Ernest Hardy

For anyone who wants to see wildly inventive, peerless filmmaking that's oblivious to market-place formulas, Beau Travail is an absolute must-see.

The costumes are gorgeous, and the settings are plush, but the acting is merely serviceable, and the film lacks either the wit or the energy of its predecessors. Long before it ends, you find yourself indifferent to the fate of the mismatched lovebirds or anyone else in the tale.

Leigh and his solid cast make sure that inside jokes translate to a broad audience, and that their rendering of the back-stage drama is smart, engrossing and often very funny.

Hinges almost completely on the taut body and delectable beauty of Jessica Alba, but is otherwise so riddled with limp clichés that it doesn't even qualify as a guilty pleasure.

Death of a Tree, written and directed by John Martoccia, is filled with so much unintentional humor that it quickly slips into the realm of parody — and stays there.

The roles of affect and artifice in mediating the realities of racism, homophobia, and poverty are perhaps the true subjects of Shirley Clarke's landmark doc.

Singleton has neither the emotional nor intellectual depth to do justice to his thesis. He is too in awe of the stereotypical hood lifestyles and macho posturings that he's trying to critique.

One of the things that makes Traffic so very good is the wry humor that's laced throughout the film. It's a funny movie.

To watch Sevigny's Lana slowly thaw to Brandon is to see the transformative, heartbreaking power of romance in a way that Hollywood is rarely able to capture anymore.

It's both surreal -- and wholly accessible.

Without forcing the material into facile uplift, Bloodworth-Thomason still edges it into the realm of inspirational, never overplaying the anguish or soft-pedaling the bigotry at the heart of the story.

Mitchell retools his play magnificently, opening it up into a vibrant cinematic work.

The film isn't as smart as it thinks it is, and its characters are painfully generic.

A crash course in history, politics, and social science, Valentino's Ghost is both sobering and illuminating, and its execution is thrilling.

Though a little long, the film takes us right inside both the creative impulse and the margins of American life. Its triumph is to show those two things as being deeply, wonderfully connected.

Informative, revelatory, and full of astonishing photography, Frame by Frame is about embedded journalists (the photographers) fighting the power, not kowtowing to it.

But for all its bleakness, Nightmare is a film that demands to be seen. In unflinching terms, it captures the hellish existence endured by the many so that the few may wallow in privilege.

All these years later, the film is far more infuriating than it is exciting.

A deceptively simple film, gingerly peels layer after layer of sharp insights into the dynamics of familial love, using compassion and droll humor as its tools. Its strength is that it manages to tap genuine emotion without succumbing to sentimentality.

Results in moments of real beauty that make you grateful Chappelle chose an aesthete for directing chores. And yet, in terms of content, the film doesn't quite reach the bar set by its historic predecessor (Wattstax).

Moodysson's movie, one part mash note and three parts scathing piss-taker, is hugely compassionate toward the well-meaning fools in his tale, but he doesn't suffer their nonsense gladly; his film is, in large part, about grown-ups needing to grow up.

As Bomb snakes its way toward tragedy, it grates rather than entices. The actors come off more as poseurs than as characters, and the film's political and cultural insights are superficial and old hat.

Tough and relentless, dazzlingly researched and crafted. At its core is compassion for those who are angry, violent and uneducated.

Victor Vargas has the look and feel of a neo-realist masterpiece, yet captures New York with a burnished authenticity not seen since the glory days of ’70s American cinema.

It does what the most powerful films and music have always done, which is to spark contemplation of our own lives and choices, and our place in the world, while also stoking compassion and empathy for lives far removed from our own.

This is powerful reportage, beautifully shot and gracefully laid out; too bad that Kendall ties it all up with more deep thoughts from the bus itself, thoughts that sound like outtakes from a TED Talk on the interconnectedness of all living things.

Lilya is the more genuinely unsettling film because Moodysson seems to actually know something of what it is to take and stumble beneath a crushing blow. You feel that here. And you feel it for days after.

It's utterly rousing watching the women master their instruments and then push past the birth pains of their new business enterprise, and it's completely wrenching as their individual backstories unfold.

One of the funniest, shrewdest, smartest movies in recent memory.

