It's a story of global consequences and historic proportions, and of astounding athleticism and synchronicity - and filmmaker Polsky ices it.

Less famous perhaps than some of Alfred Hitchcock's other wartime thrillers, this 1940 spy yarn is possibly one of his best. [07 Mar 2014, p.W15]

A transcendent work from Ireland's Cartoon Saloon studio that's almost wasted on kids.

The photography is lush, the dialogue uproarious, and the crazy action sequences unforgettable.

Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer contrasts the mundane and the domestic with the appalling. The tone doesn't vary at all, and it's not a pretty picture, but movies that burn their images into your consciousness like this one are very, very rare. It is admittedly hard to look, but this is a portrait that demands to be seen.

45 Years is a study in economy, in the beautiful symmetry of word and image and music.

Classic.

Whether it's simply the change of locale, or a change in Allen's psyche, something is up in Match Point. With a dark view of humankind, and of the vagaries of chance - bad luck, good luck, dumb luck - the filmmaker has crafted a wicked, winning gem.

A flat-out electrifying experience.

Cinderella Man is not a movie about boxing, but about this boxer who personified the heart and hope of 1935.

A bracing, unblinking work that serves as a painful elegy and sobering cautionary tale.

The definitive movie of the genre - a scathing satire of the warped logic of atomic confrontation with a brilliant cast led by Peter Sellers, George C. Scott and Sterling Hayden. [14 July 2001, p.E01]

The Magnificent Seven has a secure niche among the great westerns. Its action is brilliantly staged. [12 May 2001, p.E01]

It speaks to the courage and resilience of one man, the savagery of many, and the potential, for both good and for ill, in us all.

Aronofsky has fashioned a chilling vision that lives up to the caustic irony of its title and gives us a nightmare that is not lightly forgotten.

It's a stunning Roman triumph.

If we approach the unfamiliar with fear and apprehension, we will be met with fear and apprehension. But if we approach with sympathy and curiosity, we will be rewarded with same. And our souls, not to mention our bicycles, will soar to the heavens. [2002 re-release]

If vigilance and preemption, recompense and retaliation is not enough, the film asks, then what is?

Our Little Sister zooms in close, observing everyday rituals, the commonplace that suddenly turns significant.

Beautifully observed, and beautifully acted by the novice thespian Polanco (culled from a New York City public school), Chop Shop is at once a heartbreaker and a story of hope and the American Dream.

Pitch-perfect and profoundly moving.

It is a gorgeous triumph - one lion in which the studio can take justified pride. [24 June 1994, p.03]

Not only is it the best documentary in a vintage season for nonfiction films (see "American Splendor," "Capturing the Friedmans," and "Spellbound"), it's also one of the best films of the year. It's as lyrical about the particulars of Kahn as it is about the universals of fathers and sons.

Paterson is easily one of Jarmusch’s most accomplished films. He portrays the life of the mind and the workings of the creative soul as a kind of secret love affair, a deep, hidden well inside the most ordinary, mundane existence.

It is with gravity and levity and incomparable grace that Ang Lee's Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon -- by light years the best movie of 2000.

Spoofy and sweet... endearingly old-fashioned.

It is, without doubt, a transcendent endeavor, from its exhilaratingly smart screenplay - director David O. Russell's adaptation of the novel by former South Jersey teacher Matthew Quick - to the unexpected and moving turns of its two leads.

Without doubt one of the scariest, creepiest, gut-churningly unsettling pictures to come along in ages.