Roger Moore

The movie is so “interior,” it so zeroes in on Isaac and his baleful stare, that we’re relieved any time something overtly funny happens.

Pacing aside, “The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp” is an intensely lovable picture, a daring comedy that went against the “patriotism first” ethos of the war films of its day.

Field and Blanchett have given us an unforgettable character presented in almost molecular detail, and a glorious, guts-and-Gustav behind-the-scenes plunge into a rarefied world few of us have so much as dabbled in or seriously wondered about, even if we know our Tchaikovsky from our Mahler, pianissimo from forte.

It’s a poetic, mystical and meandering immersion in the life-as-a-slave experience, both for the viewer and for our on-screen surrogate.

If history’s tide runs against the Globe, at least those who worked there have the satisfaction of exposing a global wrong, and helping to end it. And they have McCarthy’s film, one of the best pictures of 2015, as a permanent record, a tribute in cinematic form, to their art and craft in its finest hour.

If you love movies you should love the ones with great writing. And if you’re looking for that yardstick against which to better judge any movie that comes along, you can’t do better than immerse yourself in Chinatown.

It’s interesting enough as it invites the viewer into interpretations, messages it might be sending and observations Devos is making about our changing world and those best adapted to roll with those changes, taking comfort and pleasure wherever they settle and accumulate.

Rarely has a movie gone as deep into the magical resiliency and adaptability of childhood.

When it’s over, there’s nothing more to take from the film than the uneasy feeling that what we’ve seen is either intolerant and biased, or a warning. It’s not Islamophobic to fear the spread of this primitive oppression, be it in Syria or Nigeria.

The surgeries shown here, organs in their place in the crowded human body, functioning or failing, is indeed eye-opening. But the film’s structure is, as an ancient Roman critic would have put it, inportunum et inordinatum.

Longer, more thorough and tweaked to play to modern audiences better, Apocalypse Now Redux packs every bit the wallop it did when it was new. After Gallipoli and Full Metal Jacket, after even Platoon, it remains the definitive anti-war war movie.

“Zone” is a cryptic, underexplained tale that buries us in banality and educates us about evil.

The politics are rarely overt. “Pussy Riot” stories pop up on TV, and the Orthodox Church’s role in the hierarchy (cozying up to power, serving as a calming “opiate” to the masses) is mocked. Zvyagintsev is a bit too willing, in this overlong film, to let the landscape, the remote setting and the insular world of crumbling apartment blocks, sagging houses, collapsing churches grey skies shape the film’s message.

Dazzling, scary and sentimental.

It’s a movie of repressed characters living interior monologues not delivered, the cinema of droning along storytelling rebranded as “serene” or “patient.” That makes this festival darling one of those films you ponder and appreciate, almost at arm’s length. It’s that afraid of moving you.

While there are things to be explored and pondered in drab “Saint Omer,” Diop’s organization of her message and lack of prioritization of simple courtesy-to-the-viewer information we need in order to follow the story and answer that fundamental question, “What the hell is this thing about?” leaves a lot to be desired.

Is it better to have loved and lost than never to have logged on at all?

Gerwig’s concocted a fresh, frothty and fun take on a timeworn classic, the perfect family film for the holidays.

It’s a sardonic satire that lacks the wit, style or pacing to let it come off.

Make no mistake, “Soundtrack” is a real work of art, an historic film painted with extant footage, a fresh interview or two, sound from many sources and thoughts, facts and opinions from a wide range of people with a stake in not just events back then, but the urgent need to have those facts preserved and honestly served up to those of us trapped in the present.

The most striking thing about this classic adventure epic today might be its look. Using real locations, crumbling brick fortresses, parched passes and snowcapped peaks, “King” feels positively analog in its depiction of an “exotic” place of both beauty and stark, hardscrabble ugliness.

Intentions and inspiration aside, Last Jedi doesn’t add up to an “Empire Strikes Back” for this trilogy. There’s no romance, little pathos and no real punch-in-the-gut moment. Its emotionally sterile tone was set with “The Force Awakens,” and that’s proven hard to shake, new innovations and plot twists aside.

The frights are muted, but the air of dread that hangs over Irish writer-director Kate Dolan’s debut feature makes it an immersive experience, one anybody with “mother issues” will quickly identify with.

It goes on too long, but this is personal essay filmmaking at its best, one that passes that ultimate test of such self-involved projects. It has a story worth telling.

Nickel Boys is American history, Southern history and Florida history uncovered and exposed, and a cautionary lesson to a culture backsliding into the comfort of more and more lies and delusions, all served up in one of the most artful films of 2024.

This grand curtain call is a much better gateway film for inspiring new fans of the undisputed master of his art form to dig into his back catalog and visit the striking and distinct worlds he dreamed up over his legendary sixty year career.

In just 70 minutes, Hymanson has shown us what “soul mates” look like, and leveled with us about the best possible outcome for our final years, months and days. Not bad.

Panahi spins all this into a road comedy with a bittersweet aftertaste, letting us laugh out loud at the travel companion from Hell — or at least “The Ransom of Red Chief” — while wistfully reminding us of loss and leave-takings, the helpless desperation of running afoul of an authoritarian state, the very foundations of heartbreak.