It is certainly one of the best westerns ever made, and the best film of any kind to come out in 1969.

Although the filmmakers are subtle in their methods and unobtrusive in their interviewing style, they make their points forcefully.

Quite simply, Ran is a great, nightmarish motion picture.

Visually imaginative, thematically instructive and thoroughly delightful, it takes us on a roller-coaster ride from innocence to experience without even a hint of that typical kiddie-flick sentimentality.

The movie's sneaky intelligence pokes out in surprising, amusing ways.

This lush classic is funny, dramatic, thought-provoking and always, always, always romantic. [20 Sep 1991, p.43]

To fully appreciate Fantasia, it's best not to think of the animated sequences as visual adaptations of the music. Instead, think of the music as accompanying the images. [01 Nov 1991, p.28]

Much as I like Beauty and the Beast, I think I would have preferred it if its dark parts had even been darker. The brooding beast is a fascinating character to consider, and his fearsome battle with a vicious pack of wolves is one of the most powerful scenes in the movie.

Probably the greatest, wittiest and most eccentric of all classic horror films. [13 Feb 2000, p.F1]

The performances, direction and writing of one of the best pictures of 2010 make this Social Network every bit as addictive, and a little chilling as well.

It's a grim and depressing but powerful story, beautifully told through stunning animation. [25 Oct 2002, p.37]

Shadow of a Doubt is considered to be director Alfred Hitchcock's best American film. Hitchcock himself regarded it so. [02 Aug 1998, p.60]

The first masterpiece of Hollywood's golden age of musicals. [22 Dec 1996, p.63]

A classic of aggressive nonsense. Also, there is something tighter about Duck Soup as compared with their later efforts. It isn't just the absence of an extraneous love story, or the fact that Harpo doesn't play the harp and Chico doesn't "shoot the keys." Nor is it that much of the comedy crosses the magic line from parody into satire. It's a glistening patina of whimsy that rushes through the work, a heightened effervescence. In addition, the film is only 68 minutes long. [16 Dec 2001, p.16]

No, this offbeat story probably wouldn't make it on Matlock. But it does make for a gripping documentary about a particular way of life - and of death. [05 Jun 1993, p.E3]

A mad compound of naturalism, surrealism, farce and philosophy. [07 Jul 1996, p.65]

Frenzy, which was Hitchcock's 54th and next-to-last film, displayed a macabre sense of humor, playful use of film techniques and edge-of-the-seat suspense. [27 Feb 2000, p.60]

Longer, more thorough and tweaked to play to modern audiences better, Apocalypse Now Redux packs every bit the wallop it did when it was new. After Gallipoli and Full Metal Jacket, after even Platoon, it remains the definitive anti-war war movie.

Dazzling, scary and sentimental.

This 1935 adaptation flourishes because of a tasty, idiosyncratic cast (W.C. Fields, Basil Rathbone, Lionel Barrymore) that nicely matches up with Dickens' characterizations, and because of the assured production and direction of David O. Selznick and George Cukor, both at the top of their respective games. [02 Feb 1992, p.G1]

This unblinking look at America's Red State Crystal Meth Belt is an instant Southern Gothic classic.

Strip away the French and Arabic subtitles, the French-prison setting and the Muslim-messianic title, and A Prophet, opening Friday at The Enzian, would still be the grittiest prison thriller in years.

Profoundly moving. [24 Sept 1993, p.17]

Zaillian's usual weakness - a tendency to simplify and sentimentalize - asserts itself from time to time here. But much of the movie has a dry, almost documentary-like tone that helps to keep the material in perspective, as does the filmmaker's loving attention to detail. [13 Aug 1993, p.20]

James Cagney gives an electrifying performance as a psychotic and paranoiac mama’s boy in White Heat. The 1949 film is undoubtedly one of the most terrifying and violent crime films ever made.

Flynn's combination of lithe, animal grace, clear-eyed youthfulness, pure English-speaking voice and athletic prowess is irresistible. [01 Nov 1998, p.68]

The Yearling, based on Florida author Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings novel, is one of the best depictions of American rural life that Hollywood has ever produced. [12 July 1998, p.60]

This is getting a little monotonous, but yes, it's another instant classic. [24 June 1994, p.17]

It certainly ranks as one of director John Ford's finest efforts in a long string of outstanding human dramas the director made during the late 1930s and early 1940s. [19 May 1996, p.57]

Fun-and-fin-filled feature-length Disney cartoon that revitalized the studio's animation department.

Engrossing and moving story of a alternately warm and combative relationship.

This brilliant contraption of a film could become the hit of the summer. It's a cinematic Rube Goldberg machine whose parts connect in audacious, witty ways. [04 July 1985, p.E.1]

It's a measure of Leigh's sensitivity that the big scene arises naturally, never threatening the delicate fabric of the narrative... And not only has Leigh grown as a storyteller, he appears to have acquired exactly the right amount of filmmaking technique to tell his story.

Director Carl Franklin takes a simple premise and treats it so straightforwardly that the result is jarring - at times, even powerful.

