It’s an inward-looking film that seems to be saying something about life. Whatever it’s saying — and it’s not clear that it’s saying anything specific — it connects. It’s not just another good movie. Somehow, it all adds up as something more important.

Ultimately, Ford v Ferrari is about art versus commerce, devotion versus cynicism, and inspiration versus deadness. It’s one of the year’s great films, and of all the great films so far, the most accessible.

This is an intense and complicated story, and the film doesn't rush it. It lets it unfold and build, methodically.

Sure to be an instant animated classic as it expertly balances emotion, humor and social politics amid a backdrop of surreal, eye-popping visual beauty.

The Details has a light tone, but it's anything but light in purpose. It's committed and passionate, one of the most perceptive and morally persuasive movies of 2012.

Jeffrey Wolf’s exceptional documentary Bill Traylor: Chasing Ghosts seeks to tells its subject’s story in a deeply personal way, while also pulling back when needed to contextualize his work.

An intense, powerful film.

Grievous, loving, organic and mysterious. What a celebration.

Riveting from its first moments.

The issues of aging and familial relationships and the appealing nature of this family would make “Our Time Machine” worthy of a look in any case, but what puts it over the top is Maleonn’s fascinating visual inventions.

There's a lot to process when watching The War Tapes, and that's probably why the documentary gets even better a few days later.

A hard, funny and realistic movie about the future.

Director Jesse Moss was basically a one-man production crew, which explains how he was able to film such intimate, painful conversations. His work is haunting — one of the best documentaries of the year.

“Popstar” has more going for it than outrageousness, though it certainly has that. It has genuine outrage, a good-humored but clear-eyed take on today’s pop culture as a morass of corruption, idiocy and relentless self-promotion.

It’s one of the best war films ever made, distinct in its look, in its approach and in the effect it has on viewers. There are movies — they are rare — that lift you out of your present circumstances and immerse you so fully in another experience that you watch in a state of jaw-dropped awe. Dunkirk is that kind of movie.

An engrossing new drama from France.

All the actors are good, but it's Farnsworth's brilliantly simple performance that brings The Straight Story so close to greatness.

One of the great movies -- a triumph of storytelling and character development, and a whole new ballgame for computer animation. Pixar Animation Studios has raised the genre to an astonishing new level.

There are moments of genuine pathos, genuine humor, genuine surprise. As much as the film adheres to the strictures of the standard comic-book movie, it also pops with a knowing, loving, Whedon-world jokiness that keeps everything barreling along.

If you're the type who doesn't go to art-house films , Murderball should be your exception. It's hard to imagine anyone could walk away from this movie disappointed.

This Alfred Hitchcock film on his familiar theme of the wrongly accused man is outstanding in every respect. [19 Sep 1999, p.52]

Documentary reaches an exalted level of filmmaking. It explains the very fabric of American society.

The silence captured in this documentary -- a meditative look at life in the Carthusian monastery of the Grande Chartreuse in the French Alps -- may be the most eloquent you'll ever hear.

Riveting.

The Visitor, is, if anything, more imaginative and touching than his first.

Screenwriters Bridget O'Connor and Peter Straughan have clarified a few things that needed clarifying, camouflaged a few things that needed camouflaging - and gently tugged some passive flashbacks into the active present. It's a cagey adaptation.

The movie rarely, if ever, feels mechanical. Instead, you may find yourself marveling at the fertility of an imagination that could allow itself to toss so many vivid characters and stories—enough to supply four or five movies — into one generous package.

A heartrending film, Lee's Poetry is indeed a work of art.

A visual poem.

A superb drama about sexual harassment at Fox News.

Anomalisa may simply be a brilliant one-off, but it’s pointing a new direction for animation, if anyone cares to follow it.

It is a well-researched smorgasbord of newsreel and documentary footage spliced with current interviews with those on the front lines.

The new version excels because it makes its teenage protagonist deeper and more mature — and its monsters extra frightening.

Scorsese has done nothing less than rescue this evanescent moment and brought it into the light, 45 years later, a glorious and slightly miraculous resurrection of a transcendent enterprise that would have otherwise passed into the mists of time.

A daring, free-spirited and ultimately moving performance by Benjamin Bratt lies at the beating heart of Pinero.

Best movie of the summer.

Parasite, Bong Joon-ho’s latest masterpiece and the best film I’ve seen so far this year, is about two families of four at opposite ends of the economic spectrum, and how the one on the lower end systematically takes over the lives of the other.

See Gravity in theaters, because on television something will be lost. Alfonso Cuarón has made a rare film whose mood, soul and profundity is bound up with its images. To see such images diminished would be to see a lesser film, perhaps even a pointless one.

Interviews with Pinochet's victims put a human face on the systematic torture that existed under his rule.

Frothy and exuberantly entertaining - in part because of the sexual innuendoes - it's the best romantic comedy so far this year.

An unforgettable film.

The film is an excellent reminder of how important soccer is globally. It’s more than a sport.

The writing, by Rapp and Catherine Dussart, is exquisite, and the performers, including Francois Truffaut's old colleague Jean-Pierre Leaud as a magistrate, are all first-rate.

It takes about half the movie, but gradually we realize that we’ve stumbled into something wonderful, that there’s magic happening here, both onscreen and within the lives of the characters.

Magnificent but somewhat frustrating movie.

The film’s writer-director is British-born Sabrina Doyle, who is making her feature debut after spending the past decade in Los Angeles making short films. Her touch is nearly perfect: authentic, patient, guiding — giving her actors plenty of space. And they respond.

Wetlands, an in-your-face story about bodily fluids and the collateral damage of a family gone wrong, is crass, vulgar and brilliant.

A film that doesn't let go from the very first moment.

