Blessed substance marries beautiful style in a '90s film noir.

Spectacular, wrenching masterpiece that unflinchingly documents the random horror, the grisly spectacle and the ugliness of war.

But there's so much more of the very, very British Topsy-Turvy that just seems so stuffy and inert.

Unfortunately, no awards committee is hip enough to praise this strange masterpiece.

A must-see.

An exhilarating, fascinating story about the amazing and horrifying depth we are sinking toward as we strain to raise the entertainment bar another notch.

A movie that kids may want to see again and again, and adults will be happy to oblige.

As gruesome as Fargo is, the Coens keep us laughing with a Hollywood-centric view of middle America.

One of those rare sequels that's even better than the original.

A deeply affecting allegory that explores the symbiotic relationship between genius and madness.

The most romantic film of the year.

Emerges as a thoughtful reflection on the many roles women must play throughout their lives.

The scene-stealer here is Bill Murray, who, after 25 years of near-hits, finds his most fully realized character yet.

The power of the Fiennes/Scott Thomas affair burns through the clutter (imagine "Casablanca" meets "Map of the Human Heart") making The English Patient a theatrical must-see.

As lensed brillantly by 26-year-old Anderson, the movie is at once tasteful and raunchy.

A snail-paced story in all of its glorious ... slowness.

It’s Del Toro who really gets to strut his stuff with a subtle, ambiguous, and riveting performance. In a field of top-notch actors, he’s the one whom you remember days later.

It's essentially a play-by-play of events that's so cheaply made it reeks of made-for-TV status.

Thornton has written himself the role of a lifetime, yet he plays Karl with neither condescension nor saintliness.

Overall, a solid piece of film that not only entertains but also educates.

Near-perfect editing, and cleverly poignant dialogue.

A dark comical masterpiece that single-handedly announces the collapse of the American family infrastructure as it exists on the brink of Y2K.

Irresistibly bleak appeal.

Dumb, dumb, dumb.

It's full of energy and drops an emotional bomb with its unexpected tale of reluctant heroes.

The electrifying jolt that they gave to a moribund music scene, and British society in particular, is still riveting to watch.

The what-you-don't-see element makes this an excellent film for people with overactive imaginations, and if that's you, it will scare the living crap out of you.

High Fidelity’s hip structure and offbeat characters provide consistent laughs and a good time.

More frustrating, however, are the many side stories, which introduce potential conflicts but never fully form, as well as completely unnecessary voice-overs that come late in the movie and culminate in a final monologue, which tells the audience what to think, rather than allowing us to decide what it's all about for ourselves.

Like a lot of anime, it's overlong and gets way too metaphysical at the end, but ultimately, this is a Princess worth worshipping.

This just may be the greatest war movie ever made.

I found myself roaring at the grotesque way some of the characters talk to their pets, pausing only briefly when I realized that I do precisely the same thing.

I went into Magnolia like a kid running onto a beach with a pail and shovel ready to explore, only to find myself neck deep in quicksand three hours later, screaming for help.

What's fascinating about Morris's riveting portrait is the notion that monsters can be born not just out of overwhelming evil, but pure egotism and stupidity -- much more mundane, yet still dangerous.

One major inappropriate casting decision (Kirsten Dunst, who's made a solid leap to young adulthood in "Dick" and "Drop Dead Gorgeous" is cast as 14-year-old Lux?) and an underdeveloped motive for the girls' self-demise left me unaffected.

Any minor annoyances are eclipsed by great performances from the entire cast.

The talented Mr. Minghella is aping Alfred Hitchcock as effectively as Tom Ripley is doing Dickie Greenleaf.

Tumbleweeds has a certain hopefulness about it. "Anywhere But Here," on the other hand, gives you nowhere to go.

This is a warm, accessible story with delightful characters and a nice metaphor about following your own rules.

Simply, one of the year's best films.

A heart-tugging potboiler that is at once poetic, tragic and cold as steel.

Compellingly watchable.

This may be what life was like for Levinson back in the day, but it makes a boring movie for the rest of us.

While slight and fairly unassuming considering its subject, the cast is uniformly fine.

Zemeckis is more interested here in getting us thinking (and feeling) than in telling us what to think.

See Wonder Boys for the acting, particularly McDormand and Maguire, but use the goofy moments to get popcorn refills.

May well stand as his (Chan) final word on true martial arts cinema.

More of a moody performance piece than a film.

There's a great movie to be made with this story.

Manages to present rave youth's on-the-go attitude as well as "Swingers" exposed its hipster culture.

