Until things devolve into a stormy conclusion, Dheepan is a sharply observed drama about identity and separation, strangeness and commonalities, and making do while hoping for something better.

Nelson has gifted us with a thoughtful and rich profile which, like a fading note escaping from Davis’ trumpet, leaves us wanting more.

This film is a pleasurable experience, but it’s a frustrating one as well. There’s a nagging feeling we should expect something more from this guy. To borrow the most quotable line of dialogue from "The Room" (bellowed at the top of the lungs): “YOU ARE TEARING ME APART, FRANCO!”

Provides no revelations and left this viewer, at least, puzzling over whether the picture Cunningham has allowed to develop of him is completely transparent or utterly impenetrable.

As Lo and Behold anecdotally lays it out, in the blink of the eye of human history, this invention has become essential, and in another blink – a solar flare, or cyberwarfare – its failure could trigger a civilization’s collapse.

All Light, Everywhere’s roaming tangents always return to the heart (or the eye) of the matter, and that skill of orchestration is no mean feat.

There's a genuine sense of loss when dreams go unrealized, and in these moments Dig! transcends the typical "rock movie" format and aspires to something greater: an examination of why we create and what we receive from art.

Dipping between English and Irish, and borrowing wholeheartedly from the fictional music doc/concert format of A Hard Day’s Night (hey, steal from the best), stylish musical comedy-drama Kneecap the movie is an accurate-ish biopic of the real Kneecap, with Dochartaigh, Annaidh, and Cairealláin playing themselves.

At one point, a rapt concertgoer enthuses about Russell, “The guy’s a gas!” So, too, is this thankfully restored film.

Iconoclastic British environmentalist and sculptor Andy Goldsworthy doesn’t experience the world in the same way the rest of us do. Using more than just the conventional five senses, he profoundly intuits his surroundings as if in a meditative trance, mentally and physically absorbing the details of his environment like a forensic scientist in the pursuit of a unique artistry that’s brought him worldwide acclaim.

At times, it looks as though Broken Embraces might be the love child of Douglas Sirk and Alfred Hitchcock, with its dramatic broad strokes, iconic reds, and teasing narrative clues.

The story is simple and true-to-life, and the technique is naturalistic, using nonprofessional actors, photography that emphasizes the characters' environment, and deliberate narrative pacing that mimics real-time events.

Maggie’s Plan is an ensemble piece, with Maya Rudolph, Travis Fimmel, and a magic, romantic New York rounding out the cast. They’re all great, but it’s Gerwig who’s just so damn gosh-wow.

The movie demands to be watched and rewards that attention handsomely, though at times Heavy seems a little too introverted for its own good.

A confident return to the kind of teen comedy that's funny without being raunchy, youthful without being juvenile, and reflective without hitting you over the head.

Filmmakers nicely mix the historical and the tributary, honoring both Bennett's cultural landmark and the dancers who dream of joining its ranks.

It’s muddy, bloody, and studded with amputated limbs, yet still rather generic-feeling; it lacks the visceral impact of Joe Wright’s version of Western Front atrocities in "Atonement."

The characters’ painful inability to connect only endears them to us, and somehow the film seems, like any human object of our affection might, more vivid and more knowable in its absence.

White couldn't stay away, and neither can the band's legions of fans, who bop up and down in sold-out arenas at the reunion tour that provides the film's hopeful coda.

Gary Oldman and Chloe Webb dramatically and unforgettably burst from nowhere onto the screen with their searing portrayals of Sex Pistol Sid Vicious and American groupie Nancy Spungen. Their performances in this embellished docudrama are so intense and definitive that they leave little room for any other memories of these doomed junkie lovers.

There’s an intriguing story to be told here, but there’s a better way to tell it. To borrow from the Bard, the spots in Lady Macbeth simply won’t wash away.

As with all of Lee's films, there's much more going on beneath the surface than is immediately apparent.

The very best animation can excite the senses and inflame the imagination. But Chico & Rito's charmless line drawings just made me wish the film was live-action instead.

