Beyond the title, the elegant, calm, and unnerving La Llorona has nothing in common with the bland big budget namesake. If it has real cinematic kin, it's the much harsher and more grotesque "A Serbian Film," or the darkly comedic "Cold Sweat" - even (and especially in the trial sequences) Costa-Gavras' "Music Box."

The script, and Byrne’s suitably breathless, solipsistic reading of it, give the audience every reason to not simply dislike Linda but despise her.

The overall tone of this rocket-paced updating is exhilaratingly giddy, making it by far Disney’s best animated film since "Mulan."

A disturbing, spare story and a return to Polanski's earlier thematic grounds; it's not Knife in the Water, but it does feature fragmenting marriages and a big boat.

This is the antithesis of a sequel for sequel’s sake. Instead, it’s second verse, even catchier than the first.

It’s nowhere near as soulful or questing as "2001" or "Moon" – but as popcorn entertainment, it’s surprisingly provocative.

Unlike Alfonso Cuarón's critically-lauded "Roma," which somehow managed to reduce its indigenous protagonist to a passive observer in her own life, Song Without a Name never loses sight of Georgina's pain or her agency - or its limits.

A center ring extravaganza of smackdown movie entertainment

In a startling, last-reel freeze frame, the male ego pops like a balloon, and I wanted to pre-book for the next Trip right away.

It's a finely-crafted puzzle box that speaks as much to the heart and the head, with a simple but poignant message that we are only ourselves if we are complete.

American Animals is as much an exercise in objective truth – or the lack thereof – as it is the retelling of a single series of events.

While the climax is admittedly something of a letdown after all the build-up, it's a hopelessly, helplessly original film, all guts, no glory.

It’s one of Roberts’ best ever performances, not in least part because of how confidently she wears her age and Alma’s secrets, now that her ingénue years are firmly behind her. The woman with the mile-wide smile is no longer interested in courting our favor.

While Raes may not be able to replicate the experience of the show for the cinematic audience, she undoubtedly leaves them with a new perspective on the curator's calling, and the work of Vermeer himself.

Should be required viewing for prospective parents still sitting on the spermatazoan fence; after all, you're going to need a good sense of humor, aren't you?

So great are the charges raised against the Bush administration in the film, and so combustible the current state of geopolitics, that Moore’s film could actually prove to be the first in history to help unseat a sitting American president.

It's an education suitable for both children ready to see the world's shadows, and for adults who may still not comprehend Southeast Asian history beyond the Vietnam War.

If you like your affected character dramas with a healthy dose of weird insanity, you may just find yourself head over hooves.

What makes The Front Room universal is that it’s ultimately about power, about who runs the house.

After spending time with Moretti during the course of this movie, one discovers that he makes an interesting and entertaining companion.

One of the most affecting and certainly the most intimate of the cinematic arguments against the war in Iraq yet made.

It’s a slight film, really a seriocomic tone poem about the absurdities and obstacles we can create for ourselves even when our intentions are for the best, but it brims with ordinary everyday good cheer and feels like just the right movie at just the right time.

The Legend of Ochi is a kids’ movie in all the best possible ways, all the most enriching, magical ways that a kids’ movie should be. It’s also educational, but not in a teaching, preachy fashion. Instead, it’s filled with wisdom and heart, a fabulous tale of the fantastical that will leave your children filled with a sense of wonder about the world.

Taking the concept of the dysfunctional family to a degree that might even boggle Leo Tolstoy's mind, Flirting With Disaster is every son or daughter's nightmare… multiplied.

The action sequences are breathtaking, and the character-driven humor is, as per usual, top notch.

The film’s third-act reach for a redemptive arc plays hollowly, and Harrelson teeters over the line into hillbilly affectation. Still, it’s not enough to erase the memory of Harrelson’s subtler moments, or to ruin what is an altogether worthy adaptation.

What's compelling about Caché is not the answer to the whodunit but Haneke's exacting invocation of palpable tension.

If future films deliver similar spectacle and true, epic filmmaking, then this lengthy sequel can afford to be a prelude.