A patchwork of impressions, ruminations and unsolved mysteries, The Last Black Man in San Francisco teems and even overflows with life and love, some might argue at the cost of narrative focus or momentum. That strikes me as precisely the point.

As directed by Rachid Bouchareb, himself born in France to Algerian immigrants, "Days of Glory" is a kind of a North African "Saving Private Ryan," a taut, involving film that delivers all the things we look for in war movies and does so with intelligence and integrity.

Two teen girls forge an explosive connection in a compelling Pawel Pawlikowski film.

If there is a reason to cherish this often captivating, sometimes irritating, unavoidably perplexing movie, it's that its mere existence seems to defy rational explanation. It is by turns savage and soulful, mangy and refined, possessed of an unmistakable pedigree and yet boldly resistant to categorization. It's a shaggy Frankenmutt of a movie, dressed in artisanal fur and infested by bespoke fleas.

Filmmaking at its most fearless, with Ostergaard creating a suspenseful, harrowing account of his original key subject, known only as "Joshua."

While the plot twists in Read My Lips may be too intensely melodramatic for some tastes, the performances of the two leads are impeccable, just about compelling our belief.

While most films are fortunate if they succeed on any level, The Return works easily on several, making as powerful a mark emotionally as it does visually and even allegorically. Yet the film so catches you up in its compelling story, you're almost not aware of how masterful a piece of cinema you're watching.

People fall in love in every country, but nowhere is the experience put on film with the flawless style, empathy and emotion the French provide. Mademoiselle Chambon is the latest in that line of deeply moving romances, an exquisite chamber piece made with the kind of sensitivity and nuance that's become almost a lost art.

The storytelling is straightforward, with a classical sheen, even as mischief and hallucination puncture the serene surface.

Masterfully keying the compact performances into a striking lighting scheme that often bathes the musicians and dancers in warm golden or somber indigo hues representing the cycle of life, Saura's spare, elegant staging and the fluid, intimate cinematography by the great Vittorio Storaro ("Apocalypse Now") create an intoxicating effect.

Reichardt has never been one to reduce her characters to an easy emotional or dramatic equation, and here the everyday challenge of being female in a male-dominated profession is just one element on an extraordinarily fine-grained human canvas.

Awe-inspiring visuals and equally stirring orchestrations combine to fittingly majestic effect in Mountain, a unique portrait of mankind's enduring fascination with the world's most formidable summits.

A film that understands childhood-to-adolescence as few films do, with dark and loving affection. [12 July 1987]

In an era when AIDS research still seems in its infancy and bacteria and viruses seem to now be able to outwit science's most powerful arsenal, there may be lessons to be learned here. And they're told with great feeling and fine craftsmanship. [15 Apr 1994, p.F24]

As the summer heats up, let Frozen River wash over you; let its bracing drama and the intensity of its acting restore your spirits as well as your faith in American independent film.

Drugstore Cowboy, an electrifying movie without one misstep or one conventional moment. [11 Oct 1989]

The gently transcendent, tear-inducing conclusion that “Little Amélie” reaches suggests that memory serves as our only remedy for loss. As long as we don’t forget, what we cherish won’t become ephemeral.

Heal the Living reveals a gift for joining skillful visual filmmaking with moving, affecting storytelling, all in the service of a story that unfolds in surprising ways.

In the hands of two of the craft's best, the most ordinary of moments become illuminating, penetrating.

The geopolitical landscape has changed dramatically in the last few months since this sleek, smartly assembled and almost indecently entertaining movie premiered at the Sundance Film Festival (where it won two audience awards), and as a result, it can feel timely and outdated, relevant and redundant, disturbing and escapist all at once.

“Girl” is a welcome reminder that animation doesn’t have to be synonymous with realistically rendered CG, but can be a means of artistic expression as uniquely personal as a signature.

Combining Hou's patient, observant style with a historical martial arts tale, the film is a fascinating hybrid of craft, genre and story. Beautiful to look at and with deeply felt emotions, the film has a meditative aura punctured by sharp bouts of fighting.

[A] fascinating film.

Late Marriage will assuredly rank as one of the cleverest, most deceptively amusing comedies of the year.

This utterly compelling behind-the-scenes account of that horrific event unfolds with a potent sense of authority and authenticity.

It's a highly enjoyable spree that doesn't add up to a whole lot by the end. But you don't necessarily want it to add up to anything -- that's part of its charm. [24 Sept 1993]

The film's septuagenarian director deserves his share of the credit for bringing this human story to the screen with engaging B-movie modesty and no small measure of chops.

Madeline’s Madeline is the product of a lengthy, improvisation-heavy collaboration between Decker and her star, an astonishing teenage discovery named Helena Howard. It is also a skillful and imaginative blurring of fact and fiction, albeit one that insistently calls the act of such blurring into question.