It’s a great feeling to know from a movie’s first frames that you’re in the hands of an assured genre auteur. The rare action thriller that takes place almost entirely in broad daylight, Hope pulls you in immediately with its virtuoso camerwork, pulse-pounding score, adrenalized pacing and sharply drawn characters.

Academic in its approach but very informative as well as surprising in the degree to which it addresses the man's foibles and ethical shortcomings, the film turns a welcome spotlight on a resourceful and singular artist who was forced to do everything from scratch in the absence of any local industry infrastructure.

This is in many ways a frustrating film, its commitment admirable but its execution chaotic.

After its slow start, Minyan becomes progressively more absorbing, its gritty visuals conveying soulful intimacy, accented with occasional understated touches of wry humor.

This beautifully crafted film intrigues as a story never told before and ratchets up dramatic interest through a succession of unexpected turns.

No good performance can hide the fact that what happens during roughly the first hour is perhaps beautifully laid out and told but also extremely familiar. There is an expectation that Akin, also credited with the screenplay, will somehow step it up in the second half with a new twist or unexpected insight. But quite the opposite happens, as the narrative becomes both more melodramatic and erratic.

Considering the subject matter, Everything Went Fine is not the most affecting drama, but its honesty and intelligence keep you glued.

This is, in a way, a real horror film about everyday things and a disconnected family.

Pascal and Thatcher are an outwardly compelling team, though they’re playing constructs instead of characters, hollow vehicles racing through this ragged future as opposed to convincingly long-term inhabitants of it.

Despite its high-concept premise and lengthy spells of laboratory work, Britto’s movie is fundamentally an intimately humanistic exploration of death and acceptance.

While a handful of the characters and the actors playing them have appeared in previous entries, there’s a disarming freshness to this first-time assembly, not to mention something even more unexpected: heart. That’s due to an appealing ensemble cast but also to the new blood of a creative team with a distinctive take on the genre.

An affectionate and intimate celebration of the acclaimed troubadour in stirring music and words.

An extraordinary feeling for nature and the seasons of life pervades Out Stealing Horses (Ut Og Stjaele Hester), an ambitious reflection on our responsibility to others from Norwegian director Hans Petter Moland.

No matter when the action is set, some things never change in Park’s world. Nor should they.

Batmanglij balances emotional tension with practical danger nicely, a must in a story whose activist protagonists can make no distinction between the personal and the political.

Depp's instinct for observing, underlaying and keeping things in, then letting it all out when required, pays big dividends here in a performance far more convincing than his previous big gangster role, John Dillinger in Michael Mann's Public Enemies; it's unexpected, very welcome at this point in his career, and one of his best.

Though they have little to add to familiar genre themes, Uthaug and the screenwriters make the most of the unique location, which lends itself to jaw-dropping vistas from every camera angle.

That rare beast, a terrific movie that boasts intelligent wit, expert storytelling, delightful characters and grown-up dialogue plus suspense and a wicked surprise ending.

This Bollywood epic crunches together romance, comedy, extra-terrestrials, martial arts, dancing and action to tell an entertaining story about a reluctant Indian superhero.

A playfully quirky and, ultimately, unexpectedly affecting portrait of a 17-year-old slacker.

Will richly award locals with sly in-jokes and a wonderful comic performance by Bruhl. Non-Germans will certainly get the essence of the humor but may find the movie long and repetitive.

An ultimately moving effort that well illustrates the often hopeless situation faced by the people whose lives it depicts.

Highly informative and likely to increase enrollment at film schools.

Although the story takes place during a tumultuous period, historical events never obscure the gaming genius' story. Rather it's a scrupulous examination of a somewhat naive intellectual.

Informative if selective documentary will eventually find its natural home on the History Channel.

Few true-life stories are as inspiring as that of Darko Kralj, the subject of Dejan Acimovic's new documentary The King.

The filmmaker documents the proceedings in refreshingly matter-of fact-fashion, thankfully avoiding the temptation to overly sentimentalize or mine cheap humor and contrived suspense from the proceedings.

A thrill-stuffed sports doc whose daredevil subject will quickly endear himself even to viewers who've never heard his name.

Although a bit too leisurely and featuring a few too many interminable group therapy scenes, the film nonetheless succeeds in packing considerable dramatic impact thanks to its incisive characterizations, realistic dialogue and well-drawn milieu.

There is absolutely no doubt about who wrote the elaborate, pungent, profane and often funny dialogue that a fine cast chews over and spits out with evident glee, nor as to who staged the ongoing bloodbath that becomes a gusher in the final stretch.

In telling their remarkable story, filmmaker Leslie Zemeckis has not only etched a heart-wrenching portrait of their individual and dual misfortunes, she has subtly illuminated on the general public's dark fascination with “freaks.”

An impressive debut driven by a timeline-blurring narrative and nuanced performances.

Doyle overstuffs some of the content, jumping through dozens of interviews without allowing us enough time to process them. Still, the director and editor John Murphy manage to give all the material a solid through-line, making the many voices echo into one underlying argument: Showrunning sucks, but it may be the greatest job in entertainment today.

