Writer-director Greg McLean, who has many shorts and commercials under his belt, makes a significant feature debut here, with unapologetic horror that doesn't compromise.

Tokyo Godfathers just might be the equivalent of "It's a Wonderful Life" or, to be hip and new-millennium about it, "Elf."

Feels like something entirely brand-new; such are the gifts of Kaufman and Gondry, inventors and magicians.

Wong weaves a spell that no other director could create.

In this bolder, longer new cut, characters are allowed to finish scenes previously left as DVD extras, effects are creepier, and the theories of "the Tangent Universe" are explored in greater depth. Friends and neighbors, this is a Great American Movie.

Overlong, but with moments of greatness.

It's not easy to pull off a good morality tale. That's why Moolaad, the new film from 81-year-old Senegalese writer-director Ousmane Sembene, feels like such an exceptional success. Its moral center is painfully clear, but so is its humanity.

It's best appraised as a strong ensemble piece, a darkly dreamy slab of social commentary and definitely one of the year's best films.

He's (Hanson) never before generated the kind of heat inside a picture--and out of it--that he has with L.A. Confidential.

It's a work of art for sure, but a sadistic one. Oldboy is one of the year's best; it just isn't for everyone. If you're still interested, go for it.

It isn't your typical scary movie--there are no "boo!" moments--but it may gradually creep you out and perhaps even more after you've seen it.

The original retains its dark tone and deadly serious anti-war message. For today's moviegoing audiences, this may not be your daddy's Godzilla movie, but chances are your granddaddy could teach you a thing or two about the context.

If not the best superhero movie ever, it's definitely in the top 3. Reeve will forever be Superman to most of us.

Turns out to be more than simply a near-miracle of filmmaking, however; it is also an astonishing work of art, a historical epic that drifts through one's consciousness like a reverie.

A masterful film about the magic of performance and the foibles of the artists behind it.

So enchanting it takes your breath away.

Brilliant.

The cast is full of cool cult actors past and present, and the movie is great at what it does. It's also brutal as hell, and not everyone will have the stomach for it.

This astonishingly gritty film maintains its strong niche between Roberto Rossellini's "Open City" and Paul Greengrass' "Bloody Sunday" as a pinnacle of war-torn neo-realist drama.

How often does one see a masterpiece about a masterpiece?

When the action sequences work, they work well; the climax cribs heavily from 1989's "Batman," but improves on Tim Burton's finale.

It makes it clearer than ever before that these films are comedy. Granted, the sick kind of comedy that involves laughing at stupid people being ripped in half, but we know there are plenty of you out there.

It would be a masterpiece in any language.

A superb and piercing documentary.

The movie's scares are intense, but the notion that the Terminator would move on to politics is even more frightening.

Fargo is a concert performance--an illuminating amalgam of emotion and thought. It glimpses into the heart of man and unearths a blackly comic nature, hellishly mercurial and selfish, yet strangely innocent. If it weren't so funny, it would be unbearably disturbing.

One of this year's best films--a classic, even, like a C.S. Forester "Hornblower" story on steroids.

The result is a vivid anthropological document suffused with plenty of emotion and a touch of ancient magic.