What If doesn't break new ground. But it has charm to spare, and Radcliffe and Kazan are irresistible. No ifs about it.

A meandering but altogether mesmerizing film from writer-director Azazel Jacobs that finds buoyant comedy and touching gravity in the ashes of a relationship.

Thanks to Professor Marston and his real-life Wonder Women, something close to a death blow was dealt to the demeaning, centuries-old image of the damsel in distress. It's a hell of an origin story.

Yes, it's in French with English subtitles. Don't worry. Nothing gets lost in translation as this coming-of-age tale brims over with humor, heartbreak and ravishing romance.

As directed by the Safdie brothers, Josh and Benny, the movie rips through 100 minutes of screen time like Wile E. Coyote with his tail on fire. It's electrifying.

Eastwood's modest approach to these momentous events shames the usual Hollywood showboating. In a rare achievement, he's made a film that truly is good for the soul.

It feels lived it, honest and painfully funny.

No list of the year's best performances should be made without her (Sally Hawkins).

Moore's fireball of a movie could change your life. It had me laughing with tears in my eyes.

You don't have to be in vogue to enjoy this stylish ride through Bergdorf's. It's a surprise package to die for. Miele and his virtuoso cinematographer, Justin Bare, show how fashion can be aspiration, a model for dreaming the impossible.

A fiercely funny human comedy with jokes that sting and leave marks.

Sound plays as crucial a role as visuals in replicating an authentic culture to drive the storytelling.

Director-writer Martin Hynes shapes his first movie into something emotionally truthful, painfully funny and vibrantly alive. It's a near-perfect road movie, since you don't want the ride to end.

An artistic triumph.

Little Men, with its two boys racing at life with the brick wall of maturity still at a distance, is funny, touching and vital. It's truly an exhilarating gift.

Top Five is Rock's best movie by a mile. It's authentically hilarious.

I've seen A Mighty Wind only twice so far. Maybe it is less fresh than "Guffman," more strained than "Best in Show." Who cares? It's still a gift from comedy heaven.

Farmiga expertly guides a large and gifted ensemble cast and proves as fearless a director as she is an actress. She lights up Higher Ground and makes it funny, touching and vital.

When a forty-four-year-old man makes a movie about his family and friends sitting around singing old tunes, you certainly don't expect an unforgettable amalgam of humor and heartbreak. But that is precisely what Terence Davies delivers.

When it flies, it soars.

Nothing can detract from the film as a portrait of hell so shattering it's impossible to shake.

Dark secrets are unlocked, words draw more blood than punches, and Desplechin turns one family into a universe that resembles life as a startling work of art.

By stooping low without selling out, this babes-and-bullets tour de force gets you high on movies again.

A hell of a hilarious time at the movies if you're up for laughs that stick in your throat.

Bouchareb's film helped shame the French government into raising pensions for more than 80,000 of these veterans. Here's that rare movie that really did change things. I'll be damned.

Kelly Reichardt makes films that unfold at the speed of life, not Hollywood. She's a poet of the space between words, and the hypnotic and haunting Certain Women presents the writer-director at her artfully attentive best.

What Robert Downey, Jr. is to "Iron Man" and Ryan Reynolds is to "Deadpool" – that's what Benedict Cumberbatch is to Doctor Strange. By that I mean, he's everything.

The Raid 2 lets its warriors rip for two and a half thrilling hours. With the precision of dance and the punch of a KO champion, Evans keeps the action coming like nobody's business. The wow factor is off the charts.

Kirby Dick's indispensable guerrilla attack on the film-ratings system gives Hollywood a swift, smart and hilarious kick in its institutional, hypocritical ass.

Nolan directs the film exactly like a great trick, so you want to see it again the second it's over. I'd call that wicked clever.

Want to find the heart of rock & roll? You can hear it thundering in Anvil.

Herzog conducts his own expedition into knowing the unknowable -- the true task of any filmmaker. Herzog makes it an art.

Huppert's brilliance is indisputable, her performance alternately playful and deeply moving.

