Director Francis Ford Coppola, with a strong assist from cameraman Gordon Willis, has done an extraordinary job of capturing period and place.

Citizen Kane is a great motion picture. Great in that it was produced by a man who had never had any motion picture experience; great because he cast it with people who had never faced a camera in a motion picture production before; great in the manner of its story-telling, in both the writing of that story and its unfolding before a camera; great in that its photographic accomplishments are the highlights of motion picture photography to date, and finally great, because technically, it is a few steps ahead of anything that has been made in pictures before.

Here is a drama that lifts you right out of your seat.

It's the selective but cumulative use of seemingly arbitrary but significant experiences that gives Boyhood its distinctive character and impressive weight.

With the names and versatile talents of Gene Kelly, Donald O'Connor and Debbie Reynolds, supported by lilting melodies, wonderful dancing and some very funny comedy, the show just can't miss being another MGM top-grosser.

Barry Jenkins' Moonlight pulls you into its introspective protagonist's world from the start and transfixes throughout as it observes, with uncommon poignancy and emotional perceptiveness, his roughly two-decade path to find a definitive answer to the question, "Who am I?"

The performers are all good with Baquero poised and beautiful as Ofelia and Verdu vital and spirited as the rebellious Mercedes. Lopez gives an extraordinary performance as the bestial captain, an irredeemable villain to rank with Ralph Fiennes' Nazi in "Schindler's List."

Some Like It Hot is another supersonic, breakneck, belly-laugh comedy that should be a block-busting bonanza at the box office. It should be a proof that when the making of pictures is taken out of the bands of men-of-measured-merriment and handed over to men whose only purpose is to create amusement, they are still the world's best means of entertainment. Billy Wilder, who produced, directed and wrote the screenplay, with I.A.L. Diamond, was on the front burner all the way.

This film is pure entertainment.

The filmmakers assemble a dense portrait of a man disheartened by his failure to move the needle on economic justice, even as he succeeded in tracing ties among the common problems facing blacks, Latinos, Native Americans and even low-income whites.

Baleful and brilliant, Dr. Strangelove; Or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb, will outrage a predictable percentage of the population and enthrall an even greater percentage.

The subject is horrifying but the screen is hard to look away from, as the situation becomes a powder keg of tension.

This is a first-rate mystery thriller, full of visual shocks and surprises which are heightened by the melodramatic realism of the production.

The film is dark, gloomy and without music, but it is also observant and highly suspenseful, with Mungiu using his often static camera to balance banal cruelty with simple generosity.

Like much of Bong’s work, Parasite is cumbersomely plotted and heavy-handed in its social commentary. The largely naturalistic treatment here may also alienate some of his fantasy fanboy constituency. That said, this prickly contemporary drama still feels more coherent and tonally assured than Snowpiercer or Okja, and packs a timely punch that will resonate in our financially tough, politically polarized times.

On a number of accounts it is distinguished celluloid entertainment, but it is of great interest to the trade because it reveals, in startling terms, the unheralded talent of topflight scenarist, John Huston, who, in the dual capacity of writer and director of this picture, is now entitled to take his place among the most important creative artists in the industry.

The ingeniously structured screenplay by Katz, Huyck and Lucas offers up a load of wonderful characters who whirl about in ducktail haircuts and shirtwaist dresses, lost in the obscenity of American culture. Thanks to some of the most spirited, daffy dialogue since Lubitsch, their sweetness is deliriously funny. No matter how high the dramatic stakes become, the movie never loses its sense of humor, and although it has a lot to say, it's gloriously free of pretensions.

Roma may not be the memoir film many might have expected from such an adventurous, sometimes raunchy, sci-fi/fantasy-oriented filmmaker, but it’s absolutely fresh, confident, surprising and rapturously beautiful.

Spirited dazzles and entertains like no other movie this year. It also comes to a satisfying conclusion and never once seems to take shortcuts. Miyazaki is one of world cinema's most wondrously gifted artists and storytellers.

With "instant classic" written all over it, Toy Story, the first full-length feature entirely composed of computer-generated animation, is a visually astounding, wildly inventive winner.

Summer of Soul is as thoughtful as it is rousing, a welcome shot of adrenaline to kick off not just a film festival but a new year.

Perhaps the nature of the story is such that the film can’t help but be obvious and quite melodramatic at times, but it gets better as it goes along and builds to a moving finish.

Lonergan layers and then layers some more, allows his characters to stew, not always disclose themselves and then come to decisions and changes naturally, or after due deliberation. And they can relapse and not always be ready for the breakthrough moment toward which the story seems to be pointing. The result is something that feels more akin to a full meal than the usual cinematic popcorn.

More than in any previous Altman movie, we are made to feel the pathos and vulnerability of those impoverished souls he draws so well.

Brad Bird and Pixar recapture the charm and winning imagination of classic Disney animation.

At once the most realistic and beautifully choreographed film ever set in space, Gravity is a thrillingly realized survival story spiked with interludes of breath-catching tension and startling surprise.

Disney's 30th animated feature, Beauty and the Beast stands at the pinnacle of animated accomplishment, even when weighted against the excellencies of its lineage.

Its untethered, ethereal flow is utterly intoxicating, an immersive experience shaped by the clouds of cigarette and reefer smoke in the air, the smell of goat curry wafting from the kitchen, and above all, the sinuous rhythms of the slow-groove romantic reggae subgenre that gives the film its title.