It weaves every detail — whether provided by an on-camera witness, a document, a drawing, a painting or a photograph — around that set of intertwined arguments, which are too complex to explain in this review, but come across powerfully by the time the credits roll.

With The Card Counter, Schrader has a sub-theme he can toss off like a light cloak, and when he does, the movie swerves into a semi-surreal realm not entirely like that of the climax of First Reformed. But then it swerves back into a variation on Bresson that constitutes one of the most brilliant shots of his career.

While Loznitsa’s films, particularly his documentaries, often have a terrifying epic sweep, “Two Prosecutors,” as its title implies, is an altogether more intimate undertaking. And no less terrifying for all that.

Writer-director Shuchi Talati’s feature debut, “Girls Will Be Girls,” is a profoundly moving document of generational girlhood.

As delightful as it is surprising. The surprises begin with the fact that the Iranian master’s last work is, of all things, essentially an animated film.

Watching Kristen Wiig's lived-in and alive performance as this blunt, practical, and yet totally innocent woman is to be in the presence of something very very special.

With Sachs’ painterly compositions and Whishaw’s deceptively effortless performance, “Peter Hujar’s Day” is a surprisingly beautiful and subtle tribute to the balancing act it takes to be a working artist.

For all its stunning exteriors, it's really concerned with emotional interiors, and it goes about exploring them with simplicity and directness.

In the end, Killers of the Flower Moon is like a puzzle—each creative piece does its part to form the complete picture.

I do know this for sure — I can’t wait to see this film again. It’s so layered and ambitious, the product of a confident filmmaker working with collaborators completely in tune with his vision. Every piece fits. Every choice is carefully considered.

Brian De Palma is one of the great seducers of the cinema, and he proves it with Passion, a spellbinding thriller.

The structure dispels the idea that there is a “right way” to navigate the Kafkaesque complexities of an oppressive regime, as is made plain by the ultimate fate of Hind and the two ambulance first responders, Youssef Zeino and Ahmed Madhoun.

A fantastical examination of man’s inhumanity to man, and as replete as it is with persistent visceral disgust, it also pulses with intelligence, a mordant compassion, and yes, incredible wit.

Polsky is so honest he has to add a question mark to the film’s declarative title. This slight detachment, this hesitation to believe without question, makes Polsky the best of guides.

Based on Jonathan Ames' novella of the same name, the film is rooted so firmly in Joe's point of view he sometimes is absent from the screen entirely. We're inside his head.

Dragon Inn is a romantic action film, but it still feels modern thanks to Hu's strict focus on action. I don't just mean the film's relentless series of fight scenes. Hu's film is all about movement.

On the whole, what Baker has created here is nothing short of pure movie magic— his smartly interwoven urban machinations make you giggle and inexplicably tear up on repeat (sometimes within the same sequence), while somehow keeping you acutely aware of the sorrow that is bound to rise to the surface.

More than anything, “How to Have Sex” is masterful in showcasing the drive and apprehension of sexual coming of age.

Its narrative clarity makes its fable seem timeless, while innovating and expanding the visual immersion of its medium.

The New Rijksmuseum is a four hour procession of minute details, an exhaustive catalogue of art world diplomacy and process, but what sticks is the way Hoigendijk weaves all the strands together, crosscutting here, overlapping there.

It is equal parts Buster Keaton-Jackie Chan slapstick extravaganza, WWE-styled spectacle, and "geek trick."

First Cow, adapted by Reichardt with frequent collaborator Jonathan Raymond from the latter’s novel "The Half Life," is many things. A simultaneously gentle and unsparing dissection of the formative flaws of capitalism, and thus of the “American dream”; a frontier story which captures the harsh realities and simple pleasures of a life built painstakingly from rock, wood, and soil; a heist movie; an argument for the power of baked goods.

When Melanie falls under the spell of a silver-haired pedophile as tall and trim as a Marine (Joseph Lorenz), the film gets set on its rocky path to a conclusion that fulfills the film's title and rounds out the "Paradise" series quite beautifully — if you're not afraid to look.

I’ve been trying to think when there was a historical drama I found as electrifying as Joe Wright’s Darkest Hour. It may have been Steven Spielberg’s “Munich,” which topped my 10-best list a dozen years ago.

The movie is potent with rage from end-to-end.

There are few gentler films you’ll find this year than Rohan Kanawade’s “Cactus Pears.” A touching queer romance whose subtle rhythms pull us into its tender embrace.

You have to be prepared to see a film like this, or able to relax and allow it to unfold. It doesn't come, as most films do, with built-in instructions about how to view it. One scene follows another with no apparent pattern, reflecting how the lives of its family combine endless routine with the interruptions of random events.

The most satisfyingly diabolical cinematic structure that the Coens have ever contrived, and that's just one reason that I suspect it may be their best movie yet.