Neil Genzlinger

If Urban Hymn starts with that familiar dynamic, it stays surprisingly fresh thanks to three fine performances and a willingness to be uncompromising.

The film over all is a pulse-pounding success.

The story in Tallulah sometimes strains credulity, but it’s beautifully told and acted.

The story has several well-disguised twists, and although it’s a drama, it is sprinkled with touches of whimsy, thanks to a colorful collection of robots.

This is dark comedy indeed, and if viewed as such, it works deliciously.

If "Wall-E" pushes the boundaries of what can be done in an animated movie, Space Chimps proves that the old formula is still pretty effective when executed well.

You can feel just how jarring and stressful it must be for a soldier to go from the life-and-death adrenaline rush of war to the maddeningly slow world of rehabilitation and forced inactivity.

Generally speaking, bird-watching is a pastime that is extremely interesting to a few people and not at all interesting to anyone else. But Scott Crocker has turned a bird-watching tale into a multilayered story that will fascinate practically everybody in Ghost Bird, a witty, wistful documentary.

[A] sweet if not very credible film.

A striking experiment in music and moviemaking.

"Star Wars” fans will, of course, love this film, but it’s also a thought-provoking exploration of the dawning of our current age.

The movie sweeps you along with a brisk pace and even dashes of humor.

An assured and thoughtful debut.

This is not an easy documentary to watch, in the sense that the filmmakers let the story tell itself, without narration or expert commentary. That ultimately makes it all the more touching.

If you are one of those people who romanticize the East Village in New York when it was at its grungiest, Ten Thousand Saints might be the movie of your dreams. Even if you’re not, it’s still a very fine film, full of quietly impressive performances and young characters who register as authentic.

Lots of comedic fight scenes break up the story’s more somber stretches, and the animation, especially in 3-D, is simply gorgeous.

Those whose tolerance of Greatest Generation war stories isn't exhausted, not to mention those who still thrive on them, will find the group of men who called themselves the Ritchie Boys good company.

At this point no documentarian can possibly have a fresh take on climate change, right? Wrong. The Anthropologist, a stealthily insightful film by Seth Kramer, Daniel A. Miller and Jeremy Newberger, improbably mixes that topic with a mother-daughter story to produce a distinctive study of change and human adaptability.

Stands as both a tribute and a study in healing.

It’s adorable.

Ellington fans will certainly relish the many vintage clips scattered throughout.

Ms. Bailey’s willingness to let the children talk and to let the viewer impose broader meaning elevates it.

The journey could be a bit more eventful, but the payoff is charming.

It's a Christmas present for cat lovers. Miss Minoes, the tweaked title of a 2001 Dutch film by Vincent Bal, is being given an American theatrical run (dubbed into English), and it's a pleasantly quirky, family-friendly fable with lots of meowing.

It avoids the big confrontation or grand statement; doing so allows it to be an effective, if somewhat uneventful, study of the Brooklyn bubble effect.

The movie looks great, the writing is peppered with moments of wit, and there’s even an educational component built in as dinosaur facts are displayed on the screen.

It takes a while to realize that this is actually a sly, very funny comedy, one that stays admirably deadpan every time you think it’s about to veer into gross-out territory.

The script, by Mr. Canon and Doug Simon, eventually strains credulity - even frat boys aren't this dumb - but Mr. Canon, in his first feature, shows a great knack for keeping things moving. The gathering implausibility is dispelled by a nice ending twist.