Its dispassionate approach toward the major injustices and minuscule triumphs that make up the life of its protagonist, superbly played by Gabriela Cartol, is always balanced by compassion, perhaps making it more effective than any impassioned rant.

It’s a minor, but most edible, bloody bonbon.

Enigmatic but oddly entrancing feature debut.

At times, The Most Dangerous Year gets bogged down with its extensive footage of hearings about various bills and ballot initiatives that, however pertinent, inevitably come across with a C-SPAN dullness. But that's a minor quibble about this powerful documentary, which makes the valuable point that this is a civil rights issue and that the arguments being put forth about transgender people sound much like those promoting segregation decades ago.

V. Scott Balcerek's documentary Satan & Adam makes for fascinating viewing. And even as the film captivates, it sparks instant theorizing as to who will play the lead roles in the inevitable Hollywood feel-good dramatization. I'm thinking Ryan Gosling and Samuel L. Jackson.

A stylishly made, nail-biting effort that proves consistently engrossing.

It looks and feels far more substantial than most indie debuts, confidently bending genre rules with its minimalist dialogue and hallucinatory plot, which owes more to David Lynch or Lars von Trier than to more orthodox horror maestros.

Portraying his most complex character to date, Adkins delivers a ferocious turn that proves visceral in its emotional as well as physical intensity.

A Faulknerian look at domestic violence, self-destructiveness and faith set in a small Louisiana town, its cinematic style owes something to Terrence Malick — though this spare, 77-minute debut has none of the meandering self-indulgence of that auteur's recent work.

It's the kind of serious but broadly appealing, modestly scaled picture that people love to say doesn't exist any more.

Despite superb performances by Nat Wolff as a conflicted young soldier and particularly Alexander Skarsgard as a sociopathic platoon leader, the picture proves only sporadically compelling.

[A] modest but heartfelt picture. ... Lost Transmissions tells its story without engaging with foolish cliches about creativity and madness.

Although there is nothing groundbreaking about the story told in Standing Up, a series of small grace notes help to freshen this dissection of lost souls searching for second chances.

Those who grew up reading Scary Stores to Tell in the Dark will no doubt be thrilled by this cinematic tribute. And those who didn't may find themselves compelled to read the books to find out for themselves what all the fuss is about.

Herzog’s film may not be the final word on Gorbachev, but it is affectionate and candid and leaves audiences in a melancholy mood about the sometimes short-lived nature of reform.

Savage rivals most mid-budget Euro-American wintry police actioners in its lush production values and slick execution of genre tropes. There are plenty of visceral thrills on offer in the dark and violent confrontations between a hard-boiled detective and a gang of cold-blooded robbers, as the action unfolds in impressively choreographed sequences on Changbai’s snow-covered slopes in northeastern China.

It simply offers a chance to spend time with engaging people who've enriched our understanding of complex ecosystems, and who assure us that much of what we've done to the planet is reversible — provided we take action before the keystone species in question are still around to be saved.

A finding-yourself dramedy grounded in a sense of place that's socioeconomic as much as geographical, the warm-hearted film ... is an understated but assured debut.

Astutely chronicling an amazing musical career that ended prematurely due to Parkinson's disease, the doc will delight the singer's old fans and likely make her many new ones as well.

Irizarry sees locals who survived these challenges acquiring new layers of toughness and pride, increasingly ready to fight for their communities.

The plot machinations of Stuart Flack's screenplay can be seen from a mile away, but that doesn't make this familiar tale of a vengeful, obsessed woman any less satisfying.

This labor of love should be embraced wherever the term cinephile means anything.

Plus One is nothing if not formulaic. ... But what Plus One lacks in originality it at least partially makes up for in warmth and watchability.

The Proposal has a life of its own, beautiful and provocative. The biggest complaint one can make is that Magid, whose previous works have involved spy agencies and police surveillance, hasn't made similar features while pursuing those projects.

Sienna Miller offers a beautiful, agile performance that would by itself justify the film's existence.

A combination of exposé on Air Force experiments with chimpanzees and cuddly pet story, Project X should fly high as family entertainment.

Neither over-bleak nor falsely heroic, the movie sensitively observes a short span that, however things work out, is going to be a turning point in their lives.

The filmmaker seems to have been granted unprecedented access to both Manning and to the people around her, and he uses this natural, unforced intimacy to present a fragmented portrait of a person attempting to readapt to a society in which they never particularly learned how to fit.