It’s an understated performance in many ways, but in those quiet moments, whether it be a new haircut or a tapping foot, Ebrahimi provides an astonishing education of what it means to be a woman fleeing an abusive relationship.

A wicked return to form for Murphy, who absolutely nails Moore’s straight outta West Hollywood brio and never-say-die single-mindedness. It's an often uproarious glimpse into microbudget filmmaking and the fearless badassery of the man they called Dolemite.

Guardians of the Galaxy is an outlier: a space opera in a largely earthbound movie cycle (excepting the occasional red-eye to another dimension in the Thor pictures), candy-colored and bopping where the other Marvel movies are muted and imposing, and the funniest one to date, without a doubt.

Although there are moments that push the story a bit beyond credulity, Shortland has created something remarkable by forcing us to find within ourselves sympathy for this would-be Aryan princess.

Nagahisa's script dares to embrace true nihilism: not selfishness, not posturing decadence, but the genuine commitment to your core that the meaningless of the world isn't a bug, it's a feature. These zombies may be dancing in the trash, but at least they're dancing.

Admirable efforts aside, I Carry You With Me is still an enchanting mix of drama and romance, but also a timely, poetic love letter to Iván’s home country, Mexico.

The movie will not be for all tastes. Its seedy lifestyles, nonjudgmental attitudes, nonlinear narrative, and central character whose problem is his lack of emotions is definitely nonstandard fare.

These people and the tale of their migration and reintegration into life’s ebb and flow will remain with the viewer long after Johnny's and Sarah’s green cards expire.

Corsage has many things going for it, most of them being the virtuoso performance from Vicky Krieps. She imbues Elisabeth with a restlessness that comes off her in waves, and as her fury percolates, so too does her shrewdness. And so would the dramatic tension, but Kreutzer wields metaphors so bluntly that any emotional poignancy quickly evaporates.

You have to wonder – not too hard, though – what this gore-soaked auteur's bedtime dreams are like.

This is a film you skip seeing at your own risk.

A wacky joyride.

All of the major players turn in powerhouse performances, and Fishburne nails his best role yet as Furious.

As is typical by now, Baker (along with cinematographer Drew Daniels) captures the ethos and texture of America on the fringes in a way not many others do.

This film is an example of a Western that ought to appeal to a healthy-sized contemporary audience, and is also a remake of the 1957 film of the same name, which is a hallmark of the type of psychological Western.

Perhaps every decade gets the Jane Eyre it deserves: Is the emphasis of conscience over passion emblematic of our times?

This debut feature from Australian director Duncan is still a wonderful sociopolitical experiment, dripping with sarcasm and bizarre, oddball humor, which make it all the more potent.

Even when the film doesn’t hang together perfectly, MacDougall maintains its momentum as his character painfully journeys toward a sense of acceptance. It may be only a few days into 2017, but this is a performance that you’ll remember for the rest of the year and beyond.

Meehl's documentary features plenty of interviews with cowboys and ranch hands who've had their lives – and their horses' lives – changed by Brannaman, but it lacks the literary or cinematic magic of either version of "The Horse Whisperer."

The most original comedy from either side of the pond in years.

Their Finest may ultimately be the best words to describe the amalgamated work of all participants in this film.

Syriana is the most challenging and uncompromising movie to come out of Hollywood in a long time.

There’s an element of synesthesia and a touch of religiosity to The Colors Within, but more importantly there’s Yamada’s welling compassion for the inner lives of young people.

The end result is an electrifying, morally complex story of the evil that men (and women) do in the name of the greater good.

Even when it feels packaged like a holiday entertainment that aims to please, watching Dreamgirls is like being on cloud nine.

What keeps Outside In interesting throughout is the nuanced work of its so very watchable leads – especially Duplass, who spent the first half of his career behind the camera writing, directing, and producing film and TV with his brother Mark.

That they were just hormonally blitzkrieged kids at the time, unaware of their role in history, only makes Peralta's superior doc that much more winning.

