Kyle Smith

As this frequently lyrical and touching portrait of youth reminds us, for many thousands of people over the years, Cabrini-Green was simply home.

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.

Rich, evocative, crafty and exciting, it’s one of the few standout movies of the year.

In Listen Up Philip, the tiny fury of Jason Schwartzman suggests his “Rushmore” character is now 15 years older and a middling Brooklyn novelist. His deadpan misanthropy is good for some acerbic laughs in a movie that starts appealingly but gradually comes to seem closed and stuck.

Amrum is a stirring example of how childhood reminiscence can stand for so much more.

The age when such images held firm positions in the culture may be over, but Mr. Corbijn’s film has given it a glorious and stirring elegy.

A film I admired, but didn’t especially like, The Revenant is a master class in craftsmanship, marrying the ethos of 1970s Hollywood, with its beaten-dog heroes forever roughed up by a brutal system, to the technological prowess of today’s digitally obsessed blockbusters.

September 5 is tough, rough, messy and gritty, in the tradition of American cinema from the decade in which it takes place.

No, this film by director/co-writer Gillian Robespierre just isn’t funny, and the mismatched leads aren’t even interesting together.

Most of the best gags are in the early going and the film seems ever more stretched and thin as it goes on. It would have made a brilliant eight-minute sketch, though.

It contains no poetry. It simply conjures up a horrible feeling -- and then sits back awaiting congratulation.

We tend to think of gangland tales as exhibiting clear demarcations between those who are and are not “in the game.” La Civil catapults us into a considerably more disturbing environment, a sort of toxic sinkhole that pulls everyone into its horrors.

Sony Pictures is positioning “The Woman King” as not only a rousing action film but also an important one: At the screening I attended, a marketing slide read, “Join the conversation.” I’ll start: Is there any limit to Hollywood shamelessness?

Asteroid City may be infused with the powers of the Atomic Age, but no Anderson movie except “The Darjeeling Limited” runs so low on energy.

The only thing that's shocking about Death of a President is how boring it is.

The excruciating and the hilarious mingle nearly to perfection in this marvelously visualized and deeply felt British film.

Sly, wry, adorable and deplorable, Guillaume Marbeck is priceless as the endlessly irritating and yet frustratingly charismatic Godard in one of the year’s brightest pictures, a rare standout in a sea of multiplex mediocrity.

Mr. Malek is incapable of providing the audience with an emotional hook.

To really pull off Greenberg would require a lead performance from a master actor. The actor it stars is . . . Ben Stiller.

Like warriors themselves, you will be left to sort through a jumble of emotions: pride and sorrow, bitterness and gratitude. [09 Feb 2007, p.43]

Cinema Sabaya, a quietly affecting little film about unexpected connections and unseen sorrows, shimmers with a bright optimism about how people might overlook one another’s differences if only they took a little time to learn about each other.

Mr. Birney’s exotically low-fi imagination makes for a freaky and feverish trip.

Caper movies rely heavily on how well they build plausibility into the doings of professional scam artists, but Emily the Criminal scores poorly on that front.

Gritty visuals and a strong central performance elevate the routine crime story at the heart of Sweden's Easy Money, a sort of mash-up of "Goodfellas" and "The Great Gatsby."

Porno plus Parkinson's don't quite add up to sexy fun.

Just Before I Go is a “Garden State” retread in which filthy jokes gradually cede ground to sentimental slush.

In these days when flat-out comedy features are scarce, it’s one of the most welcome tenants at the summer multiplex. A mid-movie snowman gag puts the new one over the top, bestowing on it the honor of being mentionable alongside its predecessors. It sets the lunacy level to “inspired.”

The bad news about the Ennio Morricone documentary Ennio is its length: 2 1/2 hours. Far too short!