William Arnold

It's a magical film -- an exquisitely made and exceedingly wise family drama that communicates a touching sense of the universality of the human condition, and leaves us with the rich emotional satisfaction we just don't seem to get often at the movies anymore.

An undisputed masterpiece and a one-of-a-kind experience: a wise, poignant, wryly funny, tenderly open-hearted comedy-drama that shrewdly portrays a microcosm of French society on the brink of WWII through an ensemble of love affairs taking place at a country estate over one hectic weekend. [09 Mar 2007, p.6]

It's essentially a propaganda film, but Eisenstein's stirring (and, for the history of cinema, truly revolutionary) montages of men in action still are uniquely powerful. [04 Jun 1999]

Absolutely riveting.

A highly original and unusually powerful drama that deserves comparison to the great Scandinavian films of the past.

As powerful as the movie remains and as much as I enjoyed this new cut, I have to say that the additional footage -- material that Coppola felt he had to excise 20 years ago to reach a commercial length -- has turned out to be something of a mixed blessing.

Antonioni's moviemaking panache and distinctive narrative rhythm rarely have seemed so enticing and satisfying.

It's an emotionally gripping, daringly genre-twisting, consummately crafted piece of filmmaking.

The movie is so well-cast, sympathetically acted and delicately directed -- and so genuinely touching and funny -- that it leaps right out of the narrow confines of the family bonding formula.

People who have seen it seem to be crazy about it.

In what was indisputably his finest moment as a filmmaker, Forman summoned the absolute best work of his craftsmen -- costumes, makeup, camerawork, production design -- and merged them with his own storytelling sense and his special way with actors to create what has to stand as cinema's most successful musical epic.

The film is a hugely compelling tribute to the French Resistance movement in World War II, staged with a genuine epic flair but in the icy, downbeat, film-noir style of the director's celebrated policiers.

So magnificent in so many ways that, for the first time, it seems to raise the docudrama to high art.

The granddaddy of all caper/heist movies. The work that defined the genre for the subsequent four decades of filmmakers, none of whom was able to surpass it for style or suspense.

A tasteful, richly textured, exquisitely nostalgic drama that carries with it an enormous emotional punch. [09 Oct 1992]

Above all, the film is a classic of "poetic realism," that distinct brand of pessimistic '30s French urban drama that gave lyrical, sometimes even surrealistic, interpretations to working-class romances and underworld characters, settings and dramas.

It's not only the most gentle and effortlessly funny movie so far this year, it's a film with a style and sensibility that wonderfully harkens back to Hollywood's golden age of sophisticated comedy, and in particular to the masterpieces of Crowe's filmmaking idol, Billy Wilder.

No one does this genre better than actor-writer-director Christopher Guest.

Penn's direction is amazingly sharp and intuitive, full of masterful touches that give an epic dimension and scope to the parable.

An unusual, visually hypnotic, American Gothic historical epic that traces the rise and tragic fall of a Western mining magnate of the Gilded Age.

The movie grabs us from its heart-pounding opening sequence and pulls us inexorably along its trajectory with the grip of the last gruesome act of a Greek tragedy. Its fascination is not what happens but HOW it happens.

The final scene of Balthazar's demise is one of cinema's most moving and haunting moments.

It's an immensely successful movie - and far and away the most emotionally charged, psychologically uneasy and diabolically suspenseful thriller Polanski's made since his heyday. [27 Jan 1995, p. 26]

There's no denying that Eating is a significant achievement: a movie that explores one of life's most important subjects in an intelligent, entertaining and original manner. [29 Mar 1991]

A brilliantly conceived, boldly executed, cumulatively thrilling fantasy epic that expands the art of film and is sure to be the middle link of one of the movies' greatest trilogies.

An excessive, expressionistic, agreeably nonjudgmental period biography that carries with it an enormous emotional wallop. [01 Mar 1991]

Hilarious, near-flawless.

The movie is never mechanical or emotionally contrived, and at its heart is a guileless, enchanting performance by Tautou.