Noel Murray

Accepted is remarkably affecting, thanks to the way Chen works his way back to what his doc is really about.

The filmmakers are incredibly resourceful. While they shot “The Passenger” mostly in and around one beat-up old camper in the middle of nowhere, their movie is nevertheless suspenseful and funny, with a few good jolts and gore effects to satisfy fright fans.

The emotions evoked by Bird People should be familiar to anyone who ever stared out the window of a classroom, imagining what it would be like to leave school, hop on a bike, and go for a ride around the mostly empty neighborhood.

Had the movie been just a little more thought through, it could have been a new classic. Antibirth is still quite good, though, with memorably surreal imagery and an abrasive texture that enhances Perez’s overall vision. As a portrait of a middle America full of forgotten people and ruined civilizations, this is one of the year’s scariest movies.

Prey works because the filmmakers don’t overcomplicate it. A “Predator” story should have well-crafted and excitingly staged scenes of humans fighting an alien. This picture has plenty.

Even during the gunfight, this always remains a character piece: a thoughtful, imaginative movie about stubbornly authoritarian professionals, protecting their territories.

Even more than describing her cause, the affecting I Am Greta introduces us to the person herself, digging deep into why she’s pushing herself so hard, to do what our planet’s adults apparently won’t.

Given how well Micheli captures the personality and aspirations of two complicated professionals, it's too bad she never answers the key question: What makes one person a stuntwoman, and another a star?

This movie is more like a gallery exhibition of moving portraits — each more astonishing than the last.

The story’s a bit convoluted, though no more than most detective plots. Ultimately, it’s a solid mystery, explained well by Enola in her fourth-wall-breaking chats with the audience. The pairing of actor and role here is just about perfect, and as much a star-making turn for Brown as her breakout performance in “Stranger Things.”

This film is a superior example of how flavorful dialogue, talented actors and excellent staging can make something familiar really pop.

Though Wings Of Desire has a classic look, its mood and style is New Wave in every sense of the term. The synthesis of deep thought, leisurely pacing, and stunning visuals is in the spirit of work by the young European filmmakers of the '60s and '70s. (Reviewed in 2003 for DVD Release)

Most of what makes Brooklyn 45 so entertaining doesn’t cost a lot of money. It just takes talent, and diligence.

By letting the archival material carry most of the weight, Pettengill creates an instructive kind of time-travel experience for viewers of all political persuasions, transporting them to a past hauntingly similar to our present.

It’s remarkable how fully fleshed out Bateman’s hell-scape is, given that much of this movie was shot in an empty storage facility. There’s something haunting and poetic too about the simplicity of this story, which is primarily about how people find reasons to persevere once they find a companion.

The word “visionary” gets tossed around too much, but there’s really no better way to describe the spectacularly bleak animated science-fiction film Mad God or its creator, Phil Tippett.

This riveting and righteously furious film is about two subjects: the worrying phenomenon of police departments discrediting and even arresting sexual assault victims; and the more promising trend of journalists doing their own research into cases that may have been closed too hastily.

Beyond its genre roots and its deeper meanings, Southern Comfort is a well-honed study of characters and setting.

It’s simultaneously tricky and profound—a documentary about something small that gradually grows to cover so much more.

For a movie that’s so photo-realistic in its backgrounds and detailed in its character design, Ghost In The Shell is just as effective when it goes minimal, suggesting presence through absence.

Do the undeniably Malick-derived qualities of The Better Angels work against it, or is the film all the more special for being, essentially, a bonus Malick picture? To be fair to Edwards, a lot about The Better Angels sets it apart from Malick.

This intimate slice-of-life doubles as a haunting meditation on the meaning of “identity” to someone who has long felt discouraged from expressing every part of who she is.

Maddin mixes personal reminiscences with elaborate fantasies of Masonic rituals and collectivist brothels, to construct a vision of Winnipeg as a city of sleepwalkers, roaming through mazes of snowbanks. In the end, it’s the “my” that matters more than the “Winnipeg.”

Herbulot and Diop have made a movie that is bold and exciting, combining bits of reality with outsized myth, in a tale of crime, revenge, and literal monsters, set in a wonderland where it seems anything can happen.

Going strictly by plot description, Ritesh Batra’s The Lunchbox sounds a little like an Indian knock-off of a Nicholas Sparks movie, but it plays out more like Brief Encounter.

Here’s a seemingly twee movie that ultimately, surprisingly argues that some music isn’t for everybody, some people are too broken to fix, and some would-be artists are better off in the audience.

Thanks to a focus on the setting and emotions of the story, by the time the life-or-death action kicks in, Harcourt and McKenzie have clearly delineated these characters and what they’re facing — bringing Mahy’s words to life.

Darkman is funny, but it’s no joke; it’s the work of a man who underlines the conventions of adventure stories and horror because he enjoys them, and knows that even when rendered tongue-in-cheek, they’re timeless.