What's amazing is the raw honesty of it all -- the performances, the interviews, the spontaneous occurrences. There is little artifice. The 70mm print is must-view material for rock fans and sociologists of any age or generation. [1994 version]

It's hard to dislike a picture with flying cows and oil trucks.

One of the rare films that directly responds to and expresses modern anxieties, this debut feature from director Henry Alex Rubin interweaves the stories of three sets of people, whose lives are upended through various bad things that happen over the Internet -- including bullying and identity theft. A fascinating and riveting thriller.

It's the picture that proves action films don't have to be silly, that a few thrill sequences don't mean every other value has to be shot to pieces.

The movie is laugh-until-your-stomach-hurts hilarious.

[Soderbergh] plays with time and narrative to reveal character, mood and longing in ways you just don't find in a mainstream crime picture.

So it's two guys traveling, eating and talking. Doesn't sound like much. But it's terrific.

The Maid would have been worthwhile just as a showcase both for good acting and for the director's virtuosity. But the movie's ultimate virtue is its humanity.

So good it's scary.

A moving, quite amazing documentary.

An exceptionally powerful film driven by contradictory forces.

One great monster movie. [11 June 1993, Daily Notebook, p.C1]

A complicated family story that takes place in three distinct time periods, and that's handled with astonishing ease and fluidity by director Claude Miller.

This one enters the pantheon of great American war films.

Now that she's past 50, can we all stop holding Michelle Pfeiffer's looks against her and just admit that she's a great actress?

Aftersun is a film about memory and regret, of finding small islands of warmth and happiness and holding on; a movie that beautifully struggles to say what is unsaid.

Twenty-five years after its release, "Diva" is still an excellent model on how a crime thriller should be done.

In his big-screen directing debut, British film maker Danny Boyle demonstrates wit, intelligence and economy of style.

An ambitious and exciting piece of work, a movie about sex and movies made by a filmmaker who understands the power of each to set off fantasy, create addiction, incite danger and transform the spirit.

Crisply funny and fleetly paced, it's in its quiet way one of the saddest things in the theaters all year.

This is a serious film, but it is also entertaining. Ngassa and Ntuba should be galvanizing figures for a nation stuck on "Judge Judy" and "Jerry Springer."

There's an edge to this exemplary family movie, just as there is in the story.

Director Nicholas Hytner doesn't soften or cosmeticize Miller's tale -- it's often uncomfortable to watch -- and he draws an emotional pitch from his actors that helps us understand the mob fury and irrational fear that make a situation like the one in Salem possible.

Dares to present a flat-out heroic president, without the safety net of irony. It succeeds.

In 90 brisk minutes, we get a three-dimensional portrait of a private, gender-nonconforming trailblazer who not only paved the way for Black Americans, but also for women and LGBTQ people.

Besides the huge smiles on your faces, Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse offers mainstream moviegoers an overwhelming feeling of optimism. If this kind of risk-taking and artist-driven creativity can exist in Hollywood’s biggest money-making genre, then our superhero movie future is filled with hope.

Morricone’s presence in the documentary is the key element, because by watching him, we understand the sensitive qualities that made him so good at interpreting and augmenting the work of others.

By the end, we’ve experienced one of the best films about street hustling ever made.

At its slowest, the film has value as a historical document. At its best, the film gives a human face to stories of unimaginable suffering and unexpected triumph.

Magical and haunting, The Piano has the power and delicate mystery of a gothic fairy tale. [19 Nov 1993]

Enchanting documentary that also serves as an animated gallery of Goldsworthy’s uniquely ephemeral art.

Exhilarating and enchanting family picture. It's the best I've seen this year and highly recommended for girls and for boys, too.

With House Party, the Hudlins have made a happy, harmless romp of a movie that, in its own minor way, manages to make a contribution to black cinema. There is a measure of social equality in the mere fact that black teens get stupid movies made about them, too. [9 Mar 1990, p.E6]

It’s coolheaded and incisive, a thorough and informative study of corporations, their origins and their place in the modern world.

Anyone who enjoys stylized hyper-violence should be enthralled by this long, sweeping, murderously vivid dramatization of ancient Chinese warfare, circa A.D. 208.

Often is on the verge of spilling over into melodrama, but that doesn't bother me because life is the same way.

Deneuve has fun with her best role in years.

Philippe Blasband's screenplay is witty and economical, and the film's editing is crisp.

A wonderfully twisted comedy.

A compact British drama that does more with only three people and a few modest settings than most movies do with computerized bloat and a cast of hundreds.

The best movie of 2008? The most revealing war film ever made? The greatest animated feature to come out of Israel? All these descriptions could apply to Waltz With Bashir.

An extraordinary film, mythic in feeling.

Perhaps no director has so thoroughly explored the American concept of police work, prosecution and legal justice, and Find Me Guilty is a film that brings the 81-year-old filmmaker thematically full circle, back to his starting point, 1957's "12 Angry Men."

The thrills in Spike Lee's singularly savvy thriller are in small unexpected moments.

Scott is having a remarkable year. To be exact, he’s having a remarkable season. Less than two months ago, “Last Duel” was released and it was Scott’s best film in years. Now the even-better House of Gucci is his best film in years — and it’s different from his previous work.

Ferocious brutality is presented without commentary or judgment, yet with unmistakable moral understanding and vision. [21 September 1990, Daily Notebook p.E-1]

A joyous, exuberant celebration of the New York band’s brainy yet kinetic post-punk groove that ranks as one of the best concert docs ever. [Review of re-release]

Martel's vision is so visually rich and complex it borders on the impressionistic, but The Headless Woman would be nowhere without the precise tour de force performance by Onetto.

A thoroughly entertaining and hilarious look at a board game that's an occasional amusement for some -- and a serious obsession (or disturbing addiction) for others.

An astonishingly beautiful, irresistibly grim movie.