It is impossible to overstate how grating Nia Vardalos is as the title character in Helicopter Mom. Throughout her career, her default setting has been something like "Jack Russell terrier after an amphetamine bender." No surprise that she's exhausting here.

What follows is a film as odd as its title character. Timothy flings grown-up ideas at the viewer but rips the teeth from them rather than risk our discomfort.

Drumming doesn't quite have the skills to finesse the varying tones demanded by his textured script...and he could have taken one more pass on smoothing out character arcs, which are too truncated to be believable in a few cases. Still, the ensemble cast is fantastic, and Drumming is a talent to watch.

What could have been an impossibly bleak viewing is actually made more unnerving through DeFriest's droll humor and acceptance of his fate — rather than being Zen-like, he's prickly and dark, with such dazzlingly high native intelligence that you mourn for potential needlessly wasted.

Stays with you, though, not because of its political content, but because of the unexpected emotional punch that's thrown near the end.

Remind(s) us of the power of good old-fashioned character-driven movies.

Tragic, funny and deadpan dark, it's easily one of the best films of the year...It's the brutally unsentimental, intelligent, unflinching heart at the film's core that makes it a marvel.

It’s the captured conversations about everyday lives and struggles that pin you to your seat.

Deceptively rambling, shrewdly ragtag documentary.

It's an often gut-wrenching viewing experience in which the triumphs of the hero are hard won.

For adults, the film will drag in spots, but it's filled with all those values you hope to instill in your children.

A provocative, timely script full of gasp-inducing lines and scenes.

It's a small film whose power is derived from its stripped-down scale.

Writer-director Niki Caro, who adapted the screenplay from the novel, has crafted a script replete with both crowd-pleasing touches and subtle but powerful insights into all the characters.

What makes Kuchu work as taut agitprop, and ultimately to devastating emotional effect, is that Wright and Zouhali-Worrall allow the enormity of the film's political concerns to be telegraphed through the stories, experiences, and astute analysis of ordinary queer folk and their hetero allies.

What makes this straightforward film so incredibly moving is that it keeps its scathing political commentary firmly rooted in everyday struggle.

It's a sweet and wise film - neither groundbreaking nor revolutionary save for the fact that it places narrative and character arc at the center of its concerns.

The film's scope is staggering, including its detailed outlining of BP's origins and fingerprints across decades of unrest in Iran.

An unassuming little film that packs a huge emotional and artistic punch.

Hotel Rwanda, based on real lives and events, aims unequivocally to break your heart.

The film staggers under its own didacticism. Too often we're told of men who were professionals back home and are here reduced to driving cabs, waiting tables or vending ice cream.

A heartfelt documentary.

Presswell's stylized dialogue, whose rapid-fire banter often hardens into self-conscious artifice, is biting and witty, but is thankfully absent either endless pop-culture references or cloying self-consciousness of its own cleverness.

MTV, comic books and gangster flicks are all in Lola's cinematic family tree; it's a heady, breathless ride.

The execution is actually worse than the premise. Nonstop racial, sexual and cultural stereotypes parade across the screen with little wit or real humor to guide them.

It's a wit-free homage to Hitchcock and M. Night Shyamalan that, for all its slick presentation, never comes close to hitting the mark of its forebears.

A Zeitgeist potpourri, strung with late-20th-century fear and anxiety.

It’s a rousing celebration.

If only this movie were rich enough, strong enough to be worthy of this (Dafoe's) performance.

Slight but enjoyable documentary.

The film lacks a pulse. There's sound and fury, but the result is more drizzle than tempest.

The filmmakers deftly capture the boys' depression and triumphs, but something of the American character -- the generosity and the arrogance -- as well.

An especially compassionate look at human frailty that also never loses sight of the inherent ridiculousness of "the human condition." Jesus' Son is one of this summer's best movies.

What leaves you breathless, though, is the knockout acting by the cast.

Morris seduces us into stepping into Leuchter's world of delusion and ego.

Through masterful editing, nimble music selection and smart use of documentary materials, the filmmakers shake the dust off cultural clichés to provide a provocative survey of the past. It’s a subversively sleek enterprise.

Sofia Coppola, who's directed the film from her own screenplay, narrowly misses making the story work on the screen.

So gently told, so deceptively simple a story, that its considerable emotional power sneaks up on you.

Grim but riveting viewing, a layered commentary on this country's moral and spiritual underbelly.

