Rob Nelson

A masterfully composed and suitably outraged look at the neocolonialist exploitation of South Sudan.

As much as the movie rocks, Lambert & Stamp drops the needle to reveal the deep pain barely hidden in the grooves.

A dynamic and immersive piece of you-are-there verite.

The docu’s accomplished summary of tension-filled events as they transpired from minute to minute comes at the expense of wide-angle historical context.

A digressive, daringly experimental study of a flailing musician, magnetically played by accomplished bluesman and poet Willis Earl Beal.

An aptly intense and innovative study of pioneering rock poet Nick Cave, 20,000 Days on Earth playfully disguises itself as fiction while more than fulfilling the requirements of a biographical documentary.

Rossato-Bennett’s over-the-top narration often sounds cloying and banal... But the filmmaker succeeds in providing context, medical and historical, in between awakenings.

Camp X-Ray is most commendable for believably depicting the U.S. military from a female’s point of view.

[An] initially playful, ultimately haunting documentary.

Though the ugly phobia that gave rise to the killing and permeated the legal proceedings boils the blood, the film’s tone is somber rather than angry, and its effect is quietly devastating.

The ups and downs of a decades-long friendship are charted with warmth and sensitivity in Shepard and Dark.

Escape From Tomorrow is a sneakily subversive exercise in low-budget surrealism and anti-corporate satire.

Director Jesse James Miller’s bio of ‘80s-era World Boxing Council lightweight champ Ray “Boom Boom” Mancini connects on emotional levels in the telling of an up-from-nothing brawler whose colorful career climaxed in tragedy.

The brisk, brief feature appears more atmospheric than terrifying, but its bare-bones tale gets under the skin.

By turns pulse-quickening and contemplative, The Crash Reel is a thoroughly winning docu portrait of former pro snowboarder Kevin Pearce.

It takes pains to make the political personal, forging the viewer’s identification with Scahill by making persistent use of his voiceover narration and keeping him oncamera throughout.

The clearest achievement of Dolan’s typically self-indulgent eye-popper comes in equating its gender-bending protagonist’s metamorphoses with those in any relationship that lasts for years.

Skillfully adapted from Tim Tharp's novel, evocatively lensed in the working-class neighborhoods of Athens, Ga., and tenderly acted by Miles Teller and Shailene Woodley, this bittersweet ode to the moment of childhood's end builds quietly to a pitch-perfect finale.

Handsomely produced and never less than hugely entertaining, Ascher's film is catnip for Kubrickians and critics both professional and otherwise.

Give or take the titular disclosure, John Dies at the End is a thoroughly unpredictable horror-comedy -- and an immensely entertaining one, too.

A bona fide high-wire act, Cirque du Soleil: Worlds Away delivers towering thrills through its candy-colored 3D ode to the titular outfit's astounding acrobatics.

A highly satisfying Western-cum-noir in the old tradition, Deadfall is alive in ways that are all too rare among American movies.

Audaciously giving itself license to do whatever it wants, Leos Carax's narratively unhinged, beautifully shot and frequently hilarious Holy Motors coheres -- arguably, anyway -- into a vivid jaunt through the auteur's cinematic obsessions.

First-time writer-director Aurora Guerrero beautifully captures the fluctuating dynamics of friendship between 15-year-old girls in Mosquita y Mari.

Much like the band's self-conscious synth-pop itself, "Shut Up" is initially satiric but ultimately disarming in its emotional resonance.

An aptly infuriating expose of sexual abuse within the U.S. military, Kirby Dick's documentary The Invisible War calls high-ranking officials to account for turning a blind eye to a violent epidemic.

The picture scores big points by drawing a sharp distinction between corporate vidgame programmers and indies.

Under African Skies is appreciably smarter than most celebrity musician documentaries.