Jonathan Rosenbaum

This pared-away comedy-drama, which concentrates exclusively on the three characters, has plenty of old-fashioned virtues: deft acting, a nice sense of scale that makes the drama agreeably life-size, a good use of Seattle locations, fluid camera work (by Michael Ballhaus), a kind of burnished romanticism about the music, and a genuine feeling for the characters and their various means of coping. And Pfeiffer turns out to be a terrific singer.

Much of the film's potency derives from its personal edge -- the passion for precise period decor, the title dedicating the film to Leigh's parents (a doctor and midwife), and even the childlike classification of many characters as either good souls or villains.

This may be the most literate of all the spectacles set in antiquity.

Directed by Rouben Mamoulian, this 1932 screen adaptation of the Robert Louis Stevenson classic is a remarkable achievement that deserves to be much better known.

Film is still an impressive piece of work, visually and rhythmically masterful.

The conceit gets a little out of hand after one of the angels falls in love with the trapeze artist and decides to become human; but prior to this, Wings of Desire is one of Wenders's most stunning achievements.

The best Australian feature I've seen in years.

Warmly recommended to viewers who like their romantic comedies small-scale but life-size.

His mise en scene is mesmerizing, and the final scene is breathtaking. Not an easy film, but almost certainly a great one.

Not to be hyperbolic, but Richard Linklater's first big-budget movie may be the Jules and Jim of bank-robber movies, thanks to its astonishing handling of period detail and its gentleness of spirit, both buoyed by a gliding lightness of touch.

The results are skillful, highly affecting, and ultimately more than a little pernicious.

Clint Eastwood's ambitious 1988 feature about the great Charlie Parker (Forest Whitaker) is the most serious, conscientious, and accomplished jazz biopic ever made, and almost certainly Eastwood's best picture as well.

Impressive for its lean and unblemished storytelling, but even more so for its performances.

Exciting not as ethnography but as storytelling, as drama, and as filmmaking.

I was floored by Cronenberg's mastery of the material. Fiennes gives one of his finest performances; Miranda Richardson, playing at least three characters in the protagonist's twisted vision, is no less impressive.

Action-adventure pictures have a lamentable tendency toward mindlessness, but Edward Zwick's epic story has numerous virtues apart from suspense and spectacle.

It's Fellini's last black-and-white picture and conceivably the most gorgeous and inventive thing he ever did—certainly more fun than anything he made after it.

Thoroughly researched, unobtrusively upholstered, this beautifully assured entertainment about Victorian England is a string of delights.

A lot more imaginative and entertaining than one might have thought possible, a feast for the eye and mind.

An astonishing tour de force--especially for Irons, whose sense of nuance is so refined that one can tell in a matter of seconds which twin he is playing in a particular scene.

Richard Linklater goes Hollywood (1995) -- triumphantly and with an overall intelligence, sweetness, and romantic simplicity that reminds me of wartime weepies like The Clock.

Beautifully structured and emotionally wrenching.

Crichton keeps the laughs coming with infectious energy.

This may not have gotten much publicity, but it's a lot more engaging than most movies that have; Forster alone makes it unforgettable.

He doesn't lose his stylistic identity either: in addition to the very Mamet-like delivery of unfinished sentences, his command of rhythm and flow remains flawless throughout.

The narrative, capped by a brief bad dream and the capture of a mouse, isn't always legible, but it feeds into a monumental, luminous visual style like no other.

The movie evokes Howard Hawks (in spirit if not to the letter) with its tight focus on a snug, obsessive world of insiders and camp followers where the exchanges between buddies and sexes have a euphoric stylishness and a giddy sense of ritual.

A fascinating humanist experiment and investigation in its own right, full of warmth and humor as well as mystery.