It's among the most inventive, screwily funny and consistently surprising movies I've seen in years.

If you see Hot Fuzz, you'll never again watch a Michael Bay film without howling with disrespectful laughter.

Few white directors depict racial interaction in a thoughtful, non-exploitative way, but Sayles has always been one of them.

Denzel Washington directed and stars in Fences, and he has translated every element of August Wilson’s play to the screen: A language that’s naturalistic yet gently poetic, a detailed sense of America at mid-century...drama that turns to melodrama at key points, characterizations that seethe and explode, the touch of the fantastic (or is it the supernatural?) that pervades most of Wilson’s stories.

The final drum-off (c'mon, you knew it would come down to that) resembles a combination of music, gymnastics and martial arts, and I don't think I've seen a more pulse-pounding scene this year.

As dense as a Watergate-era newspaper and as immediate as a blog, State of Play is an absolutely riveting state-of-the-art "big conspiracy" thriller.

On the most basic level, Cars is an old-fashioned fable about an egotistical, talented loner who learns humility and redeems himself by helping unfortunates.

After an hour, The Pianist stops being the Holocaust movie and becomes a Holocaust movie.

Captain America: Civil War appeals to me more strongly than any superhero movie of the last decade.

It's fascinating to watch others sweat, suffer and triumph in the documentary Dust to Glory, which chronicles the longest nonstop, point-to-point race on our planet.

Allen, rejuvenated by foreign settings, makes us appreciate posh parts of England as he always did Manhattan. (Credit cinematographer Remi Adefarasin for showing us how seductive upper-crust London can be.)

Shows the fate of Sicilians who moved to the Italian industrial city of Turin 40-plus years ago, and it suggests that the experience of relocation is universal.

A director needs to know how to pace the tale, where to place the camera, how to draw out a shy actor or get out of the way of a strong one. Those skills are rarer than you'd think. Sarah Polley, who never wrote or directed a feature film before Away From Her, has them all.

Bolt has the magical quality of great animation, the ability to touch us without the hint of preachiness or manipulation.

Brilliantly embodied by Jamie Foxx in this unflinching, entertaining biography.

Howard has never been so grown-up in his handling of tough themes or so inventive in depicting states of mind. Goldsman has never been so down-to-earth or created so touching a character.

It has the charm, irony and saucy wit of the original, plus two supporting characters -- a suave, egocentric feline and a cheerfully conniving fairy godmother -- who are funnier than anyone in "Shrek."

By riffing off two iconic American narratives of the last 35 years, "The Godfather" and "The Sopranos," it has changed the template for animation, making a timely film that still deals with timeless children's themes.

Corpse Bride had me at the maggot.

This film reminds us you can have a miracle only when David slings a stone at Goliath, not when two Goliaths pummel each other with sticks.

This is the first real family comedy I've seen in a long time: one honest enough to satisfy teens, wryly funny enough for adults and zany enough for little kids.

A crackling rendition of Dan Brown's novel, siphoning off unneeded fat and fancy and leaving us with a streamlined train of a picture that never stops moving.

If you're tired of false holiday cheer, Lilya 4-Ever will provide a corrective to the spiritual eggnog force-fed to us all season. The climax takes place during Christmas, though one that would make Tiny Tim grateful for his crutch and cold chimney corner.

Cravalho shows spunk and a generically lovely voice, though she’s saddled with assembly-line anthems Disney has done better elsewhere. Johnson has exuberance, deft timing and a passable singing voice.

Yet as fine as she and Ewan McGregor are as the parents, Tom Holland stands out as eldest son Lucas, a slightly sullen teen who learns to put other people before himself.

The sequel is faster, funnier and wilder, with more cunningly contrived computer effects.

Bloom finally comes into his own as a man here, somberly thoughtful and melancholic. The elfin archer of "The Lord of the Rings" and the trivial boy-toy of "Troy" have been forgotten.

If you've been seduced by Andrew Lloyd Webber's stage version of "The Phantom of the Opera," you'll fall in love with the gorgeous, splendidly cast film.