Directed with calm passion and controlled outrage, the movie — named after the amendment which outlawed slavery, but left a significant loophole when it came to criminal convictions — is a study in profits. And power.

Arrival is a science fiction confection that wants to be smart. But the truly fascinating material that would have made this a very good movie rather than a pretty decent one likely ended up on what they used to call the cutting-room floor.

It is certainly the feel-good movie of the season.

Halfway into Blue Valentine, a work so beautifully acted and emotionally honest it is my choice for best movie of the year, there's an amazing flashback scene you hope never ends.

As gorgeous and gripping as it is faithful to the spirit of Patrick O'Brian's celebrated series of historical novels.

It’s one of the most vibrant, sly romantic comedies this year.

It's a tribute to both the subject and his biographer that this story of one man's experience is also a vital chronicle of the times in which he's lived.

It's a Master "Plan."

A pensive and searching drama that explores how deep into the national psyche these murders in the Katyn forest went.

Pixar’s latest animated film may lack the volume of out-loud laughs of the “Toy Story” series, but the fantasy set in Mexico doesn’t skimp on the tears. It’s as if the studio turned the touching first seven minutes of “Up” into a nearly two-hour feature film.

From the company that gave us “Chicken Run” and “Wallace and Gromit,” this adorable tale about a sheep who leads his comrades on a big-city adventure is some of the most pure visual storytelling you’re going to see this year.

As Claire Denis' stunning new movie reminds us, she expects a lot of her audience but gives considerably more in return.

Everyone involved can claim credit, but it's Dinklage, in an understated, outstanding performance, who turns this unlikely tale into art that will strike a chord with any open-minded audience.

Rare is the drama that plumbs the quirky, unsettling depths of human nature like Foxcatcher. Simultaneously understated and grippingly edgy, this is an arresting examination of naivete, mismatched worlds and old-fashioned American oddness.

One of Rohmer's more engaging slices of life. The acting is impeccable.

Heated speeches about the International Monetary Fund, debt relief and global responsibility may not sound like your idea of Friday-night entertainment, but Sissako makes a strong case.

Beginners is filled with crises of identity, but underneath it all is a beautifully humane, sweet and intelligent movie that knows exactly what it is at every moment.

There's nothing exceptional about Jane Campion's historical biography, but it's a sufficiently lovely tale to suit romantics with a taste for intimate period dramas.

Whenever the movie begins to falter — it cuts, sometimes confusingly, among at least three different timelines — Portman pulls it back together, and sets it back on course.

This challenging, inventive movie from Thailand is not for everyone.

Masterful.

They’ve turned Thomas Pynchon’s work into a slapstick noir homage that doesn’t just reward but demands multiple viewings.

Ferreras is similarly frank, but heavy doses of humor and empathy, along with gorgeous hand-drawn animation, keep things from getting too morbid.

Arnold generally steers clear of cinematic melodrama, and Jarvis infuses the entire film with the sort of kinetic spirit that heralds a new talent.

The result was remarkable, but the story of it, while true to the moment, needed — ironically — much more dynamism.

The film’s second act packs a bittersweet punch, along with the fact that the failed show is now much-respected. But all of that could have been tied up in a quicker epilogue. The chorus, so to speak, lacks a hook. Too bad, considering that, to quote a Sondheim song from the show, they “had a good thing going.”

Apparently Louis Kahn was not much of a father, raconteur or businessman. But he was a genius, and he left his mark on all the people whose lives he touched.

Pegg and Wright are armed with an endlessly impressive arsenal of attention grabbers, from witty editing tricks to a wry soundtrack and a joke-packed script that demands multiple viewings.

Just when we thought Quentin Tarantino had shown us all the cojones he has, in rides Django Unchained.

While the plot is too light to sink your teeth into, the dreamlike, David Lynch-style imagery is engrossing.

By turns brilliant and tedious, imaginative and mundane.

Taking Michael Lewis’ seminal book about the meltdown as source material, director Adam McKay channels his own anger into something rarely even attempted by Hollywood, let alone pulled off: a comedy about a tragedy.

Pahani’s films have become increasingly indistinguishable from his complex life, making them a challenging but often thrilling experience.

Yes, The Rock can carry a tune and his big song-and-dance number "You're Welcome" is a hoot.

