For all its cross-cultural hijinks, Japanese Story winds up as a tale about the fragility of human beings and the lasting strength of the bonds we form during times of crisis.

The filmmakers capture enough of the book's essence -- and the power of its knockout, transcendent ending -- to more than justify the movie's existence.

Nolan, who has become an assured, stylish filmmaker in the span of only a few films, keeps the complicated plot spinning.

A mature, insightful and extremely well-acted study of a boy at a crossroads in his life, and a doomed, tortured man who, consciously or not, longs for some kind of redemption, before it's too late.

Ratner is canny enough to close the movie with a devilish tease that will send the Lambs faithful out with a delirious smile. What Red Dragon won't do is haunt your nightmares. Who could have guessed Hannibal Lecter would ever become such a crack-up?

If I hadn't seen the original, I might have gone ga-ga over Reeves' version. But even with the shock of novelty gone, the film still draws you into its chilly, demonic heart.

The Wave builds up a nice bit of genuine tension and hits some surprisingly dark notes.

You may not remember The Crazies in a month, but you'll have a grand time watching it.

Touching.

It's almost startling to see a film that believes in itself and its characters so deeply.

One of the chief pleasures of My Week with Marilyn - which should not be approached as anything other than fluffy entertainment - is watching Williams bring to life Monroe's inner demons and her movie-star allure with equal aplomb. By the time the film's book-ending closing musical number comes around (That Old Black Magic), the illusion is astounding and complete.

It turns out to be a satisfying, if occasionally wandering, adventure.

Stranger Than Fiction may not be the typical crowd-pleaser, but it's a sweet, funny, intelligent film that showcases just how much Ferrell can do, even when he's doing less.

''Everything got a rhythm, even pulling cotton off the plant,'' a field hand offers helpfully. Like his eager young bluesman when he finally hits the stage, Sayles hits exactly the right notes.

May not offer anything new, but in its well-tested premise, you can't fail to be seduced.

Swinton single-handedly carries The Deep End past its nagging ambiguities.

Precious without ever being cloying, All the Real Girls is a wise, delicate and immensely touching romance.

A high-wire act of storytelling, tone and old-fashioned chutzpah.

A wrenching film.

It's a warm, skillful excavation of what look like ordinary lives, ones that aren't so simple once you dig a little deeper.

Cynics may not fall for its melodrama, but Riding Alone is good for everyone else, including children.

Screenwriter Shawn Slovo -- whose white parents were anti-apartheid activists in South Africa -- ends his finely tuned screenplay on a note not of violence and anger but of forgiveness. It's a breathtaking coda that reminds us of that undeniable human beauty: the ability to survive, to fight for right -- and then move peacefully on.

Jackson's dazzling vision turns the story into a real movie-movie -- one that, unlike too many fantasy films today, is genuinely transporting.

Although the movie never so much as flirts with melodrama, there is still a bittersweet undercurrent.

Turns out to be a lot less tiresome than it sounds, aided by a wonderfully appealing cast and a strong message.

Bergman's debut feature is tender yet disturbing, sad yet at times funny.

La Promesse (The Promise) makes filmmaking look easy. The movie is deceptively simple, a tight little drama about guilt and conscience in which the creators' strings are completely invisible. It's fine storytelling in its purest form. [31 Jan. 1997, p.27G]

A mix of slapstick, melodrama and jaw-dropping stunts.

This lively, infuriating and occasionally moving film certainly leaves you thinking, and there isn't a dead spot in it. That's the mark of a real filmmaker, not just a muckraker.

Hardly the first of Woody Allen's love letters to the good old days, but it's a high-spirited, entertaining one, falling along the same lines as "Radio Days."

It is to director Tykwer's credit that, although you never come close to understanding Jean-Baptiste, you don't turn your nose up at him, either.

Don Jon is nominally a love triangle between a woman, a man and his laptop, but the movie is much more thoughtful and substantial than that, and it takes a compassionate and humane approach to all of its characters, even when they’re at their most despicable.

Funny in the juvenile, crass way we expect.

Never stops having its dark fun.

By turns endearing and hilarious, Lilo & Stitch is proof the folks at Disney should break their own rules more often.

The result is a kind of quiet epic of rural life, redolent of the Taviani brothers' Tuscan reveries. And though Jean de Florette is whole enough to stand on its own, there's unfinished business at the end -- enough to hook us. [25 Sep 1987, p.D5]

The movie is wild, but not in the ways that you expect, and it’s also surprisingly chaste — you think you see a lot more than you actually do.

The impact of Promises comes from the openness of the children.

The Constant Gardener is difficult to watch, literally. Meirelles' lens leaps and jitters too much, as if it's anxious it might be bludgeoned to death, too.

Shower is also a comedy -- but it's the movie's melancholy streak that is its strongest asset.

