In the wonderfully droll Kitchen Stories, Norwegian filmmaker Bent Hamer takes an already inspired premise and weaves it into a spry absurdist comedy that also manages to find some considerable warmth.

A well-made and entertaining descent into a black-comic hell.

All of this material proves fascinating. It's a shame, then, that so much of Intent to Destroy plays like a special feature for the DVD edition of The Promise.

Without for a minute undermining Ride’s importance, this clear-eyed film doesn’t sugarcoat her sometimes prickly personality.

Within the culinary world and beyond, the honors and accolades have been plentiful for Kennedy, who's been compared to Julia Child, Mick Jagger and Indiana Jones. Whomever her extraordinary life might bring to mind, this grande dame of gastronomy has lived it on her own terms.

Mayor is a study in politics both micro and macro, showing what happens when the two come fatefully crashing together.

2 Autumns often lets its cute and eccentric stylings get in the way of the story itself, which, once you strip away all the accouterments, feels rather underdeveloped.

Heimat certainly has the feel of a summative work

The spare, tightly wound narrative ultimately turns on the hard-eyed, relentless efficacy of the plot, as well as the certainty of Reyes’ performance.

It's a riveting narrative, and even those not among Houston's more passionate fan base will find it an emotionally wrenching experience.

Catch Me If You Can represents a distinct change of pace for director Steven Spielberg. This is a lighter movie than he has made in a long while, and you sense his relief that nothing much is at stake.

While it's more dramatically diffuse than the reboot and lacks a definitive villain, the new film is shot through with a stirring reverence for the Marvel Comics characters and their universe.

The film works as a moving anti-war essay and as a gripping thriller.

Even when the ambitious film overshoots, you can’t wait to see what happens next.

What’s most disturbing about the film is indeed its placid, almost non-descript surface -- also echoed in the production design and camerawork -- and the knowledge that unspeakable things are happening offscreen and behind closed doors.

Thankfully, Finley isn’t only adept at writing and directing good dialogue but he also understands how images and sounds can enhance his story.

Definitely hewing to the “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it” philosophy regarding big-screen versions of long-running television shows, The Bob’s Burger Movie should well satisfy devotees.

Performances are also key to reinforcing Bring Her Back’s creepy tenor, from Hawkins’ increasingly distressed portrait of a woman undone by loss to Wren Phillips’ engrossing portrayal as Oliver. Barratt and Wong have a tender, natural chemistry that makes their sibling bond easy to invest in.

Without wallowing in sentimentality or judging any of her characters, Kim has drawn a mature portrait of an elementary school girl old before her time and a loss of childhood that rings true on every level.

Although there is still much to enjoy here, this DC Comics-fueled Lego adventure fails to clear the creative bar so energetically raised by co-directors and writers Phil Lord and Christopher Miller back in 2014.

A fascinating process movie about acting and storytelling, but also a curious meta-contemplation of our own voyeuristic attraction to tragedy.

Not since Woody Allen's "Radio Days" has anyone created such a cinematic Valentine to the wonderfully imaginative medium of radio as A Prairie Home Companion.

A gem whose intelligent, gentle, deadpan humor is entirely irresistible.

If only for the in-depth discussions of the creative process, the film is worth a watch.

After 90 years and more than 50 films, Wajda has earned the right to make stagey period pieces like Afterimage, minor codas to a gloriously symphonic career.

Even if the film ultimately strays too far into virtuosic theatricality, betraying its origins, La Cocina is a gripping reflection on the dehumanizing grind of labor and the ways that its soul-crushing routines stifle hope. Even if he takes too long wrapping up an overwrought climactic crescendo, this is a compelling vision of the immigrant experience as a hellish limbo in which even the seeming ballast of community, brotherhood and love can be illusory.

The Image You Missed arguably functions most effectively as an impressionistic primer on tumultuous Ulster affairs during and after the Troubles, providing vivid glimpses of a violent epoch whose controversial repercussions continue to periodically reverberate across the British Isles and beyond.

A sluggish exercise in formalism ... [Monica] feels like a movie perpetually struggling to connect.

There’s a carefree spirit about everything that happens, including all the talk about girls and masturbation, that makes the story as breezy as the summer air,

The secrets revealed here are not quite as shocking as the hints of child molestation captured in "Friedmans." Still, this is an equally intriguing and unsettling look at the turmoil hidden behind the white picket fences of suburbia.

One of the best looks at a period in American film to be seen in a long, long while. BaadAsssss Cinema has meat on its bones and analysis in its soul.

Cutting through many of the easy signifiers found in bad-behavior comedies to get at what it actually feels like to be an intimacy-phobic mess, Trainwreck finds Judd Apatow putting his directing chops in service of Amy Schumer's deeply felt but cracklingly funny screenplay.

That a ragtag group of intellectuals and misfits could so blindside the FBI and hold the media in its grip is an especially sobering aspect of this dynamically told story.

It's all Kovacs for 94 minutes. Which means the viewer experiences a perilous tug-of-war between annoyance at the extreme artificiality of the conceit and admiration of the gutsy performance by an actress who must, literally, carry the movie. Annoyance wins out, unfortunately.