There is no turning back; the biggest project in China since the Great Wall and the Grand Canal has claimed its human cost and now must prove its own worth. -

Director Adam Leon, 31, has slyly and reverentially crafted a perfect New York movie, including the class tensions, relentless hustling and spontaneous connections that best define the exuberant strain of the city. The soundtrack, filled with mostly soul oldies, somehow feels exactly right for the sweaty New York summer of this scrappy kid-venture.

Though a notch below "Royale," Skyfall follows that reboot's lead, making a now 50-year-old icon as cool as when he began.

Warm memories of one school under a groove and a moving ending that no screenwriter could improve upon.

Lars von Trier's end-of-days drama Melancholia feels as if it's something from another world...but even by his standards this remote yet lovely funereal dirge is in its own orbit.

Upstream Color is weird, but it’s worth the time.

The best thing the director has going for this one is the talented young actor playing Ricky Baker, as he constantly tries to emulate his tough "gangsta" heroes like Tupac Shakur. (He even names his dog "Tupac.")

Goldfine discover so many fascinating themes within their seemingly narrow subject that anyone with the slightest interest in history or human nature will find it absorbing.

Boorman doesn't shy from showing Cahill as a complicated man who, in one famous incident, nearly crucified one of his own men for a minor infraction. But the portrait is a loving one, full of empathy for an oddly principled man who, in another line of work, could have made a difference and lived to enjoy it. [18 Dec 1998, p.72]

The darkest, most thrilling entry yet in the movie franchise.

Whatever it is you're looking for - comedy, horror, parades of singing frogs and dancing kitchen appliances - you'll find it in Satoshi Kon's anime adventure, a jaw-dropping feat of imagination.

As vital as the best war chronicles to come out in recent years, this is one every American ought to see.

A great big sloppy kiss of entertainment for audiences weary of explosions, CGI effects and sequels, sequels, sequels.

At times, Chicago has the feel of a revue, with the major characters taking turns at their own show-stopping numbers. If it's too much of a good thing, I say, bring it on.

What a movie! This is how the medium seduced us originally.

Thematically tough and emotionally rough, Starred Up is the kind of movie you might enter into with some reluctance. But because everyone involved does such an outstanding job, it's also the kind of movie you won't want to see end.

As in "Purple Rose," the film works best when tweaking the disparate worlds thrown together, though "Midnight" is frothier, and so Wilson shines.

Both politically intricate and genuinely hilarious, Faat-Kine is a story grounded in dichotomies.

Despite a brief, unnecessary foray into melodrama -- stands alone as compelling entertainment.

Even the hardest heart must melt in the face of The Story of the Weeping Camel.

Some inner logic may not hold up under the sober light of day, but this unusual action-comedy has the loosey-goosey feel of something that can’t miss, like a soused round of bar pool. The final triumph: In a summer full of capes and masks, beer-bellied Frost tears off his shirt à la the Hulk. It’s this season’s best superhero moment.

If a documentary can be both alarming and oddly reassuring, it's the gripping splash of cold cinematic water Racing Extinction.

A memorable, monstrous fable that's consistently gripping.

The World has a pokey pace, but it presents a uniquely powerful look at the new big kid in the global economy.

Alison Klayman's chronicle of Chinese artist and activist Ai Weiwei is so straightforward that one can't help wishing the subject would make his own, more complex cinematic self-portrait. But for now, Klayman has provided a valuable introduction to a man everyone should know.

In this cross between film noir and melodrama, there's lust, need, camp and betrayal.

Cooper and Lawrence could so easily have stumbled over the logistical bumps and clichés strewn across Russell's defiantly dark script. Instead, they glide right over them, creating an edgy romantic dramedy that suits our anxious times.

Jacques Audiard's amusingly stinging A Self-Made Hero toys with the subjectivity of historical truth by presenting one Albert Dehousse (Mathieu Kassovitz), loser, cipher, liar. But a brilliant liar. [12 Sept 1997, p.44]

Karasawa captures the flinty, ferocious nature of her subject, Elaine Stritch, with just the right amount of clear-eyed respect.

Why are innovative educators met with so much resistance? And why is our system falling so painfully short? Perhaps ­because so many of us don't realize just how dire things ­really are.

Creating a hypnotically digressive travelogue, Herzog wanders from soul to soul, asking deceptively mild questions to potent effect.

