Moira Macdonald

It’s a film — and a city — to get lost in, and it’ll haunt you afterward, like a face you thought you recognized under a streetlamp, before it disappeared.

You’ll watch knowing you’re in the hands of a master filmmaker; only wondering when it’s over how certain effects were achieved.

Alfonso Cuarón’s Roma is a wondrously pure example of one of the great gifts that cinema can give us: to drop us into a time, a place and a life; immersing us in the sounds and the sights and the emotions, large and small, experienced by someone we’re not.

12 Years a Slave isn’t easy to watch, and it shouldn’t be; it’s one man’s tragedy, but it’s also the tragedy of countless thousands of souls beaten down, literally and metaphorically.

Every Manchester scene gives you a sense of the kind of place where everyone knows everyone, where it’s bitter cold but nobody makes too much of it, where the past stays with you whether you want it to or not. This is a movie that pays careful attention to details.

“Do all lovers,” wonders Héloïse in a passionate moment, “feel as though they’re inventing something?” Portrait of a Lady on Fire, a bittersweet celebration of passion and art, feels like that; you’ve never seen another movie quite like this. In its quiet gaze, love becomes art — and vice versa.

It’s not a biopic, but I Am Not Your Negro leaves you wanting to know and read more of Baldwin, to experience the language that pours from this film like a fiery balm.

You leave the film’s soft-grained world reluctantly, as if taking off a warm coat when it’s still a little chilly inside.

Painstakingly reassembled by producer Alan Elliott (Pollack, who never gave up hope on the project, died in 2008), Amazing Grace shows us an artist at the peak of her powers.

Dunkirk succeeds spectacularly both emotionally and visually.

The Irishman is long, to be sure, but it’s never less than compelling — Scorsese, De Niro, Pacino and Pesci, all in their mid-to-late-70s, are each carrying a lifetime of work, with practiced ease.

Watching it leaves you lighter, happier, younger — dancing your way out of the theater to the Heads’ irresistible beats.

Inside Out movingly but casually plays with our emotions, like a baby walking her fingers across a parent’s face; it leaves you changed, entertained, nostalgic, dazzled.

It’s a film full of quiet magic; of the power of words not spoken, and the enduring strength of love.

Guadagnino has explored this territory before...and he’s a master at finding electricity in a glance, beauty in a beam of sunlight, an entire story in the whisper of one name.

Johansson and Driver are remarkably, heartbreakingly good in every scene; showing their characters’ journeys to an unflinching camera, letting the gap between them get wider yet unable, for their son’s sake, to completely walk away. It’s a drama playing out on two larger-than-life faces; a family torn apart, and yet enduring.

Like a gift from the movie gods, here comes Damien Chazelle’s dreamy La La Land, right when a lot of us are in desperate need of some light. It’s a valentine to cinema, splashed with primary colors and velvety L.A. sunsets.

Lady Bird is a joy, from its start...to its finish, when that ever-so-slightly older young woman takes a breath and looks out — hopefully, nervously, excitedly — into a limitless future.

Just as it lulls you, it also devastates.

This tale of ambition and its cost — and its collateral damage — is Blanchett’s movie, and she delivers a tour de force in every scene.

Twenty-five years in the making, this warmhearted, generous film is a quiet masterpiece — the very specific story of one family, but one in which many of us can find our own.

The beauty of The Florida Project is how Baker uses a cast of mostly inexperienced actors to tell a story that feels completely, utterly real: You feel as if you’ve slipped inside of Moonee’s enchanted world, while at the same time seeing the harsh reality of Halley’s.

Yes, the film does strum the heartstrings a bit too emphatically toward the end, by cranking up Williams' music and giving us perhaps one tear too many, but that's a minor quibble. When Elliott and his friends soar on their bicycles, like flying Peter Pans who must soon grow up, it's as touching and note-perfect a moment as any in the movies. [2002 re-release]

Whether the new scenes make "Apocalypse" a better movie is debatable; for me, they were fascinating but not essential.

This Little Women purist was moved to tears by this movie, and didn’t want it to end. Beautifully intimate, gentle and wise, it made me — and all of us — part of the March family. And what better Christmas gift could we wish for than that?

It’s a lovely, inspiring picture of a crucial institution; one which, as an employee describes, serves as “a warm, welcoming place that’s committed to education and committed to nurturing everyone’s passions and curiosities.”

Nickel Boys is a life, made up of pieces; some of them lovely, some devastating. It’s a mesmerizing, uniquely told story — of memory, of injustice, of friendship, of survival.

The real fun here is in the three central performances, each of which threatens to steal the film (giving “The Favourite,” appropriately, its own balance-of-power issues).

Paul Thomas Anderson’s Phantom Thread casts a remarkable spell; it wraps around you, like a delicately scented cashmere shawl woven from music and color and astonishing faces.

Oppenheimer is hard to watch, just as that life was surely hard to live; it’s a careful, deliberate stepping toward something unspeakable.