With her angular face and penetrating gaze, Mackey commands the screen, confidently shepherding us through Emily’s mercurial moods. Her eyes — darting nervously at one moment, squinting suspiciously at another — tells us what dialogue can’t.

Dick's strongest points are that these raters receive no training and are given no standards by which to judge movies. Experts in child psychology or media or social studies are not consulted. Nor are they allowed on the board. The days of counting F-words or pelvic thrusts need to end, and in the film's quieter moments, Dick makes this case compellingly.

A well-crafted, tightly controlled and emotionally probing X-ray of the attempts of one couple to use tech to keep their relationship alive across a continent and an ocean, Long Distance is a satisfyingly solid example of form and content working together.

Gorgeously photographed and edited, the film has the look and pacing of a thriller, albeit one with near-Shakespearean dramatic dimensions.

We’ve seen the story of a woman searching for herself after tragedy many times before, but in Origin, DuVernay affectionately makes it her own.

Something more complex and rewarding than surface tension is at play here, and it builds to a conclusion of breathtaking openheartedness. Sometimes a blip on the road is magic in disguise, the root of a dazzling new constellation.

A high-wire act that almost slips as it edges perilously closer and closer to the edge of improbability. But it never does.

The portrait that emerges is intimate — perhaps too intimate for film lovers who might have preferred to hear more about the star’s working methods, and fewer details about her husbands and kids.

British director Sophie Fiennes certainly finds Jones a spellbinding subject in Bloodlight and Bami, securing intimate access to the veteran diva over several years without ever quite managing to spill her secrets.

The tale is surprising, and directors Carlos Aguilo and Mandy Jacobson blaze right through it -- recounting ins and outs across an entire continent in ways that will challenge most viewers in the West.

The film weaves enough social, political and personal themes into its mix to make it interesting even for those who mainly think of "hockey puck" as a Don Rickles insult.

At heart, it’s a story that shows no clear ending yet, and Noam makes for a fine guide to this purgatory.

Eight years since her last feature, Kathryn Bigelow returns with an unrelenting chokehold thriller so controlled, kinetic and unsettlingly immersive that you stagger out at the end of it wondering if the world will still be intact.

Like the cumbersome hybrid animal at its heart, this beast is no beauty. But it is a technically impressive and boldly original statement.

National Bird hardly offers any counterpoint to the arguments presented, nor does it attempt to show how drones could possibly save the lives of U.S. soldiers either on the ground or in the air. But it does reveal a program whose international reach and seemingly limitless surveillance powers are extraordinarily difficult to keep in check.

Capturing that transitional moment when seemingly permanent adolescent ties suddenly appear uncertain, this is a melancholy drama laced with notes of anger and disquiet, but also resilience.

Abu-Assad and his cinematographer Ehab Assal have every shot under control and rarely need to go overboard to convey a strong emotion.

Even if some viewers might grow impatient with Simon’s passivity in the face of endless microaggressions, there’s enough tenderness, heart and ultimate self-realization in Solo to keep you watching.

While Titane wants to shock and surprise — two things a lot of contemporary films seem to have forgotten how to do — it also wants to tell the strangely affecting story of two royally f***ed up human beings who, despite all the odds, and lack of shared DNA, share a father-son like bond.

Though still a stretch for Western viewers, its bold directness and modern look should help bridge the culture gap and make it one of the most accessible Mideast films this year.

The formula of ingredients is familiar and time-tested, to be sure, but some cocktails go down much better than others and McQuarrie and company have gotten theirs just right here.

Though the story is fictional, the imagery is grounded in a powerful documentary reality.

A fundamentally serious film leavened by a streak of deadpan, droll humor, its quality will ensure even greater interest in Ailhaud's memoir in the run-up to its impending centenary.

Filled with the director’s typical operatic flourishes — cameras floating down corridors or over balconies as characters race toward disaster, emotional crescendos set to a racing score by Fabio Massimo Capogrosso — it can also be a rather stuffy affair, with lots of dramatic speeches and religious symbolism that runs the gamut from satirical to heavy-handed.

Energetic, humorous and not too cloying, as well as the first Hollywood film in many years to warn of global cooling rather than warming, this tuneful toon upgrades what has been a lackluster year for big studio animated fare.

Whatever else it may turn out to be, What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? is certainly one of the most fascinating and unusual cinema items of the year, and one that will capture a huge amount of publicity and comment.

A fascinating window into the psychological and emotional minefield of early puberty and the torn feelings of a vulnerable child watching her darkest instincts play out, Hatching delivers.

Has some moments of excitement and is certainly uncompromising.

Unfortunately, the touches that endear us to Hala during the first half of the film are almost nonexistent in its second half, adding up to a choppy, incoherent finish.

It’s an utter delight to see that theoretical academic musings on gender, love, sexuality and politics can be packaged and reflected upon in such a jocular and constantly entertaining way.

The Robin Hood-like renegade hero of the Antipodean common man, Ned Kelly gets a ripping reinvention in director Justin Kurzel's feverish punk Western, a raw rebel yell of a movie that combines visceral violence with a kind of delirious, scrappy poetry.

