Walter Addiego

An understated story of coping with emotional blows that offers a compelling portrait of a decent man.

Transit has a hint of science fiction, and more than a hint of Kafka. And despite the story’s link to World War II, it’s clear that Petzold wants it to resonate with today’s immigration problems.

A superior adventure film with a poetic heart.

If you have even a passing interest in outsider art, you owe it to yourself to see Marwencol.

If you can live with its blemishes, The Lobster is a bracing experience.

The movie works by stringing together many small observations to develop a portrait more quiet and revealing than many overwrought films that strain to address hot-button issues.

Creating this kind of otherworldly mood takes exceptional talent, and this is a film worth experiencing.

The most compelling footage was taken during the uprising of August and September 2007, which put a bad scare into the government because a large number of Buddhist monks played a prominent role.

We are told at the film's beginning that we are about to see a "diary of suffering," and it is that, but the effect, after four-and-a-quarter hours, is exhilarating.

The overall tone is awed and laudatory, which may rub some viewers the wrong way. Willem Dafoe delivers narration taken from Robert Macfarlane’s “Mountains of the Mind,” which occasionally strays in the direction of the trite or overwrought.

See Love Is Strange for its sensitivity and understated jokes, but mainly for Lithgow and Molina's expertly modulated work, which pulls the movie back when it threatens to stray into melodrama or heavy-handedness.

It’s a fantasia on a short period in the life of the esteemed Chilean poet and Nobel laureate Pablo Neruda — while based on fact, it’s made with a sense of freedom suggestive of poetry.

It’s a lot to cover in 83 minutes, and you might wish for a little more depth in the girls’ back stories. Then again, the brisk pace is part of what makes the movie a crowdpleaser.

A simple story told with economy, Wadjda is a notable example of old-school, humanistic filmmaking. It's also genuinely groundbreaking: the first feature shot entirely in Saudi Arabia, and the first film directed by a Saudi woman.

Works a familiar mine and produces more than a few nuggets. It's a good tonic, if one's still needed, for '80s-style cynicism: Greed is not good.

Like in so many silents, the plot is joyously minimal.

A powerful polemic leavened with moments of beauty and humor.

It's an interesting spectacle, but not enough to carry a movie.

Director Corneliu Porumboiu ("12:08 East to Bucharest"), with his deadpan style and probing intelligence, is someone to keep an eye on. Using a minimalist style, and possessing the courage to risk alienating his viewers, he has created a movie full of resonance.

The real acting laurels go to Klein, who is both an adult and a child - by turns smart and not so smart, brave and fearful, caring and full of disdain.

The documentary Hell and Back Again may be the closest most civilians ever get to the reality of the war in Afghanistan.

A potent and disturbing experience. Fortunately it’s much more, offering sharp performances and genuine drama.

The film is cleanly made and moves quickly, which enhances its effectiveness. It raises moral issues that simply can’t be addressed too often.

Nil by Mouth is slow to get going, and meanders before its impact scenes in the second half. Still, its final intensity can leave you exhausted. If you stay with the picture, it's a powerful experience you're unlikely to forget.

The movie’s sympathies are with Halla and against the climate-change deniers, but it also sees something slightly ridiculous in her David-and-Goliath actions. What sets the film apart is how it balances both this sense of irony and an abrupt plunge into serious personal matters stemming from a forgotten decision Halla made years ago.

I could have done without the clips from the old "Superman" TV show - strictly sugar to make the medicine go down, and a sign that the director doesn't fully trust his audience.

An enjoyable example of this extraordinary director's documentary work.

So there’s talent on view here, but in service of a questionable proposition, with the whole thing tiptoeing toward the exploitative. It would be nice to see Mascaro try his hand at less volatile material.