Marc Savlov

Cronenberg’s nonlinear narrative is trying at times – it keeps you nearly as off-kilter as the characters, and surely that’s intentional – but as a character piece about madness and stymied dreams, it’s remarkably realistic.

Summer Wars is a magnificently manufactured piece of film entertainment that goes beyond the obvious and manages to comment, often obliquely, on everything from Facebook to virtual war and/or terrorism without ever seeming heavy-handed or strident.

You need only see Get Low for absolute proof that, while Hollywood may be in decline even as bad actors' salaries climb ever higher, there remain at least three very exemplary reasons – Duvall, Spacek, and Murray – to switch off your home theatre and get out into a real one.

Five years after Ang Lee attempted a stylistically and narratively daring reimagining of what a comic-book movie could be (an example that tanked disastrously at the box office), the big green gamma-guy returns to the screen in a purer, more unadulterated, vastly more entertaining form.

By the time this harmless but possibly harmed pack of pups is seen approaching the Atlantic Ocean at Coney Island for the very first time – “Look at that, there’s people all over the beach,” one brother nervously mutters – it’s clear that there are second acts, and more, in American lives, even ones so borderline freakish as the ones presented here.

This is one fish tale that’s well nigh guaranteed to linger in the viewers’ midnight memories long after its cinematic nocturnal emissions have unspooled.

There's no denying it's a tragic film from start to finish, but equally undeniable is the endless stoicism displayed by the women, and Panahi's crisp, meandering direction.

A gently parodic tone prevails throughout what is ultimately a pretty sweet take on bloodsuckers, even as Deacon and Nick flap their way through a “bat fight” (exactly what it sounds like) and the vamps face off against a pack of similarly esteem-challenged werewolves led by Conchords manager Rhys Darby.

The filmmakers wisely stay in the background and allow the people of Whitwell to tell their own story, although this simple, honest little film is occasionally marred by an emotionally manipulative music score straight out of Heartstring Tuggers 101.

One of the most eloquent tales in ages of dysfunctional love – between a man and his ideals, between a country and its government, and, in the end, between Evey and V.

It's not perfect -- thank Satan! -- but Hellboy II: The Golden Army is by far the most splendidly imaginative and creatively uncorked piece of fantastic cinema since the director's "Pan's Labyrinth" netted an Oscar trifecta in 2007.

Sorrentino’s film tackles the most important of all life’s questions with wit, wisdom, and no small amount of often-surreal humor.

By turns wry, quirky, joyful, and above all human, this easygoing but never less than fascinating documentary focuses on the surprisingly tolerant township of Eureka, Ark.

Alice Braga owns this film.

Spark, however, is the best of the lot when it comes to attempting to grok the burn and the burners.

There's a genuine, sparky chemistry between the three (and later, a fourth), and Robertson, particularly, is luminous in her role.

Laika's stop-motion animation is every bit as inspired here as it was in their rightfully lauded "Coraline," and the storyline never wavers from its boneyard-deep message: Being different from others is a good – nay, great – thing, no matter how many villagers (or zombies) are after you.

One glance at the cast should be enough of a recommendation for any film lover -- it's Winger's first time on the screen in seven years, and Howard deserves a nod or two if only for getting his wife back in front of the camera where she so clearly belongs.

The crime is beyond bizarre, and the film is relentlessly suspenseful, but perhaps the most disturbing question of all is this: Whatever happened to Nicholas Barclay? To that, there remains no satisfactory answer.

A very nasty piece of work, indeed.

Even if you're familiar with the details of the game, Rafferty's suspenseful editing draws you to the edge of your seat and beyond, back into 1968 itself.

What Reggio’s ultimate point or conclusion might be is, as ever, left up to the viewer for interpretation. And while this is patently not a film that big-box cineplexers are going to rush to in droves, Visitors remains a wondrous work of artistic achievement.

A touching (and at times horrific) -- albeit overlong -- Christ allegory, that scores not so much on the strength of its convictions as it does on the truly remarkable performances it elicits from the cast.

The Desolation of Smaug is, on the whole, a vast improvement over The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey. It’s a popcorn movie (in the best sense) disguised as deep-core nerdism.

So yes, Bodied is a comedy of ill manners, fraught as it is with a veritable encyclopedia of contemporaneous qualms confronted and contested with some seriously dope hustle and flow. Tag this one #badassseriousfun.

Hathaway and Sudeikis totally nail their respective roles (kudos to the great Tim Blake Nelson, to boot), and while Colossal falls shy of perfection, so does real life.

Inkheart was shot in and around Liguria on the Italian Riviera, and it looks absolutely ravishing.

This is smart, quirky, frequently laugh-out-loud comedy, in all seriousness.