Most big-screen adaptations of small-screen fare seek to discover some deeper - or, at least, more complex - implications of the material. But in this new Fugitive, the filmmakers have taken just the opposite approach.

Moneyball is a thinking person's baseball movie, and a baseball fan's thinking movie.

This delicious, mystical Mexican drama keeps you in an almost constant state of stimulation. [11 June 1993, p.28]

With Heavenly Creatures, we're always on the outside looking in. And if that view is far from boring, it lacks some of the high drama that a more inside perspective might have offered. [23 Dec 1994, p.26]

This picture isn't Shakespeare for the ages, and purists, of course, must be scandalized. But it isn't Shakespeare for the masses, either. This Richard III is only for very particular tastes. To like the film you have to love Shakespeare, but you can't worship him. [16 Feb 1996, p.22]

That humor is a the delicious underpinning to whatever melodrama happens as these five connect and clash. And that humor is what reassures us, even at its darkest moments, that no matter how things work out for the adults, these kids are going to be all right.

If you're looking for a filmmaker to document, for all of humanity, "one of the greatest discoveries in the history of human culture," the great Werner Herzog is your guy.

A quietly compelling if not particularly emotional and sober-minded treatment of an infamous incident.

Nobody's Fool is funny at times and as cuddly as an old teddy bear. But this movie is being taken far too seriously in some circles.

For the first time on the big screen, Williams' whirligig wit is totally unencumbered - and it isn't just free, it's supercharged by animation.

The finale to the Harry Potter saga is, like most of the films in the series, a bit of a slog. But it's a generally satisfying slog.

There's a soap opera going on inside that tin can with a cannon.

With its simple characters and episodic narrative, Kiki's Delivery Service has an unpretentious fairy-tale charm. [04 Sep 1998, p.29]

The Asphalt Jungle is considered to be director John Huston's most brilliant and realistic crime drama. [10 May 1998, p.67]

It's a story about storytelling, with differing versions of events in which people die by the sword. Filled with Yimou's characteristic symbolism and zest for striking colors, it's a fictional account of the unification of China.

Glibly put, this challenging time-skipping rumination is the big screen equivalent of watching that "Tree" grow.

By the end of the film, there's even something vaguely inspirational about our antihero's painful journey through the bowels of his self-created hell.

This is hatred in its purest form. Not a pretty sight, to be sure, but one that is well worth viewing. [04 Jun 1999, p.24]

Get on the Bus turns out to be a better movie than Malcolm X. With the road-picture format Lee is free at last - liberated to set his own pace and follow his better instincts. [16 Oct 1996, p.E1]

What I like best about Husbands and Wives is that for the first time in a long time, Allen seems to be experimenting.

Screenwriter William Goldman's excellent craftsmanship made what could have been an insular political saga into a captivating detective story, earning him an Academy Award. And director Alan Pakula, relying on director Costa-Gavra's 1969 political thriller Z as his inspiration, created an absorbing study of the criminal arrogance that power can incite. [01 Dec 2002, p.9]

Haneke tells this tale a bit too patiently for my taste. But the metaphors are unmistakable, as is the power of the film’s message.

Aliens is one of the most intensely shocking films to open in ages: Even if you think you've got the stamina for cinematic suspense, you may find yourself out in the lobby, midway, catching your breath. This film is also the best monster movie of the year and the best picture of any kind to open so far this summer. Put it another way: Aliens is the Jaws of the '80s.

The Descendants lets Payne show us the Other America and the Other Americans - little lives caught up in small but epic problems far away from the La La Land of Hollywood hype, sex and violence.

An intense drama of 12 harrowing hours in the life of a voracious Southern family in conflict. [10 June 1990, p.4]

A powerful film - the best and fullest expression of Mamet's brilliantly brutal sensibility to reach the movie screen. [02 Oct 1992, p.19]

13 Assassins is entirely too long and too talky. But the cat-and-mouse game of strategy, figuring out when and where to ambush the evil overlord's entourage, is fascinating.

This performance reminds us that Bridges is that rare actor who has never had to make that apology. Crazy Heart lets him be every bit as grand as we’d hope him to be.

Working from Blatty's own screenplay, director William Friedkin sets his own unhurried pace. That pace, at times, does seem a tad glacial, and that is the film's biggest failing. But unlike so many horror flicks that followed, this one really is about something. It's about several things, actually: coming of age and letting go, mainly, as well as getting sick and growing old. [2000 re-release]

Here's a documentary so slick, novel, touching and outrageous that your first thought might be "This has to be fake."

It's rooting against grandma that drives this violent, hardhearted film, and waiting for the pride of lions she's created to devour her that gives Animal Kingdom its animal energy.

A stunning exercise in 3D and a delightful celebration of Scorsese's lifelong love of the movies, something he, like Hugo, developed on childhood.