Cold War seduces its viewer, in its brief running time. You might find, in the quiet of its poignant ending, that it has left its mark on your heart.

There is a touching universality to these life stories, which at this point have a lulling near-sameness: grown children, long careers, lasting passions and friendships (Paul’s and Symon’s is particularly touching), a looming shadow of illness, the nearness of twilight.

“Killers” is a master class in filmmaking, taught by that one professor we all had in college whose every word we hung on, and whose classes always felt too short. It’s that thing we always look for but so rarely find: a great story, beautifully told.

There are several ways you can watch Elle, only one of which is mildly enjoyable.

Over its quiet two hours, beautifully punctuated by long shots of sunlit green fields and fireflies flitting at twilight, Minari lets us become part of the Yi family.

"The Farewell" is so unexpectedly and deliciously funny that watching it feels like a tonic — an immersion in love and art.

It’s a unique ride of a movie, beautiful and disturbing and haunting — in other words, it’s a Jane Campion film.

All of the performances are vivid (Webber’s ability to convey heartbreak in a silent gaze is uncanny), but Jean-Baptiste, reuniting with Leigh for the first time since 1996’s “Secrets & Lies,” holds on to this movie the way Pansy holds on to a grudge.

McDormand, carrying the movie on blue-denimed shoulders, is a wonder. Every now and then, she lets us see the tiniest crack in Mildred’s anger, through which something flickering shines through.

What Bradley Cooper’s beguiling A Star Is Born is very, very good at is showing us how a song can transform a person, or a moment, and how that transformation just might make us fall in love with the person singing it, for a moment or for longer.

Almodóvar fills the movie with eloquent touches — scenes softly fading to black, music twisting like vines, an old house whose stories whisper in every corner, a baby’s watchful eyes, a past that informs a future. Generations pass, this wise movie tells us; family endures.

In this bleak West Texas landscape where everyone seems to be struggling, you find yourself rooting, inexplicably, for all of them against a clear villain: the faceless, predatory bank.

Often beautiful, never pretty, occasionally creepy and perpetually surprising, Poor Things lives in Stone’s fiery eyes; her performance is, to borrow Bella’s words, a changeable feast.

Coogler is a young filmmaker — this is just his third feature, following “Fruitvale Station” and “Creed” (two fine and very different films) — but he marshals this world with confidence and flair. The action sequences are insanely fun.

If Beale Street Could Talk is a film about injustice, about patience and anger, beauty and despair — but, ultimately, it’s about love.

Restless Creature isn’t a mere celebration of a great artist; it’s a moving portrait of what happens when that artist confronts the possibility of not being able to make that art any more.

Watching Alejandro Gonzalez Iñárritu’s multilayered “Birdman” is like unfolding a piece of intricate origami; it keeps opening in unexpected directions.

The movie lets Israel have the last laugh, deliciously so.

The gorgeous, perfect final shot of Pain and Glory — I might have gasped out loud — will make you feel glad to be alive, and in a movie theater.

Mission: Impossible — Fallout is definitely everything we expected, and more. You might need to go lie down afterward, in a good way.

It’s also a celebration of language — Wilson’s glorious storytelling is given its due by this masterful ensemble cast, who weave colorful tapestries with his words — and of music’s transformative power.

It’s most evocative as a memorable portrait of a woman, both in youth and late life, who always knew what she wanted — and who, in doing so, helped make the world a better place.

Zhao shows us the difficulty of this life — the endless laundromats, the cramped bed in the van, the cold, the possessions left behind — but also its beauty and freedom. I wished I could have seen Nomadland on a theater screen, to see the horizons and pale-peach sunrises stretching endlessly in Joshua James Richards’ beautiful cinematography. And I wished I could have seen McDormand’s face as big as a house, looking wonderingly outward, finding possibility.

Wickedly clever and unexpectedly touching.

Love & Friendship is pure pleasure, from the lavishly precise sets and costumes to the pitch-perfect tone. It’s self-consciously mannered and merrily playful; a mixture that Austen herself might find just right.

There's something about Fiscuteanu's quietly desperate performance (with much of the emotion conveyed through his eyes), that gets under your skin.

Filmed in black-and-white shadow, Coen’s version of Shakespeare’s taut tale of murder and consequences in murky Scotland here seems so creepily ethereal it practically floats in the air, with gorgeous language gliding by on the cold wind.

In other hands, this story could have been lurid and silly. Here, told through Hawkins’ ever-dancing eyes, it’s poetry; some performances don’t need words.

Bazawule slowly but surely lifts us up, letting us soar with the cast by the end.

History almost erased Joseph Bologne; this film lets him live again.

Ira Sachs’ lovely, heartfelt drama "Love Is Strange" had at its center a New York City real-estate problem — as does his new film, the equally splendid Little Men.

The Red Turtle doesn’t answer the questions it raises, but it doesn’t need to; it’s about moonlight on the water, a hand held out to another, and the way a wave, rippling onto a shore, leaves no trace of its brief life.