Leigh embraces the contradictions in Turner. And in tandem with cinematographer Dick Pope, a master of light, he shows us the world as Turner sees it. The effect is harsh and ravishing. Leigh's beauty of a movie touches the heart not by sentimental gush but by the amplitude of its art.​

A lifetime in movies runs through this prime vintage Eastwood performance. You can't take your eyes off him. The no-frills, no-bull Gran Torino made my day.

Why should you suffer through a 140-minute Russian film that is basically a contemporary remake of The Book of Job? Because it's a stupendous piece of work, that's why, and because it represents the kind of challenging, intimate filmmaking that transcends language and borders.

You'll go limp from laughing.

The Secret in Their Eyes has a decent shot at wearing down resistance to subtitled films. Don't be put off. This spellbinder from Argentina will sneak up and floor you. It's that good.

Downsizing brims over with the pleasures of the unexpected, a hallmark of Payne's artistry.

Dissenters who see this film as a wallow in self-absorption aren't paying attention. Baumbach is acutely attuned to the droll mind games of smart people who only think they're impervious to feeling.

What makes True Grit a new classic for the Coens is the way the brothers absorb the unfairly unsung Portis into their DNA, like they did with Cormac McCarthy in "No Country for Old Men." True Grit is packed with action and laughs, plus a touching coda with an older Mattie, but it's the dialogue that really sings. Great filmmaking. Great acting. Great movie. Saddle up.

Kudos to the Russo brothers, Joe and Anthony, for directing the hostilities for maximum impact and without neglecting character. Their thundering epic is also smart, snappy, politically savvy and blessedly fast on its feet.

This is Bond like you've never seen him, almost Freudian in his vulnerability. And a dynamite Daniel Craig, never better in the role, nails Bond's ferocity and feeling.

The film belongs to Firth. Uncanny at showing the heart crumbling under George's elegant exterior, he gives the performance of his career.

A movie of potent provocation and surging humanity that ranks with the year's best.

A heartfelt human drama that sneaks up and floors you.

It's pure cinema, a hypnotic and haunting dream that tempts us to jump in and get lost. Do it.

Bad Words, starring Jason Bateman in a tour de force of comic wickedness, takes sinful pleasure in rubbing our noses in the toxic joys of revenge.

Just when you think there's nothing original or exciting left to mine from a coming-of-age story, along comes the totally irresistible Lady Bird – a reminder that no genre is played out when there's a new artist around to see it with fresh eyes.

The result, glitches and all, is a great American movie.

The Theory of Everything, referring to Hawking's dream of finding an equation to explain all existence, is riveting science, emotional provocation and one-of-a-kind love story all rolled into one triumphant film.

Just so we're straight, Ben Affleck doesn't merely direct Argo, he directs the hell out of it, nailing the quickening pace, the wayward humor, the nerve-frying suspense.

Here's the Iraq War movie for those who don't like Iraq War movies.

This bonbon spiked with malice is a triumph for Jaoui, who takes witty and wounding measure of the small betrayals that leave bruises on us all.

It's original, outrageous and murderous fun.

With the help of acting giants, Jenkins turns The Savages into a twisted, bittersweet pleasure.

One thing's for sure about this raw provocation from the Coens: Like the music, the pain runs deep and true. You'll laugh till it hurts.

In this haunting portrait of America as no country for old men or young, Hillcoat -- through the artistry of Mortensen and Smit-McPhee -- carries the fire of our shared humanity and lets it burn bright and true.

It's a compelling, twist-filled tale, one told with a highly developed sense of empathy, a few aesthetic missteps (perhaps it's time to issue a permanent moratorium on montages set to "Walkin' on Sunshine"? Actually, scratch the perhaps there) and a knack for turning the triplets' experience into something bigger than just stranger-than-fiction tabloid fodder.

No grabs you hard, no mercy, and keeps you riveted.

The film doesn't take sides, but it does fairly, subtly and movingly represent them. Captain Fantastic takes a piece out of you.