The 1951 sci-fi classic set the standard for a wave of films examining the Eisenhower era's end-of-the-world paranoia and humanity's newfound power to obliterate itself. [07 Mar 2003, p.40]

Style always outweighed substance in the atmospheric films of Josef von Sternberg, and this 1932 feature is no exception. [26 Nov 1993, p.32]

Like Tati himself, The Illusionist feels like a relic of a different time.

Hogancamp seems a pleasant, offbeat and intuitive fellow who probably takes all this less seriously than those who "discovered" him.

A masterpiece. A work of grand visual wit, clever songs, funny gags and genuine pathos, it is perhaps the greatest stop-motion animated film ever, a painstaking style of model animation that computers have all but completely done away with.

The riffing, the one-upsmanship, the off-the-cuff zingers and the singing (ABBA, a great favorite of Coogan's most famous creation, the dizzy talk show host Alan Partridge) make The Trip an easy-going trek down a road well-traveled by these two.

Marty will give you a heartening slice of life, full of honesty and humor. [24 Oct 1955, p.7]

A beautifully photographed, sentimental film about a family of itinerant Australian sheepherders who travel from job to job during the 1920s.

In Mary, Leigh has found the polar opposite of Sally Hawkin's giggle-through-the-pain heroine of "Happy-Go-Lucky."

Fresh is easily one of the best of the new ''hood flicks'' because it doesn't neglect the basics. There's a story here - a good one - and characters you can connect with.

It's a gritty, almost ugly to look at film, and Cianfrance isn't shy about including a random blast of unwarranted shaky footage.

First-time director Claire Denis (a Frenchwoman who lived in Africa as a child) wants us to know that colonialism is a bad thing. Would anyone care to argue the point? Like German director Wim Wenders (with whom she worked on Wings of Desire), Denis achieves some ravishing images but is committed to using a deadeningly static camera. [30 Mar 1990, p.16]

This is a story about people, not politics. And perhaps because we can see the actors in closeup on the screen, that is even truer of the movie than the play. When you leave this film, you're not thinking, "My, what an important story!" When Driving Miss Daisy is over, you think, "I sure will miss those folks." [12 Jan. 1990, p.12]

The 1937 movie excels with outstanding performances by child star Freddie Bartholomew and Spencer Tracy. [20 Jun 1999, p.56]

One serious omission in the film - identifying what these seemingly prosperous alumni of the band do for a living and did with their lives.

The filmmaker's dreamy style has a quiet strength: The bright, rich cinematography is a treat for the eyes and the hypnotic musical score is lulling. [10 Sept 1992, p.E1]

Souffle-light and long on charm.

The film is more overwhelming than uplifting.

Witty, sharp and, ultimately, chastening, Ridicule is a terrific movie in the sinuous tradition of Dangerous Liaisons (1988). [31 Jan 1997]

During the 1930s, James Cagney and Humphrey Bogart were masters of the gangster role. They made three films together. Two of them, Angels With Dirty Faces (1938) and The Roaring Twenties (1939), were among the best gangster epics of the decade. [05 Jan 1997, p.48]

There are people, powerful people, who don't want old cases dug up. It's a tribute to the story's construction that the mystery only deepens, the more Benjamin digs.

Incendies is occasionally compelling, but also overlong and vexing in the ways it draws out a "shocking" conclusion that we unravel long before the characters do.

Casino Royale is just swell when Bond is busting up bathrooms in Prague, busting up embassies in Madagascar and busting a move in Nassau. But when he gets to, well, Casino Royale (here, in the former Yugoslav Republic of Montenegro), the film goes utterly flat.

A vivid and harrowingly exciting melodrama. [05 Oct 1997]

Working from a smart, sassy script by James Toback (The Pick-Up Artist, The Big Bang), director Barry Levinson (Rain Man) has fashioned an elegant adult entertainment that is, by turns, dramatic, funny and sexy. It's also a movie with too many loose ends and undeveloped themes, but Levinson's knack for smoothing out unruly material serves him well in this case.

Matt Damon is an interesting, chatty choice to play Laboeuf.

Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer isn't entirely successful, but it's admirable nonetheless. The film is an honest and disturbing attempt to come to grips with the sort of modern horror that we must - more urgently every day - try to understand.

A wonderful movie anyone who's ever experienced dog ownership at its most glorious, and most embarrassing.

Director William Wellman's The Public Enemy (1931), which was billed at the time of its release as being "devastatingly real," was the first film to seriously examine the causes of criminal behavior and to portray the gangster as a product of his environment. [22 Aug 1999, p.60]

The movie doesn't paint a pretty picture, but it paints one that you sense is emotionally true. In the end, the Odones are heroes, not statues of heroes. You may not always like these people, but how can you help but admire them? [22 Jan 1993, p.E1]

In Eat Drink Man Woman, Lee's ingredients are wholesome enough and correctly prepared, and the finished product is attractively presented. There's also some inspiration here - enough, perhaps, for a fine meal but not quite enough for an entirely satisfying motion picture. [16 Sep 1994, p.20]

Senna himself gives it its heart. I just wish I'd gotten a better handle on who he was before the film's checkered flag falls.