May December is often weirdly funny.

Gyllenhaal here shows herself as a natural storyteller; The Lost Daughter flows like water as its characters navigate territory not often explored in film.

The movie works for the reason that all the best rom-coms do: you fall in love, a little bit, with Kumail and Emily, and want them to stay together. Love, this movie reminds us, is often inconvenient; but it does ultimately conquer all.

It’s uncannily choreographed, with gestures and movements timed precisely to the soundtrack’s beat.

By the film’s poignant final scenes, you feel like you’ve really been somewhere, with a new appreciation of what it means to be home.

Get Out will scare you, make you laugh and perhaps make you uncomfortable. It’s supposed to.

And the 89-year-old Moreno, creating an effortless bridge between this movie and the previous one, gives us a gift late in the film that had me reduced to tears; it’s a deeply touching choice that I won’t spoil.

Casting a dramatic film with nonactors is always a risky proposition; the fresh, natural presence of “real people” is sometimes outweighed by awkwardness when they have to deliver scripted dialogue. But Chloé Zhao’s dreamlike Western The Rider is one of those happy exceptions.

Burnham, in his debut film, makes some funny observations about growing up in the tech era.... But mostly, with glorious support from Fisher’s symphony of awkward poignancy, he makes all of us remember what it’s like to be 13.

We’re reminded, in this warmhearted film’s moving final act, that food can bring not only joy but, in the darkest of days, hope.

Malick, director of photography Emmanuel Lubezki and the cast create a mood that lifts the viewer through the occasional head-scratching moments and into a place of serenity, where answers somehow seem in reach.

The Fabelmans is a movie about being seen — and about learning to see.

Fred Rogers is gone and the world is a much scarier place; this film, like a gift, briefly transports us back to the calm we felt long ago.

This mesmerizing film is a tribute to an astonishing woman and a timely reminder of a dark period in a country’s history. And, through its vivid use of photographs (particularly the real-life ones shown at the end), it’s a reminder that through film, our stories live on.

You have, I promise, never seen a movie quite like Park Chan-wook’s The Handmaiden. It’s a period drama gone mad; a lavishly colorful, beautifully-filmed-erotic-revenge-crime thriller set in 1930s Korea.

It plants its gaze on Lee — and on Elliott, who takes The Hero in his hands and makes something quietly moving from it.

Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret is both lovingly faithful to its source, and very much its own creation; how lucky we are to have both book and movie, preserved for girls past, present and future.

Like all of Kore-eda’s films, After the Storm ends with a jolt; not in the filmmaking, but in the way you realize that you were completely lost in the lives of these people and that, as the lights go up, you’ll miss them.

Olivia Wilde’s raunchy yet adorable high-school comedy Booksmart understands a basic truth: For so many former teenage girls, your first love is your high-school best friend.

Ultimately, Moving On is about friendship, and who better than Grace and Frankie to show us that?

Like the toys of a child now-grown, or an antique lamp gathering dust on a shelf, “Toy Story 4” isn’t needed. But it is, for many of us, very much wanted: one last adventure, one last chance to say goodbye.

Director Jon M. Chu (“Crazy Rich Asians”) lets us feel the hot, heavy air of a Washington Heights summer, and dazzles us with movement.

The last moments of Hamnet are transcendent, and perhaps the most moving thing I’ve seen on screen this year.

As Kubo warns, early on, don’t blink — you might miss something. Something that — and what a treat this is — you’ve never seen before.

Bring patience — and a fondness for Malick-ish stillness — and perhaps find reward.

Widows is smart, soulful and surprising in every frame, weaving statements on race, gender, crime and grief into a tick-tock (and tip-top) heist plot.

Unfortunately, King Arthur is somewhat less compelling than the "Lord of the Rings" movies; there's serious intent here, but an often thudding execution.

His name might be a punchline, but his story — and the human toll that it took — isn’t.

Azazel Jacobs’ His Three Daughters is one of those films that’s so intimate you feel like you’re in the room with the characters, breathing the same air.

A holiday gift, it’s bringing some much-needed light to these dark days.

Winner of the best film award at this year’s Seattle International Film Festival, Greg Kwedar’s “Sing Sing” is a gentle reminder of the power of art to transform lives.

Shi and screenwriter Julia Cho present a sweet, graceful ode to growing up.

The drama of Mike Mills’ 20th Century Women takes place in Annette Bening’s masterful pauses.

Beginning with its enigmatic title and concluding with a haunting, strange ending, “Evil Does Not Exist” is filmmaking more interested in creating a mood than telling a taut story — but what a mood it is.

BlacKkKlansman manages that tricky balance of being both entertaining (some of the performances are quite comedic, particularly Paul Walker Hauser as a mouth-breathing Klansman) and devastating.

The movie’s a playful commentary on overdependence on technology — Wallace has machines that bathe him, dress him and make his tea — but it’s also just fast-paced fun, and you look forward to watching it a second time to catch the sight gags you missed.