The film is a documentary gem.

Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? is an instant film classic, and Warner Bros. deserves the highest credit for making it a movie without compromise.

Not everything on screen ultimately works here, with certain characters and situations more credible than others. But the director manages to spin a clever modern-day morality tale mixing art, social class and big bucks.

Despite its undeniably fascinating elements, Prodigal Sons attempts to deal with so many issues at once that it inevitably lacks focus. But there's no denying that it offers a hook that other similarly themed docs could only envy.

Warm, funny, heartfelt and even uplifting, the film is led by revelatory performances from Bill Hader and Kristen Wiig, both of them exploring rewarding new dramatic range without neglecting their mad comedic skills.

Beyond its message, however, and despite some unfortunate omissions in the history it recounts, the film succeeds as one of the most gripping and suspenseful docs of recent years.

Perhaps there are a couple of unnecessary complications on the way to the denouement, but the storytelling is lively and piquant, demonstrating the director’s sense of humor and sharp observational skills.

The film gets seriously weird as it goes along, but without losing its sense of direction or taste for offbeat humor.

Matthew Akers' film is a personally revealing look at an artist most famous for maintaining stone-faced silence for three months.

Based on the novel by Ruth Rendell, the film could do well with audiences who have a taste for creepy films about murder in the suburbs.

When Foxx is onscreen with Parris, a certain kind of magic happens. The pair treat their characters’ verbal tussles like rappers in a cypher: Their metaphors are smooth and their egos huge.

On one hand, She Rides Shotgun is a New Mexico-set crime drama that makes Breaking Bad look like family entertainment. On the other hand, it’s an ultimately touching portrait of the growing bond between a criminal father and the young daughter he’s barely gotten a chance to know.

A smart-ass charmer, merciless tearjerker and sincere celebration of teenage creativity.

Though this gorgeously animated affair showcases the artist's freewheeling style and colorful arabesque imagery, its rambling episodic structure is not quite the cat's meow, even if it remains a thoroughly enjoyable take on Judaism in early 20th century North Africa.

There’s a great deal of beauty in Porcelain War and there’s a potent artistry behind it, but I’ve never watched a documentary with so many running visual metaphors and so little faith that the audience will be able to grasp them. It’s a bit stunning and a bit insulting all at once.

Energetic, laugh-stuffed and very colorful (it would be a feat to make a dull film about these people).

Although The Willow Tree occasionally suffers from a surfeit of portentous symbolism, it is ultimately a powerful portrait of a man who gets what he always wanted.

As frank, discerning and eloquent as its subjects, The Woodmans is one of the most affecting art-themed documentaries.

While the film doesn’t dig deeply enough into the myriad political and social issues it raises, it’s nonetheless warmly entertaining, thanks to Dulaine’s ever genial presence and the irresistible appeal of watching young children overcome their instilled fears and prejudices.

The directors never lose sight of the struggles and the hard work that go along with his calling.

A resourceful, if rather hyperbolic documentary that devotes 90 minutes to analyzing one of the most famous scenes in film history.

With great delicacy, [Maryam Touzani] shows how Moroccan society censures a woman who gives birth outside marriage — not a terribly original theme, but here it is made heartrending by the superb performances of Lubna Azabal and Nisrin Erradi in the lead roles.

Not exactly the celebration of female promiscuity its title suggests.

Michael Moore intelligently, comically and incisively diagnoses and calls for the treatment of a sick U.S. health care system.

Challenges audiences with an unrelieved portrait of self-destruction and horrific violence. American movies don't get much grimmer than this.

The interviews in the film are perhaps a bit more limited than they might be, with the directors relying on the same people repeatedly. ... [But] the film will help to introduce worldwide audiences to his stirring story.

The film feels empty and intellectualized at the core, where it should feel powerfully emotional.

Guided by the beauty of the landscape and the nostalgia of childhood, Okuyama constructs a quiet narrative buoyed by an understated charm.

Morris clearly invested so much time and energy in McKinney's story because he saw her as emblematic of our crazed times. Others might wonder whether the sad saga deserves quite this much attention, but there's no denying the film's morbid fascination.

Morgan's script generously allows us to deduce the truth just before Abe stumbles across it, which is not to say it doesn't have some real surprises left. It's fun to watch Abe put A and B together, and to regain some of his self-respect in the process.

Buzzing attentively but not exclusively around cartoon editor Bob Mankoff, director Leah Wolchok strikes a pleasing balance between office minutiae and comic greatest hits; she gets enough face time with individual artists to please comedy nerds while keeping things wholly accessible to casual fans.

Amanda McBaine and Jesse Moss’ The Mission is an empathetic and reconstructive portrait propelled by questions surrounding Chau’s voyage.

A broken-family melodrama with a minimum of histrionics, Scott McGehee's and David Siegel's What Maisie Knew begins from scenes that will be familiar to most viewers who've witnessed a custody battle. Things get pretty orchestrated from that familiar scenario onward, but never to the point of unbelievability.