While unlikely to change anyone's stances on the hot-button issue, the film emerges as a deeply moving portrait that makes palpably clear the desperation of women for whom attaining legal abortions is impossible.

Boy Meets Girl is a funny and touching comedy/drama boasting a superlative debut performance by Michelle Hendley.

As with so many of the best mystery-horror films, the optimum way to enjoy a first viewing of this is try to remain as ignorant as possible about what happens. That said, it also brims with tiny, blink-and-you'll-miss-them details that will repay repeat viewings.

The film will have a hard time attracting attention outside the community of veterans. But that doesn't diminish its ability to put us in the shoes of ordinary men balancing boredom with life-or-death action on a daily basis.

It Had to Be You ultimately demonstrates enough cleverness and inventiveness to make it more than a by-the-book entry in a genre that's become more than a little stale.

The Sunshine Makers is an entertaining look at the days in which the phrase "Turn on, tune in, drop out" were words to live by.

There’s something admirably honest about the meta-method Amalric and co-writer Philippe Di Folco have chosen.

Sussman ultimately portrays Hayes as a man with a good heart who did not necessarily realize how his own story would wreak collateral damage upon an entire people, while the filmmakers — especially Parker — are shown to be less remorseful about the whole experience.

Viewers who'd prefer a bit more psychological probing may be left unsatisfied, but most will appreciate this chance to hang out with the legendary whistle-blower.

The optimism of Inventing Tomorrow is quite uplifting, with dauntless teenage thinkers from diverse cultural and economic backgrounds working with resourcefulness and imagination to develop practical solutions to local eco threats.

While very much a film of two unequal halves, there's more than enough cinematic chutzpah on display here, especially in the early sections, to confirm the Floridian writer-director as a name to watch.

This debut doc would have benefited from some statistics to back up its ample expert testimony. Numbers would be useful, for instance, to show how SAT scores fail to correlate with college performance or success later in life. It also would be more rounded if it gave time to the SAT's advocates instead of using footage of old speeches to represent their side.

Director Marie Monge makes their rollercoaster love affair both seductive and irritating — the former because of the heated lead performances, the latter because you spend at least half the movie wondering why Ella doesn’t get the hell out of there.

This is clearly not a tell-all autobiography, but the story of a wildly successful career as seen through the protagonist's own eyes.

The gritty environment and the non-pro cast are convincingly directed by Marlin, a native of Marseille, particularly in the pic's stronger second half.

Slight but quite amusing ... But despite a few good gags and committed performances, the nagging suspicion that this eccentric concept would’ve worked better as a medium-length work or even a short remains.

To say it's unoriginal is an understatement. Nonetheless, Villain exerts a powerful pull, thanks both to the effective use of gritty East London locations and the terrific lead performance by Craig Fairbrass, displaying his intimidating physical presence and simmering, low-key charisma. The veteran actor keeps the film percolating despite its overfamiliar aspects.

Though Downfall does some things extremely well, in the balance it’s not very good cinematic journalism and it’s only persuasive to a very limited extent — one that is almost impossible to dispute but doesn’t really take a vital conversation anywhere interesting.

Rising like Olympus above the general run of low-budget debut features, Israeli writer-director Oren Gerner’s Africa is a touchingly well-observed study of long-time marrieds starring the filmmaker’s own parents as lightly fictionalized versions of themselves.

As we’re reminded in the background here, the ’60s and ’70s were not exactly glorious years for covert operations by operatives of the U.S. government. This plot, though, was about as morally defensible as they come.

The most powerful thread in Everybody Loves Touda is how the singer’s attempts to become a sheikha, a traditional performer whose songs are lamentations for the soul, are thwarted by the people around her.

Harvest stands strong and tall, a work solid as an oak. Full of a sensual love of nature and a distinctive vibe, it’s tangy like a home-brewed ale.

What saves this from being just best-of list bait for upmarket film critics is the sincerity of the performances, especially from the core trio of Wu, Lee and Panna, each of whom projects a profound loneliness that’s never more apparent than when they’re in the middle of a crowded place. Which, this being Singapore, is just about everywhere.

If its exploration of these ideas is ultimately too incomplete to feel fully satisfying, its performances are strong enough to draw attention throughout.

Outstanding production values and mysterious subject matter give the film a surprisingly opulent feel for an independent Sundance entry.

An extremely funny white-collar satire filled with enough delightfully askew characters to pack a boardroom and the bright talent to do them justice, the picture should strike an achingly familiar chord with 9-to-5ers the world over.

Last year waylaid many plans and subverted many intentions. Homeroom is one impressive response to that adversity.

If certain pieces of the last act are less convincing than what precedes it, the themes underlying the illicit emigration resonate with the viewer's knowledge that, in the real world, two of these Cubans actually did escape.

The fact that Lindon doesn’t judge the situation as much as she simply shows it is a sign of her intelligence as a promising young filmmaker — one who has both dared to expose herself onscreen and then dared to let the audience judge for themselves.

