whether the film's a success or failure. It's both. The more you see of "Apocalypse," the more obvious its triumphs and mistakes.

As in Chaplin's films, humor and tragedy dance a wonderful tango throughout the movie. Baran is heartbreaking and laugh-out-loud funny, sometimes apart, sometimes together.

You believe in everything.

As taut, sleek and guiltily comfortable as the classic Chrysler automobile we see at the beginning, "Quiz Show" is built for entertaining road performance. The facts (at least, the dramatically inconvenient ones) are left on the side of the road. Redford retains the emotional engine of the Van Doren affair and drives this baby all the way—presumably—to the bank.

For students of cool ... Le Cercle Rouge is required viewing.

One of the great movie satires. And if it isn't the funniest rock spoof ever made, it certainly shares the title with "The Rutles."

One of Martin Scorsese's most brutal but stunning movies, an incredible, relentless experience about the singleminded pursuit of crime.

Moolaade, in short, is a movie to rock the soul.

There are so many things to enjoy here.

Kryzstof Kieslowski's White...is a continuing testament to the Polish director's poetic mastery. Like all of Kieslowski's works, White articulates a whole language of sensations, images, ironies and mystery -- often with a minimum of dialogue. But it is no rarefied, abstract exercise. The movie...aches with human dimension.

Thanks to two delightful performers, you're drawn powerfully to the outcome.

For horror fans who appreciate a bit of craft with their second-rate experiences -- Paul Haslinger's fear-mongering score is terrific for what it's worth -- this might merit a future late-night rental.

Buscemi makes Seymour into a character you simply want to see again and again. He's the most appealing, amusing "loser" anyone could ever share old records with.

At it’s core, it’s just another youth-culture flick about the search for love. It’s also a mediocre bid to join the shoestring pantheon of such filmic self-starters as Spike Lee (She’s Gotta Have It) and Kevin Smith (Clerks).

An intriguing yarn.

Mirren's finely calibrated performance reveals a complex woman coping with a bewildering world, and Blair's growing sympathy for his beleaguered monarch gradually becomes ours. This nuanced compassion may not impress the real Queen Elizabeth II, but, for us commoners, it makes for a richer experience.

Through this miasma of pain and suffering, love may not flicker more strongly than a dim lamp. But it's the only beacon to consider. Can Barry find his? Thanks to Anderson's assured picture, a symphony of cinematic textures, that disarmingly simple question becomes incredibly compelling.

An extraordinary film ... that's impossible to dismiss or leave unmoved.

Superbly conceived anti-biopic.

Without hesitation, I hand the comic award to Smith. She plays a pinched guest known as Constance, Countess of Trentham, to such a hilarious tee, her tee runneth over.

A 160 minute work of sustained brilliance and delicacy.

Honey's a little too darling for reality but, obviously, that's not what this candy-cane vehicle of a movie is all about. It's about the way Alba moves and how good she looks when she's backlighted and smiling.

So full of creativity, so subversive, so alive.

It's easily the best and brightest family-friendly movie of the year.

This is wonderful stuff, as far as it goes.

A jarring, mesmerizing documentary.

Instead of "Masterpiece Theatre"-style fawning, [Scorsese] fills this movie with visual flow, masterful cinematography and assured direction. There's an alert, thinking presence behind the camera.

To watch "Lives" is not just to enjoy a fabulously constructed timepiece; it's to appreciate a deft cautionary tale.

Chinese director Zhang Yimou understands perfectly that the small can be epic and awe-inspiring. And, by the way, he knows how to get big, too.

[Zaillian] employs every trick and convention in the Hollywood book, but with such expertise, it feels original. Never were the emotions this roundly affected -- around a simple board game.

There are so many good things to say about this film it's hard to find a statement that really nails it. Perhaps we can leave at this: Y Tu Mama Tambien is originality writ large.

Unabashed, streamlined entertainment, and you won't hate yourself in the morning for liking it.

