Rene Rodriguez

Sometimes, the simplest, smallest things require the greatest courage. Moonlight is Miami’s first bonafide movie masterpiece.

It leaves you feeling exhilarated at the invigorating power a well-told story, no matter its subject, can have. If you like Harry Potter, you will love this movie. If you don't like Harry Potter, you will still love this movie.

The remarkable Hoop Dreams proves that even at its best, Hollywood can't match the drama of everyday life. This rich and insightful documentary, which traces five years in the lives of two Chicago inner-city kids, is more compelling than anything a pack of scriptwriters could ever concoct. [21 Oct 1994, p.G5]

Brilliant, suspenseful, absolutely riveting film.

Offers a ride worth taking -- an excursion through a fantastical pop universe that is pure, enchanting magic. Try it; you'll like it.

One of the best things about 12 Years a Slave is that McQueen renders all the characters with the same depth and complexity as his protagonist.

But this is also his funniest, nimblest picture: There are long stretches in it that could pass for a comedy.

Has the sort of richness and dimension that are the hallmarks of master storytellers at work.

Self-indulgent and needlessly complicated for what it ultimately delivers.

And the animation, ultimately, is what makes Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs worth seeing again on the big screen. Aladdin may have grossed more than $200 million, but even its state-of- the-art, computer-assisted animation can't surpass the detail and fluidity, the denser-than-reality feel, the astonishing palette (check out the red on the poisoned apple) of the film. Watching it, you don't forget it's a cartoon: You relish that it is. What bigger compliment is there than that? [2 July 1993, p.G5]

Seydoux says that when the film was completed and released shortly after the end of the war, it became a symbol of freedom.

Gravity is a celebration of the primal pleasure of movies: It shows you things you’ve never seen before, transports you out of the theater and out of your head, tricks you into believing what’s happening on the screen is happening to you.

Delivers the heady, rib-tickling rush of an action picture, and it gradually builds to an emotional wallop that blindsides you.

This is the sort of small, intimate drama about unpleasant subject matter Hollywood rarely deals with, but Haneke isn't worried about turning off his audience, because death is something everyone has in common. It fascinates us, the way it also scares us.

Like every war before it, the U.S. invasion of Iraq has generated its share of movies. But The Hurt Locker is the first of them that can properly be called a masterpiece.

Maya is as consumed with finding bin Laden as Jake Gyllenhaal was obsessed with finding a serial killer in "Zodiac," only he was doing it as a hobby.

The movie has such a profound and compassionate understanding of human behavior, family ties and the way ordinary people respond when they're forced into a moral quandary, I can't imagine anyone not being transfixed by it.

This is a beautiful movie.

The movie, shot in lovely, grainy 16mm by cinematographer Ed Lachman, is so elegantly staged you can practically smell the characters’ perfume. Haynes’ direction is methodical and precise without being fussy or oppressive. Every detail has been weighed and considered.

The film is far from a downer. If anything, more than any of the films in the trilogy, this one may be the most hopeful - and the most affecting.

The movie is filled with small, loaded moments that resonate like gunshots in an echo chamber.

Jeanne Dielman is not for all tastes. But for those with the necessary patience, it is a game-changing masterpiece. [11 Sep 2009, p.G18]

A soaring, exhilarating fantasy grounded in earthy emotion, Crouching Tiger more than lives up to the hype.

If Inside Out doesn’t stack up with the best Pixar movies (Wall-E, Finding Nemo, Toy Story), that’s because there’s less plot here than usual, and even at a lean 95 minutes, the movie starts to drag a bit just before it ends.

What makes it the best movie of the year -- is its insight into human behavior.

Feels like a miracle, a movie that exceeds even the most formidable expectations without straying from its singular path. All hail this King.

Part of the accomplishment of Carlos is the sheer accumulation of detail the movie amasses, and the longer running time gives you a deeper sense of the terrorist lifestyle, and when and why Ilich gradually succumbed to ego and self-glorification without realizing it.

Here is a celebration of the artistic drive that is also a daring feat of showmanship, as technically accomplished in its own way as “Mad Max Fury Road” or “The Revenant."