Sheila O'Malley

It's a quiet and gentle film, emotional but not manipulatively sentimental, sad but not nihilistic, Marilyn Manson epigram and Goth-font chapter markers notwithstanding.

Christine, centered on a riveting and at times unbearably emotional performance by Rebecca Hall, attempts to give a three-dimensional and respectful-yet-honest portrait of a complex woman. Sometimes the film is successful in this, sometimes it's not.

Under the Shadow, a Farsi-language debut feature written and directed by Babak Anvari, creates a world where reality itself is suspect. In a year filled with great first features, add Under the Shadow to the list.

The entire documentary is unnerving. Focusing on four separate rape cases with eerie similarities, Audrie & Daisy is a stark portrait of a problem which is not in any way local, aberrant, or random. The problem is systemic.

Southwest of Salem has an investigative questioning bent, but it is always clear in its attitudes about the four co-defendants. It is a powerful act of advocacy. It's hard to look at these events in any light other than that a terrible miscarriage of justice has taken place.

The film tries to pack in a little bit too much in its running time, and there isn't a comedic moment until well into the film, a strange choice in a movie for kids, but The Wild Life has its moments of charm, hilarity, and slapstick that worked really well.

Kicks is knowing and innocent, profound and goofy.

The scenes of wretched debauchery pile up, and in a film only 88 minutes long it's a tough slog. It's difficult to perceive what story is actually being told. There's a lot to look at, colors, light, drugs and nudity, and much of it looks really good. But there's nothing else to latch onto.

The fun of the film (and it is often fun) is in the complexities of interconnections, and the sheer number of criminals raging through this tiny area, outnumbering the upstanding citizens by the looks of it.

Spa Night takes too much time to portray David's achingly slow and incomplete coming-out process, but its focus on the interior maelstrom of a teenager is extremely insightful

Played by Matthias Schoenaerts, Vincent is a tormented and inarticulate man, and the riveting center of Alice Winocour's sexy, relentless thriller Disorder.

Little Men doesn't reach the humanist tragedy of "Love Is Strange," but that's an unfair comparison since very few films achieve what "Love Is Strange" does. Little Men is extremely powerful in its own right, with its devotion to its characters' differing perspectives so refreshing in an increasingly black-and-white world.

Sorvino is great in the small role of Clark's tear-stained, checked-out mother.

So spot-on in its evocation of that whole "scene," onstage and off — its intimacy, competition, struggles and rhythms — that at times it feels like a documentary.

The film can be smothered by the obligations of its plot, but it's still beautiful and original, extremely funny, and sometimes very moving.

Captain Fantastic treats the situation (and Ben) so uncritically and so sympathetically that there is a total disconnect between what is actually onscreen and what Ross thinks is onscreen.

Carnage Park is an extremely empty experience.

Powerful and emotional, without being manipulative. It is deeply inspiring, without trying to be. It is honest about Owen's struggles, and the struggles of his family.

With all its humor (and there is a ton), Wiener-Dog, following the journey of a dachshund as it is shuffled from owner to owner, is one of Solondz's sharpest visions of futility.

The most striking part of Nuts! is its extensive use of animation.

It's charming. It's funny. The case they investigate has a legitimate twist to it, there's a lot of French intrigue, there's much that is totally implausible, but the film lives or dies on the dynamic of the two main guys. It lives.

A beautiful portrait of the man himself, still going strong at age 76, as well as a critique of the art world that has ignored him (and others) because they don't "fit."

An effective and creepy-surreal film.

The Lobster plays rigorously by its own rules without once telegraphing "Just kidding!" While extremely funny, it is a bitter and ruthless film. Lanthimos plays target practice and his aim is deadly.

See it for the performances. There you will find the whole story.

Sin Alas has a lot going on, both plot-wise and stylistically, and it often gets quite theatrical, but the overall effect is that of a pure and beautiful simplicity. There is nothing in the way between the story and its impact.

There are some good ideas in the film, albeit a bit obvious ("why can't we all look past our differences and get along?"), and albeit done much better in other films (primarily "The Visitor").

What does all of this add up to? Damned if I know. But it's fun to see a film that plays by its own rules to such a degree that any comparison to anything else falls apart.