Ronnie Scheib

Hadzihalilovic, the wife of cinematic agent provocateur Gaspar Noé and his sometime collaborator, has created a work of limpid beauty and eerie menace that some undoubtedly will dismiss as kiddie porn.

A magnificent performance by Sarah Polley illuminates every frame of this relatively upbeat melodrama.

The women's outspoken commentaries prove consistently colorful and their long-ago stripteases -- feathers flying, tassels spinning -- still pack a sensual, sassy, what-the-hell punch.

Craig Rosebraugh’s docu Greedy, Lying Bastards covers ground well-traveled by environmental exposes from “An Inconvenient Truth” to “The Island President.” Rosebraugh, however, focuses less on the issue of global warming itself and more on the deniers and their big-money backers.

Daly deftly creates a disturbing, Chabrol-like tension that plays on immediate identification with the handsome medico's lonely, shy vulnerability and slow-building horror at the depths to which his self-delusion can sink.

Endearing documentary, winner of Tribeca's audience award, should delight devotees and intrigue nonbelievers.

Thanks to Saville’s tightly controlled direction and a superlative cast, the mere exchange of glances builds as much suspense as the kinetic action sequence that opens the pic.

To the extent that Michelle Williams' multilayered interpretation of Marilyn Monroe serves as its raison d'etre, My Week With Marilyn succeeds stunningly.

Fascinating glimpse into wholly different body of laws, engrossingly evolving script and standout performances.

Engaging leads, high-end production values, wedding preparations, energetic musical numbers and a familiar story should ensure healthy biz for Mere brother ki dulhan, a lightweight, unambitious three-way romantic comedy whose utter predictability may be its greatest asset.

A must-see for stargazers of all ages.

Although the film wears its dated genre affectations on its sleeve, the script avoids pretension, its hero’s believably alienated exhaustion overriding mere nostalgia.

Pic benefits greatly from Ben Kingsley's brilliantly nuanced reading of frankly bombastic narration.

Whenever Sutherland comes on scene, any inadequacies in the film's depiction of the well-to-do become irrelevant.

Family-friendly holiday fare.

Some viewers will doubtless argue over Ismailos' choices or balk at her adherence to a romantic single-vision theory of a highly collaborative art. Still, her eclectic pantheon weighs in with entertaining anecdotes and illuminating comments, illustrated with well-chosen samplings of the artists' work.

At several points, Chang is the only thing standing between his event and total chaos, as frustrated ticket-holders rush the gates.

Giving not an inch to any sort of readable moral paradigm, this third installment in Potrykus’ Grand Rapids-set animal trilogy (including his 2010 short “Coyote” and his 2012 feature “Ape”) proves as fascinating as it is off-putting.

When a baby orca strayed from its family pod near Puget Sound and showed up 200 miles away in Canada in 2001, it became the center of a long-running human drama by turns cute, inspirational, ludicrous and tragic, as documented in The Whale.

Though picture is downbeat and defiantly low-budget, its laid-back absurdist tone and no-nonsense pacing make for an audio-visual delight.

A rogues gallery of flamboyant gangsters paint an anecdote-rich portrait of the drug trade, while a steady stream of cops, coroners and crime reporters furnish social commentary.

Excerpted interviews with WWII and Vietnam veterans suggest that every war is hell, yet it is the specificity of the Iraq War combatants' reminiscences that makes their writing resonate so profoundly.

Static, strikingly composed documentary stretches are interspersed with actors playing workers who voice a variety of complaints, appreciations and parables that deliberately, even pointedly, fail to encompass the sense of being there amid the unfolding spectacle.

Nicole Karsin's beautifully crafted documentary We Women Warriors highlights the activism of three strong, extraordinarily likable women from three different regions and indigenous cultures of Colombia.

The movie belongs to thesps Jacobs and Meester. Jacobs fully inhabits her less-than-completely-sympathetic role with warmth and just the right touch of unconscious entitlement, while Meester luminously expands the film’s affective core.

An old-fashioned postmodern hoot.

Beneath the strings of gags and wisecracks run parallel threads of ruthlessness and hysteria which bring “Motivation” a little closer to “Full Metal Jacket” than “Private Benjamin” as off-screen conflicts invade the closed-in encampment.

Distinguishes itself from such last-fling-before-the-wedding comedies as "The Hangover" with the grittiness of its Texas locales and the smug intelligence of its unapologetically narcissistic protagonist.

Spinning a wry, tall-tale version of his autobiography, the septuagenarian audaciously plays himself at every age and every stage of his improbably picaresque adventures.

Knockout performances by John Cusack and child actor Bobby Coleman help legitimize a whimsical but sententiously moralizing script.

Magnificent photographs, archival news footage, and location-shot porn add texture and immediacy to Joseph Lovett's fascinating memoir of the sexually explosive 12-year period (1969-1981).

One need not fully subscribe to Peter Navarro's demonization to appreciate his lucid wake-up call to the imminent dangers of the huge U.S.-China trade imbalance and its disastrous impact on the American economy.

Spearheaded by phenomenal pint-sized lead Sydney Aguirre, this challenging third feature from the Zellner Brothers retains much of their provocative trademark idiocy but navigates darker waters.

By the film's underwater finale, director Matteo Garrone has bestowed a tragic stature on the pint-size Othello who loves "not wisely but too well."

Brain-teasing, wildly unpredictable animated feature.

Revelatory for the disabled and entertaining for the rest of us.

Documaker Daniel Peddle also works as a casting director, and so it is small wonder his crisp, concise, intimate portrait of six very different, self-styled "aggressives" -- women who stress their masculine sides -- should reveal in each a curious integrity and beauty.

