Robert Wilonsky

De Sica's 1952 neorealist masterpiece; it's a stark snapshot in which all is revealed about the "daily life of mankind," as the director once offered by way of description.

Anderson and Sandler were meant for each other, and their romance is, unbelievably, our reward.

A gentle, frank, and often hysterical love story about two people destined, and occasionally doomed, to be together forever. Some of us should be as lucky, as blessed, as Harvey Pekar.

Certainly it exists solely to sell a soundtrack; the movie, like most made for teens, is well beside the point.

Yes, yes--The Incredibles is beautiful to look at, but even more lovely beneath the computer-generated surfaces.

The first relevant film about rock and roll and the music industry, the first film that lets you in on the secret.

Yet the magic of the movie is how utterly wrenching it renders these songs, which thrive alongside the film's simple, eloquent, dusky narrative.

May be the most wrenching, profound and perfectly made movie nobody wants to see.

Capturing the Friedmans does not end after its credits roll; audiences will try the case over and over again in their heads. Jarecki does not judge, but leaves only tragic clues for us to ponder.

It reminds one of "The Constant Gardener," another globetrotting thriller bereft of thrills that looks more important in retrospect than on the screen. Certainly, one man's trash is another man's masterpiece, and more power to the viewer who can stick with this deadpan travelogue and make it to the ending that actually satisfies.

Feels like something entirely brand-new; such are the gifts of Kaufman and Gondry, inventors and magicians.

Its exquisiteness can overwhelm in a single sitting.

How often does one see a masterpiece about a masterpiece?

It's this moralizing, this slamming down of a stop sign every time the movie wants to rev its engines, that keeps Lord of War from being great. But it's three-fourths of a great movie, if nothing else, it has more brains and balls than most studio releases, for which it's to be commended and recommended.

One of the most remarkable things about Murderball, which is easily among the year's best movies, is how little of its time is filled with the playing of the game.

It really happened, it's really corny, and it's really great.

Rock Star takes itself so seriously it becomes full-on parody -- "This Is Spinal Tap" as a sanctimonious cautionary tale. And how rock 'n' roll is that?

If Dubus' work always resembled some sort of literary therapy session, as has often been said, then Field's version requires grief counseling. It is, at times, that devastating.

In the end, The Apostle feels like a con, a movie that embraces its contradictions only because it's not smart enough to reconcile them; everything feels complex, but, in fact, it's far too simple.

It is a remarkable achievement in filmmaking, a beautiful and brutal work.

What makes About Schmidt so extraordinary is how ordinary its tale is; it's a gray picture about gray people looking for some kind of meaning in their gray lives.

The film is a whirlwind blur, a kinetic thrill ride through the industrial backwater that was one of punk and post-punk's most fertile Promised Lands: Manchester.

Scorsese's rockudrama withstands big-screen scrutiny some 24 years after its initial release.

Shrek isn't clever or smart. It just wants you to think it is, through wink after wink after wink.

The film, from its deadpan start to its languorous finish, provides the most joyous moviegoing experience in years.

The performances are uniformly remarkable.

The movie's so hung up (pardon) on its gimmick it never transcends it; might have been better had Kiefer called Moviefone.

As he did in "Shaun of the Dead" and "Hot Fuzz", Wright immerses his heroes in pop culture's detritus and diversions, but doesn't drown them in it. You don't have to be dazzled or tickled by the movie, or get every joke, to be touched by it, too.