Only Yesterday comes from a quieter, less demonstrative place. As he did in his most recent and reportedly final film, "The Tale of the Princess Kaguya," Takahata has built Only Yesterday to go gently and to last. Mission accomplished.

The result, with its flashing perspectives and stealthy wit, is unique and unforgettable.

My advice, in the face of such hallucinatory brilliance, is that you hang on.

Beat the drums for a Simmons Oscar, and add a cymbal crash for Whiplash. It's electrifying.

A knockout of a comedy that keeps you laughing constantly. It's also killer smart, lacing combustible action with explosive gags.

Mike Nichols' haunting, hypnotic Closer vibrates with eroticism, bruising laughs and dynamite performances from four attractive actors doing decidedly unattractive things.

Besides being a feast for the eyes and ears, Les Misérables overflows with humor, heartbreak, rousing action and ravishing romance. Damn the imperfections, it's perfectly marvelous.

It's one for the time capsule.

Take a swig of this moonshine. There's magic in it.

Getting creeped out has never seemed this totally cool.

Von Trier draws us inexorably into the web of these characters. He loses us in a dream of his own devising. That's filmmaking. Now if he'd only learn to shut up at press conferences.

Fierce, funny and moving, The Class graduates with honors. It's unmissable.

An indelibly funny and touching comedy with a real sting in its tail. The laughs leave scars.

A dazzling, darkly funny, quietly devastating human drama from the Islamic Republic of Iran.

In ninety-three tight, terrifically exciting minutes, Clooney makes integrity look mighty sexy.

All praise to acting dynamo Robert Downey Jr., who brings so much creative juice to the party that Iron Man achieves instant liftoff.

It's a hardcore masterpiece that digs into our violent past to hold up a dark mirror to the systemic racism that still rages in the here and now.

Step up, cynics, and see the summer 2014 blockbuster that gets damn near everything right.

Nothing and everything happen in the movie. Director James Ponsoldt (The Spectacular Now), working from a fluid script by playwright Donald Margulies, does justice to the book without compromising his film.

Fruitvale Station is a gut punch of a movie. By standing in solidarity with Oscar, it becomes an unstoppable cinematic force.

This is more than a movie, it's a privilege.

With lyrical intelligence and scrappy wit, Coppola creates a luscious world to get lost in. It's a pleasure.

In the end, what Quest gives you is not just well-earned empathy but the pleasure of the Raineys' company, and that is what genuinely makes it worth seeking out and seeing ASAP.

Silver Linings Playbook is eager to sting instead of soothe. It's one of the year's best movies because Russell makes you laugh till it hurts.

Get ready to be knocked for a loop.

Indignation is one of the few adaptations of Roth's work to make it to the screen with its claws intact — Schamus reveals his gifts as a filmmaker who respect the words and the space between them in equal measure.

Carell shows a whole new side to his talents.

Colossal entertainment -- the eye-popping, mind-bending, kick-out-the-jams thrill ride of summer and probably the year.

The story has been filmed many times, but never with this kind of erotic charge. Knightley is glorious, her eyes blazing with a carnal yearning that can turn vindictive at any perceived slight.

The movie crawls hypnotically into the skin of this global assassin and astonishes you with its brazenly violent and sexual audacity.

This film geek's dream of a movie pulls the ground out from under you, but stays smartass to the end. Sweet.

Through it all, Damon keeps us glued to the war going on inside Bourne's head. It's a brilliantly implosive performance; he owns the role and the movie. It's a tense, twisty mindbender anchored by something no computer can generate: soul.

Evocatively shot by "Selma" wizard Bradford Young, A Most Violent Year reflects a world where nothing is held sacred. You watch with nerves clenched, holding on tight.

It would be easy and convenient to dismiss Irreversible as blatant sensationalism. But Noe's bruising film is too artfully crafted to write off as exploitation.

The gripping, seat- clutching suspense in this baby will pin you to your seat.

A different kind of love story: an honest one that takes a piece out of you.

One-word reaction: bravo.