Somewhat lumbering but ultimately rewarding plot.

McGregor hasn't been this appealing or vulnerable in ages, and in both of the film's love stories, he exemplifies Mills' message.

Paris, Texas is thus a curiosity. On balance it seems overblown and rickety, as substantial as tumbleweed. And it seems to be less than the sum of its two major parts, the script by Shepard and the images by Wenders. Still, it's an essential entry into the Wenders file, full of hollow portents and signs signifying little. And it would be worth seeing for Stanton's performance alone. [8 Feb 1985, p.8]

A well-acted, well-crafted but excruciatingly tepid romantic film about a subject that will attract poetry lovers and yet test even their considerable patience.

This iconoclastic filmmaker seduces you with ridiculous laughs, then sends you home contemplating your mortality and your place in the world.

No is an exploration of the power of the media to manipulate hearts and minds. The moral of the story: Always go positive.

It is a stunning work that captures with elegance -- and touches of lyricism -- the challenge of finding the man through the artist.

Basically a one-joke movie, and they take their sweet time -- too much of it, actually -- getting to the good stuff. But what excellent laughs they provide in the end.

Django Unchained is the most brutal film Quentin Tarantino has ever made. Unlike "Kill Bill" or "Inglourious Basterds," where the violence was thrilling and carried a visceral kick, the carnage here is often ugly and difficult to watch.

The result is a movie that's funny and touching, yes, but also has something to say about family, and about the deceptions we practice in the name of harmony. Ang Lee seems to know something about the subject, and his movie is knowing and wise, too. [17 Sep 1993, p.G5]

But there is so much information to process in The Big Short that only hedge fund managers and stock brokers will be able to track every nuance and shading of this complicated story.

Mendes' approach to action is classical and elegant - no manic editing and blurry unintelligible images here - but what makes the movie truly special is the attention he gives his actors.

Leave it to von Trier to conceive an intergalactic sci-fi metaphor for a psychological disorder – and then make it work so astonishingly well.

It's a testament to the power of the story -- and this engaging adaptation -- that leaving Hogwarts is tough anyway.

Delivers an even bigger sugar rush than the hit Broadway musical.

It's hard to connect with long minutes of self-pity by a temporarily has-been celebrity.

An exuberant, appropriately cynical reinvention of the stalwart Broadway hit that deftly straddles the line between old-fashioned Hollywood musicals and experimental concoctions like last year's "Moulin Rouge."

King Kong makes clear that Jackson has no contemporary peer when it comes to outsized, transporting fantasies that enchant in an era when special effects have become white noise.

Daughters of the Dust is as concerned with grand and universal emotions as it is with its "story." Daughters is an enlightening and sublimely lyrical film. [27 June 1992, p.E5]

Midnight in Paris initially seems like a departure for Allen, but the prevailing theme blends right in with the rest of his canon.

Never stops having its dark fun.

Serves as a beautiful and delicate reminder of the myriad ways in which life is lived on this huge planet of ours.

The World’s End builds to an unexpectedly witty, funny climax that flies in the face of most films of its genre, and although its humor is not for all tastes, no one can say this crazy picture doesn’t have the guts to live up to its title.

Attention all geeks (and geeks at heart): Get ready for two hours of serious awesome.

The best artists - the ones whose work endures and matters and changes the world - are often troublemakers who challenge the status quo. Out of their defiance comes art. Ai Weiwei: Never Sorry, director Alison Klayman's riveting documentary of the esteemed Chinese sculptor/painter/iconoclast, is practically a handbook on social rebellion.

Almodóvar has never been shy about experimenting with plot structure, but Bad Education is the closest he's ever come to a metamovie, the sort of self-reflective, hall-of-mirrors contraption on which Charlie Kaufman has built his career.

This is writer-director David O. Russell's idea of a romantic comedy, and it's terrific - one of the freshest, funniest, most elevating crowd-pleasers of the year.

The most suspenseful sequence of any movie I've seen this year comes near the end of Waiting for Superman.