Karen Gordon

It’s a wistful, beautiful, and tender movie that works across generations, yet another feat accomplished. It's not just clever storytelling, dammit! There’s heart and magic at work here.

There’s more depth than meets the eye, and When You Finish Saving The World manages to be sweet and yet not sentimental, and with much to contemplate after the movie ends.

Nomadland is a beautiful and affecting film: a small scale, spare movie with a deep well of compassion at its center.

By turns exhilarating and exhausting, Josh Safdie’s Marty Supreme is a whirlwind race of a movie anchored by another brilliant all-in performance by Timothée Chalamet.

The result is a quiet film that doesn’t push an agenda, doesn’t rush, doesn’t trade on sensationalized emotion, but leaves us space to engage with wonderful characters. There’s a feeling of intimacy and sense of connection, open-heartedness and good will that stays long after the movie ends.

I Am Greta is a wonderful, rich documentary and at points it moved me to tears.

The Taste of Things is rare, with a depth and maturity we don’t often see on screens anymore. It charts the connection of two mature adults who are at peace with themselves and each other. There’s a calm restraint to their relationship, and that adds to the film’s sensuality.

Throughout, Rasmussen never loses focus on the humanity. He’s telling the story, not of a refugee, but of a fellow human being whom he knows personally. The rapport between the two, the quiet honesty with which Amin speaks and the respectful and obviously deeply affectionate way in which Rasmussen tells the story, makes this film something special.

Metaphors abound in The Secret Garden if you are so inclined. But the beauty of the story on its surface is enough.

It is a wild and trippy ride that mixes “reality,” with sequences that dip into the mystical world of the Vikings, and back out again. It’s also meticulously made, with an attention to detail as close to actual 10th century Viking life as is possible.

The Zone of Interest is a careful movie, observant. It’s a movie that asks us to reckon with history, with human nature and, in today’s world with the drumbeat of fascism rising again. Call it a caution.

In terms of its setting and plot, The Eternal Daughter is quite spare. But what Hogg and Swinton patiently coax out of it is affecting.

After 28 films, it’s incredible that Marvel studios has anything new to say, never mind the ability to be fresh and entertaining.

Subtlety is the strength of The Humans. It is an intelligent even-handed drama where the family’s issues aren’t played to the point where they’re gruelling and destructive. Rather, they show us something more ordinary and therefore more truthful.

In the end the joy of the movie is in watching these four very different characters interact.

The two biggest questions I had going into Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny were: will it be fun and will the film stay true to the character of Indiana Jones. The answer, I'm pleased to say, is yes on both counts. It's a ton of fun. I had a blast.

On the surface it’s a solid and and absorbing character study. But thanks to Marder’s script and masterful direction, and Ahmed’s beautiful performance, there are increasingly deeper layers that take this movie to a deeper place.

Joker has what may be the best lead performance of the year, but it is not for the faint of heart. Director Todd Phillips digs deep into the shadow side of society for one of the darkest movies in recent memory.

This is a heavy-duty topic but rather than lecture or make an angry or ideological film, Diwan works here with restrained and even slightly distant tone, focusing on the character of Anne and her determination to control her own life.

Everything Everywhere All at Once is a sci-fi/fantasy/martial arts action movie on steroids: a cuckoo-bananas story about life and love and family and humanity and a bunch of other things… all at once.

What we get is quite fabulous: a wide-ranging gem of a documentary, an utter delight that ends up being, in some ways, a life and times look at both men.

As a movie, it’s riveting. It also ends up being a thoughtful study in media coverage very much worth contemplating.

Led by a stunning performance by first-time actor Park Ji-Min and based on a real-life adoptee’s reunion with her biological parents, Return to Seoul is a slow boil, a subtle powerhouse of a movie.

Oddly, in spite of all the pain, what sticks in Rosi’s Notturno is a feeling of resilience.

It’s a fantastic mix of the funny, the astute, the disturbing and the brainy in the very specific style of Östlund. It’s a pleasure to watch it play out.

Madcap, complex, and already controversial — bursting with fabulous acting from two newcomers and some of the best cameos of the year — it’s a character study, a (sort of) coming-of-age story, a platonic rom-com, and a tribute to life in the suburban San Fernando Valley section of Los Angeles where Anderson grew up, among other things. In short, it’s one of the most exhilarating movies of the year.

On the surface, Parallel Mothers is an engaging melodrama centred around a fabulous performance by Penélope Cruz. But, as is typical of Pedro Almodóvar’s movies, this easygoing, entertaining film is deeply layered, dealing with issues of personal morality and family ties, mixed with a reminder of Spain’s dark and not-so-distant fascist past.

It’s a deceptively simple movie, a lot of fun. And it doesn’t require you to do a deep dive to really enjoy it.