Densely informative yet always grounded in deep personal investment and clear-eyed compassion, this is a powerful indictment of a traumatic social experiment, made all the more startling by the success of the propaganda machine in making people continue to believe it was necessary.

The film's stylistic approach places an unmistakable and compelling veil of empathy around Magdalena, Miguel and the migrant workers just trying to survive amid violence, economic desperation and political strife.

Not intended by any stretch as a proper biography, the film is also not one of Herzog's more mainstream efforts. But admirers of either artist will find it very worthwhile, as will viewers who need the occasional reminder that the world still contains wild places to explore.

If Asteroid City was a too-rich 20-course tasting menu, The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar is a deliciously calibrated amuse-bouche.

With compelling and charismatic performances by Keira Knightley and James McAvoy as the lovers, and a stunning contribution from Romola Garai as their remorseful nemesis, the film goes directly to "The English Patient" territory and might also expect rapturous audiences and major awards.

Brandishing an ambition it's likely no film, including this one, could entirely fulfill, The Tree of Life is nonetheless a singular work, an impressionistic metaphysical inquiry into mankind's place in the grand scheme of things that releases waves of insights amid its narrative imprecisions.

Crafted with unforced humor, ravishing visuals and commanding maturity, Decision to Leave intoxicates with its potent brew of love, emotional manipulation — or is it? —and obsession.

Angela Patton and Natalie Rae’s Daughters targets viewers squarely and simultaneously in the head and the heart, succeeding much more effectively at the latter, presumably with the hope that the former will follow.

Immediately joining the first ranks of artists’ memoirs, Steven Spielberg’s The Fabelmans is both a vivid capturing of the auteur’s earliest flashes of filmmaking insight and a portrait, full of love yet unclouded by nostalgia, of the family that made him.

Featuring past and recent interviews with many of the key figures and generous doses of archival photographs and vintage performance footage, Fire Music should be on any serious music lover’s must-see list.

One in a Million feels both ultra-specific and universal.

Bong has pulled together a multilayered horror-drama that works more often than not. The film gets back on track after a clumsy middle section that's too long and finishes strong, and Bong fans, horror fans and Asiaphiles are likely to be thoroughly satisfied.

Writer/director Mia Hansen-Love’s first feature, All is Forgiven, a keenly observed study in intimacy that has the rhythm and feel of real life, announces the arrival of an intriguing sensibility. Technically accomplished and finely acted without artifice by a talented ensemble cast, it’s an astutely written, mature work in its content, understated, naturalistic style and sensitive rendering of complex emotion.

In-depth account of Army deployment in an Afghanistan hotspot shows soldiering at its most rugged.

Starless Dreams (Royahaye Dame Sobh), shot in a juvenile correctional facility for girls under the age of 18, is the perfect example of how powerful simplicity can be, when it’s underpinned by compassion for its subject.

In its poetic portrait of a man whose quest to help others has cost him dearly both emotionally and physically, The Departure proves quietly profound.

An astonishing real-life geopolitical thriller with a very run-of-the-mill historical explainer grafted to it like a remora, Madeleine Gavin’s documentary Beyond Utopia is so packed with high-stakes tension and nail-biting set-pieces that it’s fairly easy, and probably even ideal, to ignore its clunky structuring and expositional choices.

The portrait of a nearly vanished rural way of life remains compelling, and the melodrama engaging enough to suggest this might have been improved by being spread thinner as a TV series.

Director Brad Bird (TV's King of the Hill, The Simpsons), adapting the original children's book by the late British poet laureate Ted Hughes, has created a wonderful character in the huge childlike visitor from space.

It’s a demanding sit, a film both rigorous and indulgent, rewarding and aggravating.

There's more to Fred Rogers than any 93-minute documentary can contain, and it was easy for me not to lament what Neville wasn't doing and just to embrace what Rogers was.

In directing the film, Lee allows the show's inherent vitality to carry the doc, relying on Stew's charismatic stage presence, the cast's absorbing performances and the production's effective combination of minimal staging and impressive lighting design to convey the musical's energetic celebration of artistic discovery.

A realistic slice of pioneer life that offers a disquieting alternative vision of America's most mythic location.

The Long Day Closes is impressive in many ways. It may be a strange filmgoing experience, but its haunting imagery and sounds make it powerfully memorable. [24 May 1993]

As Oscar, Jordan at moments gives off vibes of a very young Denzel Washington in the way he combines gentleness and toughness; he effortlessly draws the viewer in toward him.

I’m Still Here is a gripping, profoundly touching film with a deep well of pathos. It’s one of Salles’ best.

For all its playfulness, there’s an intellectual heft to A Useful Ghost that exerts its own gravity.

A film whose lightness of touch rides a wave of family conflict to perfectly balance smiles and tears.