Despite footage onstage with John Lennon and jamming “Happy Together” alongside Howard Kaylan and Mark Volman, plus naturally him taking on censorship during farcical Congressional hearings in the Eighties, Zappa never adequately spotlights its raison d’être’s wit – hello, Burnt Weeny Sandwich, Sheik Yerbouti, and Does Humor Belong in Music?

All Quiet on the Western Front is more grisly, disturbing, and sadistic than any horror movie in 2022.

Flight's pat closing sequences are at odds with the complexities presented earlier on. They travel the conventional route and threaten to vastly simplify this story into one of an addict's redemption. Perhaps it was inevitable that the drama on the ground could never equal the excitement of the action that occupies the movie's beginning sequences.

Iwish I could say 99 Homes delivers a shockingly good sucker punch to the American electorate and a stand-up-and-cheer piece of socially conscious filmmaking, but it’s not. It lacks the satisfactory denouement of, for instance, Michael Mann’s The Insider (and Garfield is no Russell Crowe), in part because the events it depicts are still happening across the country (albeit to a lesser extent).

It all comes back to Sorkin's core idea, implicitly and expertly expressed: that the tactic of violence and provocation, then making the victims seem like thugs, is still performed in Portland and St. Louis and New York, just as it was in Chicago. It's also a reminder that there was no Chicago 7 until the establishment brought them together.

While Pulse was a warning, Cloud seems more like a funeral bell, a despairing look at life on the online economic periphery.

While Hewson’s splashier performance energizes the film, it’s Gordon-Levitt who gives Flora and Son its sweetness and light.

The Lunchbox offers us a naturalistic glimpse of middle-class life in modern Mumbai.

The film is very funny, but a thoughtful Reitman is just not as funny as when he used to blast into space.

Dedicated to Atlantic Records fountainhead Ahmet Ertegun, whose complications from injuries sustained in a tumble backstage at the Beacon resulted in his death, let the record show that a lifetime of musical innovation concluded with dying not at but FROM a Rolling Stones concert.

As uncomfortable as it is to have your nose shoved in this nightmare, its unforgettable in its violent lyricism and the bloody power of its message.

The kind of movie that gets under your skin and takes root.

There’s more narrative happenstance loaded into the script of Blue Car than its running time should effectively allow, but the real keeper moments in Moncrieff’s movie are the small, quiet ones in which a simple glance speaks volumes.

The elements are all here for something spectacular – and in brilliant bursts, Jeunet really gets it – but in the end, all that potential is sunk by a terminally confused tone and milquetoast pairing of lovers. Pity that.

Living in Emergency, then, is like a hard slap to the face: There is nothing remotely romantic about this grim depiction of two missions in Liberia and Congo in the mid-2000s.

Denise Ho: Becoming the Song offers an affecting timeline of a political awakening of a person, of a movement, and of a generation utterly frustrated with the machinations of oppression.

If only Cartel Land were as rigorous in its thinking as it is in its filmmaking methods, the film might strike an even deeper blow than it presently does.

One of the most intelligent crime-thrillers to come along in years.

Artfully stitched together sans narration, Soul Power stands alongside "Wattstax" as a critical concert film of the Black Power era.

Thoughtful and achingly empathetic – there is so much grace in these performances – We Grown Now occasionally tilts a touch too capital-A Arthouse Film.

The movie makes us all want to stand up and cheer, “Shine on, Tina. Shine on.”

Housebound nimbly jumps through the hoops of horror tropes, inventively subverting them along the way. The fact that it sticks the landing is a testament to Johnstone’s solid script and direction.

What Hail Satan? really achieves is to show this new brand of Satanism as part of the same tradition as the Dadaists and the Church of the SubGenius, fighting for actual liberty and debunking falsehoods. As one activist so adroitly explains, the devil’s work is never done.

The Dog reveals both expected and unexpected things about this oddball character to keep you interested.

Presumably the first ever feature film adapted from a Twitter thread, Zola makes use of the graphics and sound effects of the internet, as has been common in film for the past several years. But there’s more depth to it here given the context.

