Ms. Moncrieff's low-key directing is matched by fine acting from Agnes Bruckner as Meg and David Strathairn as her mentor. Aside from a somewhat schematic climax, this is as smart a debut as we've seen in a long while.

Almereyda's movie is riveting for several reasons: its inside look at Shepard in action, its vivid account of how a challenging play is brought from printed page to public stage, and its glimpses of Shepard's troubled youth.

Longer than necessary, that is, for the story it has to tell. This flaw aside, the drama is well crafted and sometimes touching, with especially forceful opening scenes.

The acting is excellent.

Shine A Light is essentially just an expertly made concert film. But what a concert! (And what a camera team.)

Given what this film is about and the dangers hindering its fullest accounting, a dramatic rendition, rather than a documentary, might have been more emotionally satisfying. Still, there’s nothing like seeing some of this stuff up close and for real.

The performances are persuasive but the plot rattles on much too long.

Levy-Hinte has said that a great deal more concert footage exists. I can't wait for the expanded version DVD.

The power of this film sneaks up on you. It glides from jubilation to heartbreak without missing a beat.

Angela Bassett gives a superbly versatile performance as the heroine, and Laurence Fishburne's portrayal of Ike Turner consolidates his status as one of the most expressive and intelligent actors in movies today. [18 Jun 1993, p.13]

Although the documentary is something of a patchwork affair and lacks the late singer's ineffable smoothness and rhythmic brilliance, it emphatically makes the case that here was one of the four or five all-time great female jazz voices – or "song stylists," as she called herself.

The humor is broad, the jokes not of the first freshness, and the cast, especially Bousdoukus, is hammy. And, for the record, the upscale menu, which is supposed to be scrumptious, doesn't look as tasty as the downscale one.

The results are far more exciting than most Hollywood espionage thrillers.

Three short documentaries about photography made by one of France's finest directors.

It's an engrossing and inventive drama despite its flaws.

The movie makes up in sweep and splendor what it lacks in psychological depth and dramatic impact.

A triumph of psychological drama, owing as much to Ms. Bier's sensitive style as to Anders Thomas Jensen's smart screenplay, based on Bier's own story idea.

The Last Station isn’t all that it should be, but whenever these two actors are onscreen, it’s like a great night at the theater.

It's all fairly entertaining but also confusing for anybody who doesn't get the Wall Street lingo. Irons, as the company's chief executive officer, seems to sympathize with us: He keeps asking his minions to explain the impending problems in plain English.

The best parts of Wonder Woman are frivolous in the best way.

Because we know almost from the get-go that things will turn out bad-to-bittersweet for them, the movie is like one long autopsy of what went wrong, starting with Day No. 488.

A mixed package, but often fun to watch.

To the film’s credit, Diana’s gilded-prison desperation is not displayed as a martyrdom for which she is blameless. This royal can be a royal pain, and Stewart doesn’t flinch from the more unsavory aspects of Diana’s woe.

One of the best pictures so far this year, marking a high point of Rudolph's career and reconfirming the extraordinary talent Mr. Campbell has shown in earlier films. Dentistry will never seem the same.

What The Revenant attempts but fails to do is create a larger vision from all this survivalist mayhem. It’s a useful how-to guide for how to stay alive after a bear attack – or a human attack, for that matter – but it doesn’t soar. It crawls.

What makes this small-scale drama so compelling is Pontecorvo's treatment of the main character.

Too much of this movie is a conventionally rendered gloss that, in its own way, also attempts to cast Bauman as an inspirational icon. He is, but we can see in Gyllenhaal’s looks of grief and panic the makings of the more complex movie this might have been.

The movie makes up in sincerity and goodwill what it lacks in originality and style.