Excellent trick photography and a solid plot based on the H.G. Wells novel results in a superior horror film as Rains goes amouk and vows to use his power to rule the world. [11 Aug 1984, p.B3]

Shot in the style of a documentary, which lends the movie an aura of utter realism, Maria Full of Grace derives an unsettling power from the clinical details of Maria's ordeal.

Stoker is the sort of stylish, cerebral movie that engages your brain instead of your emotions, and yet you’re never less than intrigued by the breathtaking visual artistry of this slow-burn thriller.

For this last chapter, the filmmakers play things relatively straight, resulting in the best Shrek movie to date.

Woody Allen's new movie, A Midsummer Night's Sex Comedy, will not make you cry, as Annie Hall and Manhattan were capable of, and it won't make you cringe, as Stardust Memories almost demanded. It is not screamingly funny, romantically piquant, bitter or even, in most ways, unusual. With the exception of a single recurring image--that of Allen as an amateur inventor of the early 20th Century, flapping about in various homemade flying machines--there is not even anything of the absurd in this film. It's just an engaging Woody Allen movie, in which much of the humor is familiar and the tone is as moistly appealing as the title suggests. [18 July 1982, p.L3]

A crackling crime drama assembled from a scrap heap of hoary cliches, Takers proves that everything old can sometimes really be new again.

There is nothing in this surprisingly funny, exciting film that feels like homework, and Branagh even dares to end the film on, if not quite a cliffhanger, then a daring "To Be Continued" note.

Norton isn't the first guy who comes to mind when you think ''period piece,'' but he's starred in two such films this year (in addition to The Painted Veil, he stars in "The Illusionist"), and he is terrific in both.

In its last half-hour, A Bigger Splash becomes a specific kind of story, and it’s not as pleasurable or strange as what preceded it.

Unlike many child-driven movies, Shyamalan trusts in the ability of a young audience to handle serious questions. There's also room for some truly funny moments, and a fine performance from Rosie O'Donnell as one of the nuns at Joshua's school. [03 Apr 1998, p.9G]

An uncommonly intense and frightening experience, The Conjuring is the first genuinely scary release in ages by a major studio that features practically no violence and spills only a bit of blood.

Some of the most riveting passages of the film are Harris slathering skeins of rich color, dipped fresh from cans of house paint, onto canvases stretched out on the floor.

Focusing on the contestants who make the initial cut -- two men and two women -- the film can't resist wringing some American Idol-style suspense from speculation about who the eventual victor will be. But the movie also leaves no doubt as to who the real winners are.

Rush is the kind of Hollywood studio production that has sadly become all too rare — a smart, exciting, R-rated entertainment for grown-ups that quickens your pulse and puts on a great show without ever insulting your intelligence.

In The Shape of Things, love doesn't just hurt: It bites, and bites deep.

May not reinvent the wheel, but its expertly delivered thrills would hit the spot at any time of year.

It's the overriding spirit of the movie that forms its greatest appeal: Here's a movie that isn't intent on conquering the world but simply entertaining you for a breezy 90 minutes.

This is a quiet, powerful film about the lengths we'll go to for the sake of the people we love - and the depths we'll sink to for the sake of the ones we hate.

Bug has an uncompromising, anything-goes daring: Friedkin, 71, has nothing to lose at this point, and he has made this low-budget, brazenly over-the-top picture strictly on his own terms.

Lost and Delirious doesn't need metaphors for the power of strength and healing. All the passion and pain it needs glows ferociously in the eyes of its young women.

Being Julia is really about the fear of aging and the battle to remain relevant professionally and sexually.

Director Douglas Sirk keeps the precipitation from becoming too maudlin. [26 Mar 1959]

This is the sort of small, intimate movie that, if it had been made on a low budget by independent actors, would be celebrated to the skies.

The creative vigor of its originality, distilled in a pure and unadulterated form, is simply exhilarating.

Made with an unerring visual dazzle -- its dark corners are shadowy, deep and melancholy, its brilliant seascapes the sparkling embodiment of why we must all find a reason to carry on.

Never has the sight of naked women been so innocent.

Dark, grim and exciting entertainment.

A manic and at times surprising comedy that has more imagination and creativity than all the Transformers pictures combined.

The film isn't as concerned with terrifying you as it is with showing you a good time, culminating with an over-the-top climax that is simultaneously utterly ridiculous and enjoyable.

Elysium, the second movie from writer-director Neill Blomkamp, isn’t quite as inventive or fresh as his knockout debut, 2009’s "District 9." But the new picture is cut from the same cloth — furiously exciting sci-fi, carefully considered and loaded with allegories and social commentary.

For those with the patience to latch onto Van Sant's slow, methodical groove. It's worth trying.