A fascinating, richly detailed documentary about the legendary queer collective based in San Francisco in the late '60s and early '70s.

Nunez is a master at rendering emotionally complex, ordinary folk into the kind of unassuming heroes that don't much appear in American films anymore.

But real-life hard-knock plot twists, as well as some tweaking of form (there's no narrator or voiceover of any kind; the film's subjects outline their grim realities largely through their rhythmically upbeat songs) make the film absolutely riveting, as does the fiercely rousing music.

Simultaneously hilarious and deeply informative thanks to the vibrant personalities at its center.

The film's almost unbearable portrait of sadness and grief transcends its specific story to speak to the ways in which need, history and presumption tangle, and sometimes destroy, blood ties.

Circo is filled with beautiful images and haunting moments, especially in the third act, when the family unravels as the film culminates in a final triumphant, haunting image.

From its low-key, guitar-based score by composer Chris Bacon to the filmmaker's refusal to sugar-coat the tough times some of the soldiers faced after completing the climb, High Ground takes its cues from the worldview of its subjects.

The movie floats to another realm entirely when the cameras go into the home of Nova Venerable, a smart, eloquent, gorgeous girl whose love for her special-needs younger brother and their hardworking single mom is expressed in terms that sidestep the formulaic verbal and physical bombast of so many of her peers.

What will pull viewers in is the empathy of the healthcare workers who battle to retain their idealism in the face of staggering obstacles.

The no-frills documentary also makes it clear that Newcombe is the real deal -- both supremely gifted and organically nuts.

Dirty Wars is essential viewing for anyone who wants to know how we wage war right now; it's also a chilling prologue for what's likely a global future of endless war and blowback.

In this truly retro horror flick, the heroes and heroines don't just quip over the action (though they do get off some funny lines); they're knee-deep in it, and scared sh------.

One of the best films of the year. Queer in every sense of the word, it's poignant, laugh-out-loud funny and thoroughly provocative.

This Ain't California is a masterful lie that illuminates a little-known reality.

Undertow, is sublime. Set in a small, picturesque Peruvian fishing village, it's less a coming-out tale than a magic realism–infused coming-of-consciousness love story.

The film's energy is primarily due to the rich storytelling skills of the musicians, who trot out anecdotes and memories filled with humor and wry philosophizing.

Animation fans, no matter their stylistic preference (computer-generated, claymation, old-school hand-drawn), will find much to sate their appetites in this collection of award-winning and critically acclaimed work. There’s not a dud in the bunch.

What makes High Art remarkable is Cholodenko's refusal to put her characters or story through a filter, her unblinking willingness to dive right in.

A dark film that raises more questions than it answers -- and it's meant to.

What director Aviva Kempner has done is shine a light into the past and recover a classic American hero, one with all the integrity, decency and largeness of spirit that we have been taught makes up the American character.

Writer/director David Mamet, who's built a career in both theater and film by being a hyper-manly sort of writer, has crafted a film that is laugh out loud funny and dinner-conversation smart.

A smart, seamless commentary on race, class and the expectations (or lack of) that are often attached to them. Kennedy is helped greatly by deep currents of heart and humor that pull you into the unfolding tale, and to the edge of your seat as the countdown to opening night begins.

It's Tobey Maguire, doing fine, subtle work, who holds it all together -- he puts a human touch to what is otherwise expertly wrought hokum.

At the center of the film is one of the year's best performances -- that of British actress Janet McTeer .

In many respects a stock item, filled with talking heads, archival film and photographs and vintage concert footage, but what gives the film newfound ache is the copious amount of time it spends on the streets with ordinary citizens (including fledgling young musicians) and the incidentals it captures.

A gorgeously burnished vintage post card come to life, Motorcycle Diaries has about as much depth and emotional currency as the cardboard that post card would be stamped on.

It's a must-see for anyone interested in art.

Because her tale is so fascinating, movie-making formula is all that's needed.

Striking the right balance between interior and exterior can mean the difference between compelling drama and accidental melodrama. Writer-director Ron Morales just misses equilibrium in the visually arresting Filipino thriller Graceland.

But what you ultimately take from the film is the awareness that this smart, self-aware, uncensored kid has been playing to a camera in his own head since well before Venditti came along.