Luc Cote and Patricio Henriquez's You Don't Like the Truth demonstrates, through excerpts from an actual videotaped interrogation at Guantanamo, the process by which human will can be systematically broken down to force an admission of guilt, regardless of truth.

Thoughtful, incisive, controversial.

Shepard delivers in spades, his character weary but just crackpot enough to survive.

A rousing, hilarious Bacchanal of family togetherness, Roger Paradiso's brilliantly cinematic adaptation of the second-longest running play in Off-Broadway history might be the best of the recent rash of wedding pics.

Culture shock often proves the stuff of comedy, but the sight of a silver-studded, sombrero-topped mariachi band breaking into a rousing rendition of "Hava Nagila" transports diversity into the realm of the surreal.

For Fry, the music's complexity, ambiguity, innovation and humanity far surpass Wagner's personal limitations. He may not convince his viewers of the rightness of his conclusions, but he certainly makes a fervent case for the triumph of art over biography.

Unlike "Unzipped," with its single focus on the charismatic Mizrahi, Seamless follows three of the 10 finalists, furnishing a quietly fascinating contrast in persona, approach and design.

Piles heavy emotional baggage on a slender story frame. Pic looks ravishing, featuring a nocturnal road trip through a cool kaleidoscopic landscape of shifting colors peopled by three commanding thesps of different generations whose interlocking stories form a cohesive whole.

Confusing lack of historical set-up considerably dims the potential luster of a great true story: Helmer Alberto Negrin relies instead on competently rendered but cliche-ridden melodrama of nasty Nazis and suffering Jews.

Burns' always impressive sense of place lends authenticity to the pals' perambulations, and the stellar cast brings a welcome overabundance of personality to regrettably one-note roles.

Barsky wisely includes just enough dissenting voices and admissions of grievous error by Koch himself to prevent the picture from seeming like a 100% feel-good puff piece.

Less cohesive and accessible than "The Maid" (which the Chilean duo co-scripted and Silva helmed solo), picture nonetheless contains unforgettable scenes.

Ron Frank and Melvut Akkaya’s docu isn’t exactly groundbreaking, but as a brief history of the Catskill resorts, liberally laced with well-edited archival promos, songs, homemovies and extended excerpts from routines by Jewish comics who performed there, it consistently entertains.

Holiff Sr.’s extensive audio diaries and taped phone conversations with Cash give authentic voice to the film’s otherwise stodgy re-creations of this true odd couple’s stormy relationship.

Director-producer Aviva Kempner's well-researched but unchallenging docu, like "The Goldbergs" itself, has cross-cultural appeal for Jews and goyim alike.

Uneven but enjoyably titillating black comedy should elate Rickman fans while pleasing aficionados of extra-flakey caper flicks.

The pleasures of well-observed characters and small epiphanies are undeniable, and Alex of Venice, actor Chris Messina’s directing debut, is amply supplied with both, thanks to Mary Elizabeth Winstead’s extraordinary performance: Registering profound shocks with slight ripples rather than big emotions, she quietly commands attention.

Despite lively commentaries by a pantheon of master musicians and magnificently performed classical pieces, "Exiles" only distantly echoes Huberman's visionary adventure.

Documentarian Jarred Alterman emphasizes oddball lyricism in the one-of-a-kind Convento, in which a 400-year-old Portuguese monastery provides the canvas for a Dutch family's artistic experimentation.

Schwarz lacks the writing chops to adequately embed the character’s predictable learning curve into a richer narrative fabric, but Dunne’s perf is pitch-perfect.

As a character study and revelation of a possible answer to addiction, the docu rocks. But Negroponte's low-res video camera, trivializes the film's already crude approximations of psychedelic experiences and its recordings of shamanistic rituals.

The indomitable siblings' unusual background, huge size and highly developed intellects, as well as the dramatic ups, downs and rebounds of their interwoven sagas, should result in a fascinating dual biodoc. But the two-hour pic's lack of economy makes for heavy slogging, with no boxing minutiae too small for exhaustive exposition.

The latest in a line of documentaries decrying the destruction of viable working-class businesses and residential neighborhoods in Brooklyn, Su Friedrich’s film bypasses sadness and indignation for flat-out anger and well-aimed sarcasm.

Picture loses its delicate edge when it builds to a prescribed dramatic flashpoint within an overly compressed timeframe

Unlike more generally philosophical, life-affirming autobiographical docus about dying, “One Cut, One Life” rehashes old problems and tries to resolve multiple unresolved issues already exposed in previous films, proving as exasperating as it is weirdly compelling.

Covering familiar ground from an unfamiliar angle, Ted Woods' oddball documentary White Wash examines the history of African-American disenfranchisement from a black surfer's viewpoint, in the process countering the racist myth that black people don't swim or surf.

As endless processions of friends and colleagues attest to Spinney’s genius, and the filmmakers wallow in never-before-seen behind-the-scenes imagery, they fail to fully capture the actual art of puppeteering, with woefully few substantial excerpts from the show itself.

Winner of the Golden Starfish fiction competition at the Hamptons fest, pic's gutsy, madly ambiguous unleashing of a mixed bag of religious reactions attests to a genuine sense of regionalism.

Though generally engrossing, Ikland's multiscreen displays and cross-cultural theatrical experiments prove more distracting than effective.

Koons Garcia has obviously opted for an upbeat approach: Choruses of scientists and farmers sing the praises of organic farming while John Chater’s camera visually devours the fruits, vegetables and livestock produced by healthy dirt.