One of year's most thought-provoking and soul-stirring films.

It's the triumph of the human spirit in its never-ending quest to be an original no matter what the establishment says.

It's super!

Soderbergh, like Tarantino, has a knack for making every shady character onscreen fascinating.

The journey -- long, dark, pungent, and twisted as it is -- is well worth the taking.

Never before have two such skilled actors been so monstrously squandered in a movie so replete with failed gags and pathetic gaffs.

The Wachowski Brothers have created some of the most unrivaled and imaginative sci-fi in years.

Professional wrestling might not be real, folks -- but, after watching this poignant and simple documentary, you might start questioning where the make-believe begins.

An enormously satisfying corndog of a movie.

Roberts shines.

One of the funniest films of the year... enough laugh-out-loud moments.

Solidly entertaining if not remarkably innovative.

Haunting character study filled with fascinating personalities, robust images, and eccentric behaviors that will please art-house fans.

Fans of the greatest working film director will be pleased.

Funny, profane and surprisingly painful at times.

Damon benefits greatly from a director like Gus Van Sant ("My Own Private Idaho") who understands quiet, funny moments, intricate relationships and beautiful young actors.

Luckily, Penn's attentive directing and Nicholson's layered acting render The Pledge's occasionally questionable story permutations secondary to enjoying this emotionally powerful film of rare and grave subtlety.

Hilarious.

The only fault I found was a lengthy build to the story's political climax (there's a subplot about slavery), after which the film quickly seams up its unravelings and ends.

What makes up for the, at times, slow-moving theatrics is the physical beauty of Pleasantville.

Chilling and technically proficient and, also, fairly hollow.

In the end, the performances and the basic strength of the premise make Shadow of the Vampire a relatively diverting ninety minutes. But there is the inescapable feeling that it is a shadow of the great film it might have been.

Though Twin Falls Idaho fascinatingly uncovers the complexities of conjoined twins, it is more about any sibling relationship where one feels simultaneously burdened and uplifted by the other.

It seems as if it was made by people who have never actually watched an episode of Star Trek. So all the old poke-fun-at-Trekkies cliches are here.

Allen's deadpan humor shines through every crevice of the film, keeping the pacing sharp, the dialogue snappy, and the situations feeling real.

Confirms its place as one of the best first films in recent memory, and one of this year's very best films.

Pretty hysterical.

Watching Wright portray a black man who actually fights alongside the very men who wish to keep him enslaved proves to be an interesting philosophical dichotomy.

It's a comedic caper with a slap-your-head-in-kookiness that ends up making Allen, at this age, seem like an old man desperately still trying to ham it up at the dinner table.

Worth watching.

It's a mind-blowing game, and all that nonsense about this being an erotic thriller was merely part of Kubrick's game.

As a whole, The Eyes of Tammy Faye funnily and lively serves to show that sometimes the best movie characters are real ones and sometimes the best Christians are ones who look like crack-whores.

Observations on the modern office space are dead-on, and I dare you not to laugh out loud at a few of the sophomoric jokes!

If you're looking for Julia Roberts (circa "Pretty Woman") playing, well, herself, and Hugh Grant (circa "Four Weddings and A Funeral") playing, well, himself, then you're in luck.

An ultra-violent cinematic rendering which will appeal to those moviegoers who like their action dramas laced with nice touches of meta-physicality and left-of-center humor.

What elevates Gladiator to the near-greatness it occasionally achieves is the performance of Russell Crowe as Maximus.

Greenwood gives a nuanced performance that may be the film's best work, but at times his surface dissimilarities to JFK are jarring.

All that suspense falls dead at its climax, which proves to be a bore. The absence of a surprise ending and the lackluster spooks make this one worth skipping. I'm going back to see "The Sixth Sense."

A brilliant, haunting film.

Polley's doe-eyed innocence is in overdrive.

Nicholson is near-perfect as he slowly allows callous cruelty to give way to vulnerability in one of the most original, idiosynchratic roles of the year.

Frighteningly intelligent and visually stunning film.

Succeeds at getting the viewer to buy into its premise, thanks to solid, often moving characterizations and the gripping way the plot is spun.

Weaver herself inhabits her character with confidence and passion, although she's inconsistent in spots.

Wes Craven continues to explore (and blur) the lines between reelity and reality with his latest, and perhaps best, cinematic slice of horror.

Moore and Fiennes both give impassioned, sexy performances.

The actors share much of the screen time but the viewer never quite gets the chance to relate to each one individually.

An impossible, yet funny scenario.