Witty, insightful portraits of hyperverbal, self-conscious young people falling in and out of love.

In a film that quickly reveals itself to be a love letter to Wu, some of the best moments have nothing to do with that legendary hip-hop collective: Sage Francis taunting the unruly, increasingly tense crowd with his cerebral, political performance-art hip-hop; Redman playfully admonishing his young son to be good and then giving the boy a kiss when the paternal command wounds.

Heartwarming here relies less on forced air than on Petter Næss’ delicate, clever direction -- and a wonderful, imaginative script by Axel Hellstenius.

As lead Columbine investigator Kate Battan has herself put it, “Everybody wants a quick answer. They want an easy answer so that they can sleep at night and know this is not going to happen tomorrow.” And now they have Gus Van Sant's Elephant.

For the soul of Gondry's work, it seems to me, is neither its soaring flights of visual fancy nor its sometimes crude slapstick, but rather its pained understanding of a generation hopelessly tongue-tied when it comes to matters of the heart.

By crafting its message in mostly understated strokes, The Syrian Bride touches your heart, which you might not even fully realize until its deft, wordless final moments sweep by you.

Doesn't offer much new in the way of news or analysis. What it does offer is inspiration from an unlikely source, via an unsparing look at one such victim.

The famously lovely mug of Tilda Swinton (cast as Kurtz’s wife) merely distracts, and I couldn’t help feeling that this potent story would have been far better served by a straight-ahead documentary.

He's (Carrey) an unruly commodity and, as such, compulsively watchable.

But if you go in knowing this, the payoff is considerable - the film delivers on its feel-good promise.

It's a laudably complicated, if emotional and a little comic-book goofy, story of how a confluence of forces - industry skepticism, trained-seal lobbyists and, last but not least, consumer reluctance - undermined the future of a quiet little bean of mobile metal that the anointed few who could afford to lease it passionately adored.

The film's plainness, and the understated force of van der Groen and Petersen's performances, sharpen its complexity of feeling until all mawkishness is cut away.

How Miike gets us from amiable point A to debilitating point B is a remarkable act of manipulation and control that may leave you feeling sucker-punched, even brutalized, but you won't forget the experience anytime soon.

This filmed Tosca -- not the first, by the way -- is a pretty good job, if it's filmed Tosca that you want. I'll stay with the stage versions, however, which bite cleaner, and deeper.

The film won't likely change any minds, but there's a taut political essay beneath the blatant campaigning.

Helped along by news clips, the filmmakers do better with the crash-and-burn business story than with the actuality of the Studio experience.

A Spanish dinner-theater comedy, this intermittently hilarious contraption by the husband-wife team of Dominic Harari and Teresa de Pelegri heaves Jewish-Palestinian conflict onto a prop-room table already groaning with loaded guns, impromptu sex toys, a wounded duck paddling in a bidet, and a brick of frozen soup that doubles as a sandbag for unlucky pedestrians below.

Where "Amores Perros" was a feast of energy, wit and imagination, 21 Grams is like a starvation diet -- a movie that wallows so profoundly in its own misery that watching it is like atoning for some sin you didn't commit.

The result is a carefully wrought, historically grounded and thoroughly absorbing look at a quintessential American experience.

What is remarkable is the absolute cool with which LaBute charts his story: The director has the soul of an assassin.

Real kudos goes to Molly Parker, searing as a heroin-addicted mother immobilized by the death of her husband, and to a poised little boy named Harry Eden, who's astonishingly good as the 10-year-old son desperately trying to hold her to the straight and narrow.

With Matangi/Maya/M.I.A., Loveridge celebrates the mashup aesthetic that enabled the artist to find a voice, and reveals that reconciling contradictions — like an outrageous sense of humor and earnest political activism — is key to both Arulpragasam’s music and the life she’s constructed with audacity and wit.

Now there is inconclusive but reasonable doubt, based on a letter that turned up in 2005 from Upton Sinclair, who had heard their disgruntled first lawyer say they were guilty. You'd think this nugget might show up in a new documentary about the case, but Peter Miller, known for his 2001 film about that other beloved song of the left, "The Internationale," has recast the story into a tale of prejudice against Italian immigrants and the violation of civil rights.

These people accept the consequences of living like there's no tomorrow. They stand awaiting their fate in a rain of fire. And now we can feel a little bit of that, too.

Winstead is wildly funny (and spot-on) doing the impressions in Nina’s act (especially of Björk ordering a smoothie) but also proves uninhibited and candid when Nina doesn’t have jokes to hide behind.

(Herzog's) tribute to Kinski doubles as a life-affirming monument to creation in all its variety.

A tougher, more experienced director may someday force Holmes to surprise first herself, then us.

A career best for the daughter of Charlie Chaplin.