More sour than sweet, but Steers knows that, even in a cruel, unsentimental world, there is room for forgiveness and hope. Just don't expect a hug.

It's genuinely terrifying, as scary as it is unexpected. [22 May 1987, p.D5]

Remarkably, director Albert Magnoli is able to use a single moment of melodrama to give this story a measure of depth. And from that point on, Purple Rain is improbably successful at tugging on the heartstrings as well as shaking the rafters. It winds up a love story, and one with power. [27 July 1984, p.D1]

Glover and especially Bassett give strong performances, shaking off their Hollywood patina and losing themselves in these gritty roles.

Go for Zucker is far from a perfect film but it brings easy laughter and joy.

Zhang, who tried to make his actors as unaware of the camera as possible, lets the story evolve slowly and deliberately.

[Csupo's] take on Bridge to Terabithia doesn't pander or misrepresent, but instead illustrates the power of open-mindedness in both its forms: creativity and acceptance.

Blue Caprice only spends a few minutes reenacting their crime — the movie shows us exactly how they did it in just a couple of scenes — because the facts of the case aren’t the movie’s focus. Instead, this lyrical, frightening film is a portrait of a man consumed by self-hatred who decided to take it out on the world.

So thoroughly absorbing while it's unfolding that later, when you play the movie back in your head, it's surprising to realize how ordinary it is. That's a testament to Nolan's talent: He's able to make even the hoariest clichés feel fresh.

Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy is the anti-Bourne of espionage movies, a deliberate, cerebral, grim and utterly absorbing film that makes covert operations appear as unsexy as the Bourne films made them seem fast-paced and thrilling.

The movie's utter lack of predictability helps to keep you engaged, even if some of the plot turns are a bit baffling, and the unusual depth and complexity of the characters -- the eponymous heroine in particular -- give the picture its unusual, scalding power. You've never met a mother quite like this one.

Corben has done an impressive amount of journalistic research that will be of particular interest to South Florida audiences. Every time you think Miami couldn't possibly get any weirder, it does.

May prove too dark to make the list of Schwarzenegger's biggest hits. But the movie suggests the actor still has a lot to offer -- and he's willing to take some chances, too. Welcome back, Arnold.

Grim, relentless and immensely satisfying, The Hunger Games: Mockingjay – Part 2 sends out the dystopian sci-fi franchise on a feel-bad high. Readers of Suzanne Collins’ source novel, who already know what’s coming, will be pleased by the movie’s merciless fidelity to the source material (or perhaps, considering the book is the least popular in the trilogy, will just be annoyed all over again).

Like "The King’s Speech" or "Shakespeare in Love," The Theory of Everything sometimes feels a bit too polished and precise, leaving no room for ambiguity and always staying easy to digest, like elegant pap.

Could there possibly be anything left to gain from yet another adaptation of Charles Dickens' tale about crabby old Ebenezer Scrooge and his life-changing encounter with three ghosts on Christmas Eve? In the case of Disney's A Christmas Carol, the answer is a surprising, resounding yes -- at least so far as the IMAX 3D version goes.

Light on plot but heavy on observation: Wang concentrates on exploring the unseen ways in which mother and daughter rely on each other.

While you watch, be sure to scour the background for in-jokes, including cameos by Gromit and other DreamWorks characters, and rest assured that Flushed Away gets even funnier on second viewing.

This charmingly modest and entertaining film feels warmly human, and its virtues will remain in your memory days after you've seen it. [02 Sep 1994, p.G4]

Mostly, though, Ondine deftly demonstrates just how far we'll reach for any promise of relief from life's hardships, in whatever form -- magic or plain dumb luck -- it arrives.

Among the invited guests are Sarah Jessica Parker and Julia Roberts. Only one fellow designer is present: Karl Lagerfeld, the German designer settled in Paris.

The beauty of Huo Ji Anqi's film transcends China's lush Hunan province to focus on the peace that comes from within.

This is a silly movie, yes. But since it works as a humorous homage for students of Hitchcock and his B-movie masterpiece, and since it works as a high-grade slasher film for the rest of the audience, there's no hating it. In fact, this is the most likable gore film in years. [04 June 1983, p.D4]

Coppola and her crew were allowed to shoot at Versailles -- family pedigree does pay dividends, apparently -- which gives the film a needed whiff of reality.

The movie kicks off with a wonderful setpiece that shows off Spielberg’s ability to tell a story primarily through visuals — is there any other filmmaker working today better at this?

Frida, the kaleidoscopic drama based on the life of the Mexican painter/feminist/icon Frida Kahlo, was directed by Julie Taymor, which is the movie's first blessing.

Yes, Pineapple Express is exceedingly crude, but it's never mean or lewd, and for all the drugs and gore in it, the movie is also strangely, unrelentingly sweet, even when its characters are bleeding to death.