Ken Fox

Kurosawa's farewell film is full of sentiment, tears, toasts and songs.

Frei assembles a fascinating profile of a deeply humanistic artist who, in spite of all that he's witnessed, remains surprisingly idealistic, and retains an extraordinary faith in the ability of images to communicate the truth of the world around him.

This is a powerful, important and, in the end, profoundly poignant movie dedicated to the lives of men and women who fight wars and shoulder the burden of becoming "heroes" to help the rest of us make sense of what remains incomprehensible.

The result is a rich and touching exploration of the vagaries of fortune, literary reputation and, above all, friendship that works on several levels at once. The soundtrack includes songs by Joy Division, New Order and Le Tigre.

This rich, complex and surprisingly entertaining film also becomes a meditation on filmmaking and the parallels McElwee finds between cinema and, of all things, smoking.

Handsomely appointed and faultlessly acted, but no more alive than a well-dressed corpse.

More of the same from Taiwanese auteur Tsai Ming-liang, which is good news to anyone who's fallen under the sweet, melancholy spell of this unique director's previous films.

It's a bit like a Chinese "Splendor In The Grass."

Forget haunted houses and the mountains of the moon: There's no better environment to show off the wonder of the immersive IMAX 3-D experience than the deep blue sea.

Even those who dismiss Von Trier as a talented sadist might reconsider after seeing this revealing and ultimately poignant documentary -- and the funny thing is, on the surface it's not even about him.

If any film can be considered required viewing as the conflict in Iraq continues to drag on and be reported, surely this among them.

As the film makes pointedly clear, ALS is what is considered an "orphan disease," meaning drug companies aren't willing to devote their resources to finding a cure because they feel too small a percentage of the population suffer from it to make an effective drug profitable.

Belvaux is no Douglas Sirk, but the film is an admirable, if uneven, conclusion to an audacious project.

Emir Kusturica's magnificent fresco rips through half a century of the tragic history of his homeland -- the former Yugoslavia -- with all the solemnity of an amusement park ride.

A brisk dramatic comedy that combines melodrama, humor and social critique in equal measure.

Brilliantly acted and lugubriously paced, Liv Ullmann's fourth feature as director — the second written by her mentor, Ingmar Bergman — will no doubt be manna to those who miss the brilliant acting and lugubrious pace that characterized Bergman's late-period films.

While this extraordinary, 90-minute film -- culled from over 10 hours of footage -- offers few revelations about Hitler's private life, it provides a fascinating glimpse into the psychology of a follower who remained blindly obedient until the bitter end.

Thirty years down the line, not everyone looks as they once did, so even fans will have trouble putting names to aged faces. Newcomers, meanwhile, will feel hopelessly shut out.

Harrowing but enormously empathetic.

The set-up revolves around a draggy love triangle, while the climax -- slo-mo leap through the air and all -- could have come out of any direct-to-video action flick.

It's an engaging diversion from a master director who, at the ripe age of 78, appears to be once again at the top of his game.

Burtynsky's keen sense of color, pattern and composition are obvious from his work, but equally acute are his thoughts on how he as an artist as well as an inhabitant of the planet fits into the larger scheme of things.

Tsai finds great beauty in streets of Kuala Lumpur particularly at night, making this gorgeous film one that should be seen on a large screen in the total darkness of a theater.

Both De Bouw and Decleir are superb.

At a little over two hours, there's a lot of Langlois to digest. But cinephiles won't mind a bit: Richard includes tons of great anecdotes and clips from classic films that wouldn't exist if Langlois hadn't saved them.

A romantic victim to the end, this Ian Curtis is all that worshipful fans could ever hope for.

With consummate grace and exceptional style, Terence Davies transformed Edith Wharton's caustic tragedy of manners into a somber, languid dream.

Powerful and startlingly unsentimental.