Talk to Me is hardly a bad horror film, but the disconnect between what was and what could be looms large over the final act.

There’s a certain spiritualism that inhabits all of Nichols’ films, and I’m not sure that the explanations finally offered to shed light on the specialness of this child are truly sufficient. But in the context of the movie, it all works.

It's a lot more than simply a string of names and dates and anecdotes, but after this many hours that's what it starts to become.

The result is an expansive and ambivalent testament to human ingenuity, human intransigence, and nature’s endangered yet enduring power to move.

The one thing that is clear from Japón is that a major new visual stylist has hit the screen and that Reygadas’ first film represents the beginning of an auspicious career.

Tickled doesn’t quite answer all of the questions it brings up, and there’s a nagging feeling that there is much more to this story than portrayed.

It's interesting and well-performed, but it's no Cain and Abel.

The Last Station would have satisfied alone as a witty, manic lark, but as it moves toward the titular railway station, the film unfurls into so much more – a work of compassion, modulated mournfulness, and unchecked joy.

With The Guest, Wingard and Barrett have once more upped the ante for the indie horror flick pack.

Unlikely to be either the tea party or Occupy America's first pick for best film of the year, Margin Call is nevertheless a surprisingly adroit effort to A) explain the birth pains of our current financial woes, and B) show what it might have been like, in these first few hours within the confines of an early investment trading firm casualty.

It’s a personal, aching, and romantic film that’s swimming in the complicated trials of youth.

The antithesis of a feel-good movie, Listen Up Philip is a challenging experience, largely because it refuses to compromise its protagonist’s dogged preoccupation with himself.

The location, the cultural mores, and most especially the sparse soundtrack (mixing minimalist electronica and the guzheng or Chinese zither) may be Chinese, but this is all-American noir at its blackened heart.

This, uh, wonderfully directed and near-perfectly cast iconic heroine female empowerment story is so similar in tone and feel to Marvel Studios’ "Captain America" that I was waiting for Stan Lee to show up, possibly as a eunuch.

Looking at the world around us, this is the perfect summer drama for a society that continually proves itself more and more obsessed with controlling women.

Something in the Dirt doesn't hide its answers, because there may not be any answers. It's the danger of obsessing over the mutability of facts that is its true and fascinating subject. In an era of post-reality politics, Something in the Dirt may be a quiet wake-up call.

The story, though structurally flawed, is an artful portrait of modern life: the 24-hour news cycle, class warfare, and rampant overconsumption leading to crippling anxiety and burnout, even in the young. It’s sadly all too familiar: Too late to be a cautionary tale, it reads more like society’s distorted self-portrait.

It feels like Glander was hoping to create something that all the former kids that grew up on Cartoon Network’s wild, weird era will gravitate towards. But the reality is that it’s not as bizarre, creative, transgressive, or even just plain entertaining as the average episode of The Amazing World of Gumball, and that was about a 12-year-old cat boy and his fish friend.

A funny, seductive, and surprisingly honest dramatization of the ways we snooker ourselves into incompatible love.

July sees the world in a most unexpected way, and it's a shame that Me and You's preciousness sometimes overwhelms that uniqueness of vision.

Co-fabulists Pablo Larraín and writer Steven Knight have made a film that marries the former’s elliptical, experimental style with the latter’s penchant for alternative histories stuffed with archetypes. But it is Stewart’s performance at the center of it all that is the most startling aspect of Spencer. She brings a theatricality in the way she moves and speaks that transcends impersonation yet falls thankfully shy of camp.

True, few of the cutup crew ever had the depth of knowledge or stylistic panache that Godard – one of the last remaining masters of the 20th century's most vibrant art forms – brings to the screen. But then, is The Image Book really a film? Godard himself has re-engineered it as an art installation, to be shown on a TV with speakers surrounding it, and that would probably be a better home.

It all adds up to a portrait in decency, which isn’t nearly as sexy as the title would suggest.