It won't take genre fans long to unravel the mystery, but the pleasures of this film lie elsewhere. Its images of the gleaming, depersonalized Tokyo in which Mima lives out her superficially charmed but lonely life are haunting, and the characterizations are unusually strong. There's plenty for anime newcomers to enjoy, and fans won't want to miss it.

Tony Award-winning stage director Jerry Zaks' debut feature is a gentle, surprisingly funny film about dying that manages to tug a few heartstrings without the usual emotional manhandling.

Silent Running concentrates heavily on special effects, resulting in some stunning imagery. Dern gives an engaging, against-type performance, though the script is stretched out very thin to support a feature-length film.

Not for all tastes, but produces haunting juxtapositions.

Good Morning, Vietnam stumbles whenever Williams isn't behind the mike, placing him in melodramatic, hackneyed situations that become increasingly predictable and preposterous, and director Barry Levinson's seemingly endless reaction shots of listeners grooving to the DJ's antics become irritating. Levinson manages, however, to be one of the few filmmakers to show the Vietnamese as complex, cultured people, rather than as helpless victims or the faceless enemy.

Directed with charming restraint by the acclaimed American producer Dan Ireland, the film is a quiet triumph for Dame Joan.

This short, gentle film is surprisingly involving.

While Costner the actor clearly imagines himself the Gary Cooper of the 21st century, he's got a crude sentimental streak that Costner the director fails to curtail.

No one can quite capture that decay -- the guilty conscience that can freeze the blood of even the most reputable of France's bourgeois families -- better than Chabrol, and this the master at his best.

A grim meditation on faith and betrayal that focuses on a relatively obscure corner of Holocaust history: the fate of the Catholic clergy under the Third Reich.

Isn't exactly a straightforward biography, but rather a snapshot of the iconoclastic American maverick at a particular point in his career.

Vic Morrow is excellent as the leader of a gang of thugs, as is Poitier in a star-making performance, though at age 31 he unfortunately doesn't convince as a high school student.

Bloody well done. Hammer finally gave the Dracula legend the treatment it deserved here, entrusting it to the brilliant director of The Curse of Frankenstein, Terence Fisher, who injected glorious life into the familiar material.

Deftly mixes rueful sentimentality and trenchant observations about the constantly shifting balance of power that drives relationships.

Scenemaker Dito Montiel's rough, grating memoir of growing up in a poor, violent section of Astoria, Queens, in the mid-1980s features a few too many arty flourishes, but also packs a raw power that's hard to shake.

Tony Scott's thriller is flashy, but it's not dead stupid and it's never dull.

Haynes's feature debut, is an exercise in cinema of ideas that, while audacious and occasionally compelling, is ultimately less than the sum of its parts.

Widely noted as a politically correct animated feature, FernGully is entertaining enough to make its occasionally overstated message palatable.

Each woman is a terrific interview, and if the climactic vision of these still beautiful ladies gliding through the water doesn't bring a lump to your throat, you surely have no heart.

Ritchie appears to have been paying attention to what made "Reservoir Dogs" (a huge hit in the UK) work, rather than coming away convinced that the formula for success begins and ends with pop-culture allusions and scarcely digested "homages" to classic crime films.

The action in this superlative film is relentless and gripping from beginning to end.

An attempt to do for poker what The Hustler did for pool, The Cincinnati Kid succeeds on its own, but it might have been a classic with some more attention paid to the script and, perhaps, a little humor sandwiched in to relieve the suspense.

Clever, exciting, and fun, The Last Starfighter boasts good performances by Guest and Preston, and a literate, funny script that highlights the real story: not the space war that only Guest can win but the difficulty of leaving home, family, and security for a totally new life when the opportunity presents itself.

If watching devout churchgoers pray to Jesus before a static camera sounds like the dullest idea ever for a documentary, think again: This might be the most fun you've ever had in church.

With MINNIE AND MOSKOWITZ, Cassavetes took a break from the decidedly somber mood of FACES and HUSBANDS, and produced the most accessible, and endearing example of his very exceptional art.

Its high-definition video images -- are coated with a convincing sheen of disgust, and Huston's performance is riveting.

Marvelously entertaining.

Although Zach Braff's promising writing-directing debut is a bit affected, few actors with behind-the-camera aspirations succeed as well as the Scrubs star does with this melancholy romantic comedy.