This is Depp's coming-of-age role, and he's terrific. Pacino, who's shown more flash than substance recently, reminds us how great he can be when he loses himself inside a character. The bond between these two makes the film sing.

The film seems to want us to pin a medal to its own chest.

No better children's film has appeared all year, but my bet is it'll be the grown-ups, not the kids, who come away with a lump in the throat.

Pollock can be clunky and TV-movie-ish. Still, Harris gives a fiery, convincing performance.

A deep, powerful and rivetingly complex study of Tienanmen - and, ironically, it's far more evenhanded in its account of the massacre that killed more than a thousand protesters than the Chinese government might suspect.

It’s too early to place Eminem alongside those Hollywood giants (Jimmy Cagney/John Garfield), but the promise is there. He understands the power of being still in front of a camera. Compact, volatile and burningly intense, he’s got charisma to spare.

Domestic violence has never been more savagely portrayed on screen.

The filmmakers are clearly in awe of the Chicks' fighting spirit. If you think Maines's original Bush remark was disrespectful, wait till you hear what she calls him here. Maines is not ready to make nice, and neither is this riveting documentary.

A Single Man's sleek surface may go against Isherwood's crisp, understated prose, yet the story's beating, wounded heart and its spiky intelligence still come through, personified in Firth's moving, eloquently internalized performance.

Armstrong's first feature is a terrific job, a universally appealing story told with an integrity, humanity, warmth and humor you can taste. It is beautifully shot and performed with a style and sensitivity worthy of England's best actors. Russet-haired, bold-eyed, defiantly freckled Davis is like a summer storm, and Sam Neill has the rueful charm of a young James Mason. [22 Oct 1979, p.101]

This is a one-of-a-kind action flick: a tale of triumph tinged at every moment with tragedy.

For the eternal adolescents of the '80s, "Warrior" is even more primal fun than its predecessor. Miller has perfected the popup Spielberg style and laced it with speed. [31 May 1982, p.67]

Ulee's Gold possesses an attribute that's increasingly rare in American filmmaking, independent or Hollywood: call it soul.

What sets Jerry Maguire above any other romantic comedy this year is Crowe's writing. He captures the venal, high-stakes world of pro sports with deadly wit and an ex-journalist's sense of detail.

In keeping with a morality tale on the excesses of wealth and power, it is extravagantly confusing, grandiosely paranoid, flamboyantly absurd and more than a little fun. Though it utterly lacks the internal consistency that "good" movies require, as a wild-goose chase it maintains a certain lunatic fascination. [04 Jun 1979, p.76]

At first, Blue Collar looks like an interracial buddy movie. Then it shows signs of becoming a caper comedy. Finally - and powerfully - it turns out to be that rarest of Hollywood commodities, a genuinely political film. And a damned good one at that. [13 Feb 1978, p.98]

Scherfig and her wonderful cast slyly transmute the quotidian into the magical. It’s like watching flowers bloom in a concrete garden.

Nair’s stereotype-shattering movie -- like the polymorphous culture it illuminates -- borrows from Bollywood, Hollywood and cinema verite, and comes up with something exuberantly its own.

It's like a spectacular roadside accident: you can't turn away.

The astonishing thing about Alex Cox's mesmerizing movie is that it makes no attempt to conceal how boringly self-destructive its punk lovers were, yet it still holds us fascinated to its preordinated conclusion. [27 Oct 1986, p.103]

The movie crackles with the serio-comic tension of thin-skinned New Yorkers thrown together in a crisis.

The movie's slight, anecdotal structure is deceptive; you wouldn't guess how big an emotional wallop it packs.

Beautifully served by Eastwood's self-containment, which is less granitelike than usual (he has a soft spot for that mouse), Siegel sets these various escapes ticking like a time bomb. [22 July 1979, p.67]

A premise this preposterous must be carried off with unflappable comic conviction, and Cusack is just the right man for the job.

Singleton's powerhouse movie has the impact of a stun gun. [15 July 1991]

Structured like a farce but filmed like a Qaalude dream, this marvelously performed fairy tale packs a lot of style into its minuscule budget. [19 Nov 1984, p.135]

What this version offers is the chance to watch Russell Crowe and Christian Bale—two of the more charismatic, macho leading men around--duke it out psychologically, while another fine but less well-known intensity artist, Ben Foster, steals

Takes the prize. It's a bloody hoot.