Rambling and unfocused but not without its moments.

The endearingly enduring 1952 E.B. White novel about friendship and salvation, has been turned into a beautifully rendered motion picture that's full of warmth, wit and wonder.

Although the film handles the process of being subsumed by love well, the characters ultimately feel too thin to make Kate’s awakening persuasive.

Many rough edges are smoothed by the strong acting and well-done tech work.

Falardeau, who made his mark with the Oscar-nominated teacher-student tale Monsieur Lazhar, again brings real tenderness to his portrait of a man in trouble.

The outrageously hilarious For Your Consideration was well worth the wait. Again delivered with comic precision by Guest's crack repertory company, his patented brand of parody takes affectionate but deadly aim at its awards buzz mania target and the results aren't just funny, they're face-hurting funny.

Cohn displays deep sympathy with her protagonist’s intersecting emotional crises, scripting a narrative that’s intensely perceptive without becoming mired in mawkishness.

Orner succeeds at evoking a deep sense of empathy for the survivors of Choudhury’s abuse, and although that’s not the same thing as justice, perhaps it’s a place to start.

There is actually a lot of imagination at work in the film, though frustratingly it rarely comes together in an emotionally meaningful way.

Oyelowo is sure-footed in his feature directing debut, delivering a smart and wholesome picture with about as little sentimentality as such a tale can have.

It’s Hauser who carries the film in a rare and unlikely role, that of a presumed loser in life (the man did die just a few years later, at 44) who suffered very unwanted attention — but who, when he needed to, found a way to rise to the occasion.

What will make the film compelling even for audiences who never heard of the miracle on ice is Kurt Russell's taut, nuanced portrait of Herb Brooks.

It is a beautifully crafted film with a star-studded cast, directed with a lightness of touch.

Rebecca Hall’s admirable refusal to soften the brittle edges of her recently widowed protagonist in The Night House makes her a compelling variation on the usual woman in ghostly peril.

Both as a writer and director, Layton delivers the dramatic goods here with the skill of a pro at the top of his game while adding the rueful perspective of time's reassessment of youthful indiscretions; this has to rate among the most accomplished and fully realized big-screen debuts of recent times.

Mitchell proves as interesting a figure as the downtrodden people he's dedicated to helping. More often seen shirtless or in a tank top and shorts than a judge's robe, he would certainly qualify for a "Sexiest Judges of Los Angeles" calendar should one ever be created.

Warm-hearted and entertaining, if more sad than its quirky premise suggests.

While the intriguing setup pulls you in, this gentle American heartland story peters out into an unsatisfying payoff.

As a nightmarish suspense drama about everyday life disintegrating, Esmail’s movie is sometimes effective, even while it echoes earlier films like The Road and David Koepp’s underrated 1996 thriller, The Trigger Effect.

A tour-de-force turn from the persistently terrific Hugo Weaving lights a fuse under Last Ride, a spare and wrenching road movie delving into the complexities of a fraught father-son relationship.

Popstar is filled with the sort of sly jokes whose targets music fans should have no problem recognizing.

This sophomore feature is a stumble backwards in terms of maturity.

If the film remains largely watchable it is because Farhadi has cast some of the finest actors in Spain and they know how to breathe life into their characters even when they don’t have all that much to do (though a few of them have quite a lot to say).

Funny and poignant in equal measure, the comedy of manners does sag here and there, with a noticeable energy dip around the two-thirds mark. But the winning cast are able to steer it back on track before the irresistibly sweet conclusion.

Disneynature’s Bears combines sweeping vistas and remarkably intimate wildlife photography to typically stirring effect.

Though different in feeling from the Japanese writer-director's perceptive family tales like After the Storm, it has the same clarity of thought and precision of image as his very best work.

There’s a depth of feeling and a disarming sincerity to the movie that keeps you watching. Even the inevitable triumph seems refreshingly understated.

The movie is, arguably, too long and overladen with ideas. Klotz and Perceval are particularly keen on nailing the use and abuse of language in formatting human behavior.

Land Ho! is appealing for not going the route of easy gags and dumbed-down humor.

The balance of humanistic and ethnographic filmmaking with poignant, often seemingly unscripted drama has many rewards.

Considering that there seems to be no end in sight of the country's involvement in the Middle East, the film proves timely and affecting.

Imperium traffics in familiar undercover cop thriller conventions while gaining resonance from its disturbing, timely milieu.

In their wonderful documentary Other Music, Puloma Basu and Rob Hatch-Miller come to both celebrate a place and lament its passing.

Let the Canary Sing is slight but competent, a “Cyndi by Cyndi” opportunity for the singer and a choice group of her family, friends and collaborators to nostalgically recount her biography.

Language Lessons, which comes from the Duplass Brothers indie production stable, is a small-scale debut but one graced with charm and genuine heart.

The basic story has been told many times before, but it’s intriguingly retold by screenwriter Philip Gelatt and director Sebastian Cordero in this low-budget, bare-bones rendering of a familiar theme.