If The Madness of King George, which Bennett adapted for the screen, dilutes some of the play's articulate intensity, it still conveys the drama's essential spirit. King George-the-movie also has the supreme advantage of Nigel Hawthorne, who originated the role of George on stage. His subtly calibrated performance, as he undergoes emotional rages, bouts of dementia and sudden attacks of lucidity, provide the film's most amusing and touching moments.

The Piano plays itself with such contrapuntal richness, it resonates in you forever.

There isn't enough magic in the bag this time. Although Parkes and Lasker produce a set of primates guaranteed to charm the upholstery off the theater seats, there is little else.

William Shakespeare would need a sense of humor to view Jean-Luc Godard's "King Lear" without getting steamed up in his bodkins.

For all his legitimate laments and pithy documentary moments, Moore gloats too much over his treasure. Where Moore makes his mark is basically where he shuts up and, like a good documentarian ought to, lets the subjects do the talking.

Simple, yet quietly astonishing film.

This is the Mickey Mouse factory at its finest, with inventive animation, stirring music and a pride of inspired, almost-human animals.

By many other directors' standards, Au Revoir would be a major achievement. But Malle has reached higher. If he'd made his childhood movie earlier in his career -- when he didn't have the sense to be so dispassionate -- it might have packed a meatier punch. Now it's just a deftly aimed poke.

The visual comedy is brilliant.

Contains about 10 additional minutes and is as fabulous and enjoyable as ever. To be honest, I didn't even notice the new material, having not seen the original film since its 2001 release. I just saw a film that works beautifully and has held together well.

Frances McDormand enjoys the comedic role of her career.

A sequel that eclipses the original. The toys are back with even more hilarious vengeance. The story's twice as inventive as its predecessor.

[The children's] remarkable lack of self-consciousness ... and Kore-eda's quasi-documentary style give this movie a stunning credibility.

One fabulous Middle-earth show.

The movie does what any great musician should: It lifts an idea to the heights of ecstasy; it sells its song.

Dramatically, this is something of a waking dream.

Amounts to a rare gift and an opportunity to appreciate the end of an era and celebrate one of the screen's most subtly etched heroes: the soft-spoken Monsieur Georges Lopez.

The sexiest movie of the year.

Mulholland Drive is an extended mood opera, if you want to put an arty label on incoherence.

A small masterpiece of a documentary that takes us into the heart of a complex darkness.

Pure energy, a perfect orchestration of heroism, villainy, suspense and comic relief.

A story that rips fleshy holes through your heart.

McNamara fits perfectly into Morris's canon: He tells a story that knocks you right off your feet.

It's one of the most powerful films of the year.

Rushmore is an almost indefinable genre of its own. A comedy with a menacing edge? An ironic romance? Hard to call.

Kettle of Fish, starring Matthew Modine as a commitment-skittish saxophone player, is a warm-spirited romantic comedy, but it tends to have a squawky pitch.

Director Itami has produced an engaging cinematic hybrid, brilliantly stir-frying Japanese food -- and other -- obsessions into cowboy themes. He calls Tampopo a noodle western.

Shows us, in an extraordinarily simple way, the hopes and frustrations of one woman's life.

The movie makes an over-long deal about Jody's immaturity and never seems to get beyond it.

The writer in Soderbergh proves the ultimate weak link. In sex, lies' last third, he seems seized with a compulsion to make sense of it all, bring everything to bear, give everyone their moral comeuppance, their screenplay payoff.

A classically polished drama about repressed emotions, self delusion and protracted heartbreak, this Merchant/Ivory movie is one of the most affecting experiences of the year.

Even though it's weak in the final stages, Rock Star has more than enough sparkle to last you. That's chiefly thanks to Wahlberg, the main firework of this movie.

The title may be a mouthful but Like Water for Chocolate is a feast for the soul. Hauntingly and exquisitely prepared, this Mexican adult fairy tale is garnished with mystery and wonder.

It's a great pleasure that -- we get to ponder one of the most involving psychological mysteries in recent memory.

As Juliet, Winslet is a bright-eyed ball of fire, lighting up every scene she’s in. She’s offset perfectly by Lynskey, whose quietly smoldering Pauline completes the delicate, dangerous partnership.

So wonderfully antiquated, so blissfully free of postmodern cleverness.