Kyle Smith

Take a stroll down London Boulevard if you enjoy surly, smart, hard-edged British crime movies like "Sexy Beast" and "Croupier."

Hunger is almost silent, most of its sounds being unintelligible moans and screams.

Yet the film is marred by Hawke’s blundering intrusions as he keeps changing the subject to Hawke: He tells us he often wonders “why it is I do what I do,” as if anyone but he is interested in the answer.

This Morgan Freeman-narrated documentary doesn’t stray much from the nature-doc formula of making its stars look frisky and winsome while sprinkling in a few info-nuggets about the critters (they’re older than dinosaurs!). And that’s just fine.

An invigorating and surprising journey.

Sex Drive has shaky moments, and its smutty gags aren't edited so much as slammed together.

Raunchy frat comedies are as hard to pull off as any other kind because they have to keep surprising the audience, and The Hangover does with a bizarre series of uproarious situations with explanations that just about stay within the bounds of plausibility.

Free State of Jones is enticingly difficult to chart. It’s anti-war, anti-plutocracy and anti-racist, but it’s also pro-Bible, pro-gun, anti-tax and sympathetic to the poor whites who usually get tagged as racist. Its hero is an avowed Republican named Newt.

A great abortion documentary might leave you guessing which side of the debate the director was on. Lake of Fire is not that film, but it comes somewhat close.

Douchebag belies its abrasive title with a soft touch for two wobbly souls.

Superb Noo Yawk attitude, dialogue and performances (including one from the essential Kevin Corrigan, now well into his second decade of being indie movies' dirtbag on demand) keep the movie lively and tart.

Written and directed with compassion by Noah Buschel, the film is a low-key chamber piece better suited to television. But don’t let its restraint fool you: As unshowy as it is, The Phenom has an impressive collection of tools.

A pleasingly low-key effort pitched at fans of the first couple.

Though somewhat marred by cheesy docudrama re-enactments, the film (produced by Steven Spielberg’s sister Nancy) is nutty, dramatic, surprising and above all inspiring.

Deeply personal screenwriting and a superlative performance by Molly Shannon as a dying mom lift Other People above the level of many similar tragedy-inflected indie comedies.

Footloose won me over early, with a sequence in which the hero gets all heavy metal while restoring his badass ... VW Bug.

As with "Capturing the Friedmans," the documentary is grueling to sit through. Yet the greasy, guilty thrill of being privy to your neighbors' most intimate dramas makes it impossible to stop watching.

Has buckets of gentle sincerity. Since there aren't any dumb jokes or hip visuals, it's easy to get caught up in the simple messages: Be good to your sister, don't be a bully, use your imagination in a pinch.

When Hopkins' Hitch directs the audience by waving his hands like a symphony conductor - it's a nice callback to a Hannibal Lecter highlight - it's one of the best scenes of the year: a delightfully personal way to show how the story of "Psycho" concluded.

Despite Gibney’s best efforts to put a halo on Manning, the enormity of what the soldier did towers over what has been done to him.

The film is still a gripping experience, though, with its circling sharks, its sun-dappled beauty and its agonies of shattered hope. At one point I was convinced that Sandra Bullock would splash down next to our man in her space capsule and Hanks’ Maersk ship from “Captain Phillips” would steam by to pick up both of them.

The magical mystery that is Paul McCartney may never be solved, but for fans (the line forms behind me), the new documentary The Love We Make includes some memorable displays of his world-conquering charm.

Soundly structured, smart and fast, with a plausible central scenario, several gripping moments and well-wrought dialogue.

How this thing got made in Hollywood is a mystery, but I laughed at most of it, especially the mean stereotypes about the French and the even meaner stereotype about England's soccer team.

Po speaks loudly and carries big shtick. Let the rest of the world cringe at our hyperconfidence, our charisma, our pure awesomeness.

Credit Westfeldt, who is also the writer and director, with a classic setup for farce, brightly executed.

This documentary, which begins at a low key, gradually becomes intense and psychologically complicated.

Director Susanne Bier's chilly morality play is slow to get started, but once established, its three parallel stories comment provocatively on one another.