The Stranger is not as wildly creative as his other films, but all the Welles trademarks are present, including superior lighting, inventive camera angles, strong transitions, and characters silhouetted in darkness.

Tran's film is a startling achievement: brimming with moments of exquisite tenderness and shocking brutality -- sometimes simultaneously -- and each invested with an almost perverse beauty.

It's mostly very crude, often very funny and a little bit smarter than you might otherwise think.

While the dizzying array of design elements and magnificent vocal performances is impressive, 138 minutes is just too long to keep the interest of any but the pure opera devotee.

The film is a shattering experience fueled by Jentsch's electrifying performance.

A little too derivative of much better movies to succeed on its own. However, in the context of recent Chinese movies, it's a pretty amazing piece of work.

This coolly beautiful film is both a superior thriller and an engrossing study of a sociopath's progress.

In a story driven by questions of loyalty and allegiance, no candidate is identified by party. It's a bipartisan nightmare from which no one escapes unscathed.

A quietly harrowing chronicle of addiction and fragile recovery anchored by Vera Farmiga's intense performance.

A vigorous, manic drama, this Lewis Milestone classic about newspapers and newsmen wonderfully preserves a host of Depression-era attitudes and a glorious headline era.

The best-ever adaptation of a Faulkner novel for the screen, directed with passion and perception by Sirk.

A deeply moving film.

Dryly funny, deceptively simple road movie that quietly reveals the state of contemporary Romanian life.

The extensive CGI work is well used and the children are exceptionally well cast, especially the girls.

This is Leone's gangster film to end all gangster films, a work of tremendous intellectual depth and emotional range.

Straw Dogs is one of Sam Peckinpah's finest films, a relentless study in violence and machismo that is shocking, not only for its explicit gore, but for the degree to which it manipulates "civilized" audiences. Even the most passive viewer may find himself silently cheering on the carnage at the film's climax--an act that, in retrospect, gives much cause for discomfort.

An offbeat, existential crime drama buoyed by fine performances; nicely turned dialogue; and an evocative soundtrack and theme song from Paco di Lucia and Eric Clapton, respectively.

Seltzer's characters are real; and Haim, Green, and Sheen play them wonderfully. As a result LUCAS is not just a film for teenagers but for anyone who has ever been a teenager.

Inherit The Wind acutely captures the farcical Monkey Trial and offers the awesome talents of two double-Oscar winners, Tracy and March, in their only film together.

A fine, straightforward tribute to a sports giant who faced blatant prejudice and paved away for the likes Jackie Robinson, Hank Aaron and other minorities who dared make a place for themselves as heroes of America's greatest pastime.

A well-crafted potboiler from start to finish.

The audacious finale, which plays out in a wholly symbolic realm, will leave even the most adventurous moviegoers scratching their heads. See it with a friend; you'll appreciate the second opinion.

"We're not that different, but we're different from what you think we are," says 16-year-old Ebony, and no playwright could have said it better.

Mamet's jabs at Tinseltown's silken ruthlessness are quietly pointed, and the ensemble cast -- even the brittle and sometimes annoying Pidgeon (Mamet's wife) -- is brilliant.

Europa Europa is a compelling story told with intelligence and wit. Holland's direction, and the acting by the ensemble cast, are superb.

The film collapses midway--because of unsure and sloppy direction, splintered story continuity, and the overacting of Adams, Cartwright, and others. The battle between Sutherland and the aliens in the "pod factory" at the end is simply absurd and sophomoric.

Though much of the plot action is downright silly, Dreyfuss, DeVito, and Hershey offer wonderful performances, and director Levinson keeps things moving with some nice comic touches. As he did in his first film, Diner, Levinson again effectively uses a diner setting in which his characters are allowed to engage in some rambling but very funny dialogue.

Features phenomenally beautiful background animation and complex characterizations, and offers glimpses of a poverty-stricken Tokyo underclass that's rarely featured -- let alone portrayed sympathetically -- in mainstream Japanese films.