This quiet drama is not for everyone. It may not even be for fans of Hungarian auteur Bela Tarr, whose spare, naturalistic films can be, well, trying. (The director has said that "Horse" will be his final film.)

Other than a tortured apology from Bill Clinton for having misunderstood the gravity of the situation, there isn't a peep of remorse heard from the normally sanctimonious West. And Dellaire's final bit of self-abuse is to blame himself for his failure to shame the world to action.

Each man winds up owing the other -- and the enormity of the sacrifices they make on one another's behalf are quite moving and have not been duplicated in the movies since.

Like a worst-case-scenario, indie-movie cliché, Wendy and Lucy throws every bone it can at the screen.

Both Rourke and Tomei bring a tender, lived-in honesty to their sad roles.

A meticulous, elaborate stunt, a movie two degrees of separation from its source, and maybe another degree from viewers' hearts.

Happily, Morrison's actors grasp his intentions perfectly, shading their roles so well that we never quite get a handle on anyone. Each player is outstanding, but the highest praise must go to Weston.

The filmmakers caught the kids arguing their cases like adversaries on "Judge Judy," sticking to phrases they've memorized or absorbed only too well.

This macabre-yet-moving Argentinian drama from director Juan Jose Campanella is nuanced and full of intelligence and emotion; just when you think you have a bead on it, it gently swerves into richer places.

Though slickly packaged, Robert Kenner's unsparing exposé is harder to watch than any horror film.

The result is a quietly simple fable that hits you hardest after it's over.

This unhurried, novelistic movie is worth looking into.

Sadly suffers from more than a dollop of boredom. Like the ornate dollhouse that plays a part, "Arrietty" is lovely and well-appointed, but filled with only what you bring to it.

Normally the sound in movie theaters is of popcorn crunching. But the sound at theaters where Central Station is showing is of hearts breaking.

It is a devastating indictment of the ruling class of Money, Miss.

This is certainly an apt time to make a crowd-pleasing movie about rich villains, but Greenfield is not an exploiter - she's an artist.

Filled with striking images and the ghosts of lives lived in hardship and war, Incendies is tough but impactful.

Another perfect little gem from Iran in which the simplest story unleashes a torrent of emotion.

Clever, compelling, funny and unpredictable, and it has a lollapa-looza of an ending.

Fans of anyone other than Sean Connery who has played James Bond may want to look away, because admirers of Ian Fleming's 007 novels are almost bound to agree that Daniel Craig is the best Bond since Sean.

This is as bitter and despairing an exploration of the human spirit as any of Bergman's films, and it is just as vibrantly written and directed.

Presents a refreshing appreciation of Chaplin's work in the context of comedy, political and social satire, and history itself.

A couple of the stories don't quite accomplish what Rodrigo intends, but most are poignant, disturbing, and superbly acted.

To capture the artistic process in this way is extraordinary, and in many ways unprecedented. The scenes are not shot in documentary style, but flow with bits of inspiration, conflict and nuance. We see and listen to some of the era’s greatest songs being made.

This stunning work by Iran's leading film maker, Abbas Kiarostami, won the grand prize at last year's Cannes festival. Open and simple in its visual style, the film takes place largely in real time, giving it a firmly anchored sense of reality to set against its abstract philosophical concerns. The atmosphere is calm, yet the film is mysteriously, powerfully affirmative. [20 March 1998, p.60]

The film slowly, slowly blossoms into an emotional wildflower by the end, leaving us with a scene that is kind of spontaneous road baptism, an unsure note of spiritual birth.

A wonderfully entertaining, beautiful Western drama that lets the quirks of the genre gallop freely as it keeps a tight rein throughout.

Entertaining, smart and snappy, this terrific doc, a Sundance favorite, digs into the country's use of steroids and how it affects sports, pop culture and the self-image of young men.

The inexplicably terrifying ending is good for a month's worth of nightmares -- no small thing for a movie in such a saturated field.

Kore-eda does extraordinary work with his young cast, who deliver gentle, natural performances in a beautifully told story of heartbreak and hope. Deceptively modest and utterly lovely, it's one of the most magical films about childhood I have ever seen.

You would have to be practicing some pretty dark arts to not smile as you watch the iconic Millennium Falcon take off into battle one more time.

If you're looking for either insight or even just an introduction into the mind of a great artist, "One Day" is worth the effort.