Stephen Holden

Almost in spite of itself, The House of Mirth is powerful, at times even moving.

In what has been called the Year of the Documentary, "My Flesh and Blood" stands beside "Capturing the Friedmans" and "The Fog of War" as an unforgettable experience.

Powerfully gritty.

If it weren't so overpopulated and desperate to shock, Nowhere might have succeeded as a maliciously cheery satire of Hollywood brats overdosing on the very concept of Hollywood. But the movie is so hectically paced that it doesn't have time to develop its characters or to flesh out the tales it sets in motion. Even comic books are better at telling stories.

Remarkable concert documentary.

An ingenious contraption that holds your attention for as long as it whirs and clicks like a mechanized Rubik’s Cube. After it’s over, however, you may find yourself scratching your head and wondering if there was any purpose to this sleek little gizmo.

Skarsgard and Headey deliver perfectly meshed lead performances in a small, beautifully acted film that will make you squirm.

A witty, sociologically astute reflection on the attraction between opposites.

For all its narrative glitches and its homemade quality, Thirteen evokes the rhythm, texture and tone of Nina's world in a way that a more carefully scripted film never could.

An unblinking portrait of a complicated, solitary gay man who has outlived his working years.

Welcome to Leith wisely resists the kind of gimmickry that might have resulted in a stylistic hybrid of “The Blair Witch Project” or “Invasion of the Body Snatchers.”

Blistering.

One of the rare documentaries you leave wishing it was a little bit longer.

Putty Hill doesn't strive for overt social commentary. It drops you into a world that the director, who grew up in the area, knows firsthand: a suburban fringe of stasis, downward mobility and lowered expectations.

Lullaby, the directorial debut of Andrew Levitas, a jack of all artistic trades, is the kind of manipulative, cliché-infested hokum that alienates moviegoers by its insistence on hogging all the tears.

Breathe conveys an uncanny insight into the psychology of late adolescence, when lingering childhood fantasies can combust with burgeoning adult sexuality in a swirl of uncontrollable feelings.

As informative and packed with cultural lore as it is, The Komediant is dramatically diffuse.

Eddie Miller (Robert Forster), the stolid protagonist of Diamond Men, a small, finely acted slice of American life, is the sort of character the movies normally shun like the plague for lack of glamour.

What makes the pain of this film bearable is Daniel’s unquenchable decency, courage and perseverance.

As La Ciénaga perspires from the screen, it creates a vision of social malaise that feels paradoxically familiar and new.

Had it had the concision and symmetry of a classic French farce, Après Vous could have been an irresistible laugh machine.

The role of Jimmy is one of Mr. Jackson's scarier characters, and this brilliant actor inhabits all four corners of his jittery, avaricious personality. When he and Sydney finally clash, the movie makes its darkest, cleverest turn into film-noir nightmare.

This comic jigsaw puzzle is crammed with deliriously funny little bits.

Louisiana's delta country has never looked more darkly, lusciously sensual than it does in Eve's Bayou, a Southern gothic soap opera, written and directed by Kasi Lemmons, that transcends the genre through the sheer rumbling force of its characters' passions.

What's really so appealing about the characters is their resemblance to everyday children. They're wildly energetic, competitive and (sometimes dangerously) impulsive. But they also learn from their mistakes, and their instincts are good. More power to them.

"We are not pickers of garbage; we are pickers of recyclable materials," Tião, an impoverished Brazilian catadore, or trash picker, declares to a talk-show host in Lucy Walker's inspiring documentary Waste Land.

Morris, instead of evoking the solemnity that surrounds most films that touch on the Holocaust, has directed Mr. Death as the blackest of comedies.

The movie uses the talent show Afghan Star as a prism through which to examine the fragmented tribal culture of Afghanistan as reflected in the backgrounds of four finalists (two of them women) and the public responses to their performances.