An undeniably effective adaptation of the Shirley Jackson novel and one of the best haunted-house movies.

Youth exploitation pictures were all the rage at the time, and while this is better than some in execution and intent, it's still exactly that.

It's vivid evidence that great music and stories transcend time and place.

Phillippe has the unenviable task of trying to make O'Neill equally interesting, but an eager beaver with some unresolved family issues is no match for a poisoned soul methodically laying the groundwork for his own inevitable fall. The unfortunate imbalance makes long stretches of the film feel dull, but when Cooper is on screen it's mesmerizing.

German filmmaker Malte Ludin's gripping documentary about the father he barely knew is both an extraordinary exercise in family history and an example of what Germans call Vergangenheitsbewaeltigung: "facing the past," particularly the years of Hitler's Third Reich.

This grim black comedy from Belgium would be unbearable if it wasn't scripted with such wry humor.

An exercise in audience manipulation, with every frame designed to stagger the senses.

A modest but finely tuned look at small-town life.

Brilliant, in its own twisted way.

Heir to a long tradition of apocalyptic scare stories, the film wears its influences proudly.

Toni Collette's extraordinary performance, Alison Tilson's sensitive script and Ian Baker's sensational cinematography add up to a surprising film.

In the end, the film is both a fitting elegy for Arna and the children she tried to help and a deeply disturbing warning about what will continue to breed within the occupied territories until peace is brought to Palestine.

Matewan is beautifully shot, and there is not a weak performance in the film. Jones is a tower of dignity; Cooper is the epitome of quiet strength; and Oldham glows with the passion of a zealot, first for God, then for the union.

Martin makes his character amiable and downright lovable; Hannah shows a fire she hadn't demonstrated in previous efforts. In an era when romance seems to have taken second place to sex, it's heartwarming to see a film like ROXANNE bring back the loveliness of love.

Lee's biography of the slain civil rights leader treats Malcolm, not as a political rallying point, but as a fully rounded individual whose life defies reduction to symbolic status.

Academy Award-winning live-action-short director Andrea Arnold makes a startlingly assured debut with this low-key psychological chiller.

Eerie, surreal and a welcome respite from Disney-style animation, this French sci-fi allegory may not offer any mind-blowing insights (genocide is bad isn't exactly a new thought), but it's a trip.

Flawed but refreshingly intelligent.

But transforming full, live-action performances into quavering cartoons isn't inherently lyrical, and here it produces the jittery sense of a world dissolving into flat forms and buzzing prattle.

This stage-bound farce could easily be an American sitcom: It's all slamming doors, eavesdropping and stupid miscommunications, garnished with a heavy-handed helping of comedy of humiliation.

Berlevag's 1300 inhabitants are by nature hardy and uncomplaining, but Knut Erik Jensen's unhurried documentary reveals that there's more to them than mere stoicism.

This intelligent, oddly aloof thriller is a worthy follow-up to director Steven Soderberg's "Out of Sight."

Salles is a master storyteller, and the film's pacing is flawless.

This modest film delivers a simple but powerful message:... the real work of creating a lasting peace must be done on an personal level, one individual at a time.

Shot on reverse film, poet-turned-director Lukas Moodyson's debut feature has a grainy, immediate feel that nicely enhances the story's emotional honesty.

In the end, it's best to make peace with the film's essential and deliberate inscrutability -- something Lynch fans have learned to do since Twin Peaks -- and to simply marvel at Dern's astonishing performance, which few actresses are likely to top anytime soon.

Predictable but sometimes moving.

Shunji Iwae's film began life as an interactive online "novel" and unfolds in a series of achronological vignettes whose cumulative effect is chilling.