While the filmmaking is raw, undisciplined and groaning under a cargo of self-conscious quirks, it scores points for originality and wacky creativity

Exhaustively tracking the five-year battle to overthrow California’s ban on same-sex marriage, they distill the dense legal process into a lucid narrative while illuminating the human drama of the plaintiffs, and by extension, the countless gay men and lesbians they represent.

An unnervingly powerful picture of atrocity.

Only the film's slow pace softens its powerful message.

The few instances of humor offer a welcome reprieve as the film's mood shifts from summery and sultry to increasingly dark and moody.

As tough as it is, France is also warm and subtly heartbreaking, offering a moving vision of life for those stuck in legal and emotional limbo.

Somewhere between Hayao Miyazaki and Terrence Malick lies Away, a gorgeously made minimalist cartoon that’s long on beauty and breathtaking scenery, if somewhat short on traditional narrative.

Nearly every scene offers a general backdrop of tragic sadness leavened by the quotidian necessity of fulfilling basic requirements, doing a job, tending to the moment-to-moment needs of others and finding hope wherever one can.

Sedentary at these encounters may be, they are also frequently riveting and invariably fascinating, as they provide first-hand accounts and insider insights of the sort infrequently heard. These almost invariably underline the significance of the film's title in the scheme of diplomacy and rewardingly reveal the hopes and regrets that come with the territory.

Despite that ominous theme, The Great Lillian Hall is a lovely tribute to life in the theater, with all its personal compromises, and a showcase for Lange, who deftly shows the character as a vulnerable woman and also displays the distinct style of Lillian the bravura actress.

Even if the film is mostly hitting familiar notes in terms of story and theme, it expresses a concise, focused and expertly managed vision with which there’s little to quibble, and the extraordinary style represents the fruition of a long-imagined dream on the part of many directors and cinematographers. From now on, when the discussion turns to great works of cinematography and camera operating, 1917 will always have to be high on the list.

Kedi eloquently taps into the mutual attraction between the cats and their people, as well as the animals’ complexity and resilience.

Overall, though, the project brings enough good into this rough corner of the world that viewers can walk out with honest cause to be hopeful for its inhabitants.

Led by an almost unrecognizable Simon Baker as a jaded cop, Limbo weaves in themes of racial inequity, broken individuals and fractured families to build quiet potency.

Providing important historical and sociological context, Hitler's Hollywood emerges as a compelling cinematic essay that should be essential viewing for cinephiles and history buffs alike.

Direction by George Cukor is ever a display of fine craftsmanship. He utilizes small mosaics of sharp characterization in building to his climax and works in each facet faultlessly. This is the job for which Cukor admirers have been waiting.

The most compelling parts of The Substance deal with how social conventions turn women against themselves. A stronger version of the film might have dug into the complexities of that truth, instead of simply arranging itself around it.

While its two credible leads are certainly up to the challenge, there's a relentless claustrophobia that prevents the film from taking on a fully dimensional life of its own.

Wholly one-third of the country, some 11 million people, watched the finale. Marking's film is too astute to pretend that such fleeting things can bring about peaceful democracy, but it's also perfectly aware that they certainly can't hurt.

Bielinsky is a most expressive director, achieving considerable nuances and depths of emotion with characters' looks, gestures, body language and silences.

There’s uncustomary warmth here and a sensitivity to the characters’ vulnerabilities that often is missing from this director’s work.

Working with a script by first-time writer Rebecca Blunt, Soderbergh has made the sort of breezy, unpretentious, just-for-fun film that scarcely exists anymore, one almost anyone could enjoy.

Peach will enthrall viewers with its blend of comedy, stop-motion animation and special effects. [8 Apr 1996]

When film lovers these days enjoy movies, we’re not always sitting in the dark before imagery that dwarfs us. But whatever the size of the screen, Desplechin convincingly argues, that screen is a place where reality, transmuted, “glimmers with meaning.” As it does in this artful blend of narrative and nonfiction.

One of the smartest things about Parmet’s film is the way it portrays internalized misogyny in her female characters. The Starling Girl is a complex, often disturbing portrait of the way women have been pressured to shrink themselves and pass on that shame to their daughters.

Without Denis’ typically transfixing aesthetics and with a storyline that lumbers along in places, High Life is not always an easy sit, even if occasional outbursts of violence spice up the action in distressing ways.

It’s a Gothic horror nightmare heaving with sumptuous visual detail, groaning under the weight of portentous dread, writhing with both convulsive violence and sweaty eroticism and leavened by sly hints of fiendish camp.

What’s remarkable about The Blue Trail and makes it such a delight is that despite all the oppression in the air, it’s a movie filled with hope and faith in human resilience at any age. The closing image will make your heart soar. And no, it’s not the one you were expecting.