Brilliant, suspenseful, absolutely riveting film.

Has the sort of richness and dimension that are the hallmarks of master storytellers at work.

Delivers the heady, rib-tickling rush of an action picture, and it gradually builds to an emotional wallop that blindsides you.

Maya is as consumed with finding bin Laden as Jake Gyllenhaal was obsessed with finding a serial killer in "Zodiac," only he was doing it as a hobby.

The movie has such a profound and compassionate understanding of human behavior, family ties and the way ordinary people respond when they're forced into a moral quandary, I can't imagine anyone not being transfixed by it.

The film is far from a downer. If anything, more than any of the films in the trilogy, this one may be the most hopeful - and the most affecting.

Offers a ride worth taking -- an excursion through a fantastical pop universe that is pure, enchanting magic. Try it; you'll like it.

Like every war before it, the U.S. invasion of Iraq has generated its share of movies. But The Hurt Locker is the first of them that can properly be called a masterpiece.

This is a beautiful movie.

What makes it the best movie of the year -- is its insight into human behavior.

Feels like a miracle, a movie that exceeds even the most formidable expectations without straying from its singular path. All hail this King.

Part of the accomplishment of Carlos is the sheer accumulation of detail the movie amasses, and the longer running time gives you a deeper sense of the terrorist lifestyle, and when and why Ilich gradually succumbed to ego and self-glorification without realizing it.

This is the sort of small, intimate drama about unpleasant subject matter Hollywood rarely deals with, but Haneke isn't worried about turning off his audience, because death is something everyone has in common. It fascinates us, the way it also scares us.

A soaring, exhilarating fantasy grounded in earthy emotion, Crouching Tiger more than lives up to the hype.

The fact that that character happens to be so repellent -- and yet so endlessly fascinating -- is one of the film's many strokes of genius.

Jackson's dazzling vision turns the story into a real movie-movie -- one that, unlike too many fantasy films today, is genuinely transporting.

A worthy and delirious final chapter to this hallowed animation franchise.

More than once during The Fast Runner (Atanarjuat), it's easy to forget you're watching a movie.

The movie itself is a nominee for Best Animated Feature, and it's good enough to pull a surprise upset over the beloved Finding Nemo. It's a mad masterpiece.

The Queen taps into the universal curiosity the world shares toward royal families -- an element of the movie that Frears wisely mines for gentle humor.

Waltz With Bashir isn't only a harrowing anti-war plea, it is also an eloquent and deeply moving argument that it is critical to never forget human atrocity, lest the past be repeated.

A model of pitch and modulation and craft. For two hours, the Coens hold you in their grip so tightly that for long stretches it feels a little hard to breathe.

Most prison movies are about escape or survival. A Prophet (Un Prophete) is about the creation of a consciousness. This one, too, could have been called “An Education.”

What Bloody Sunday lacks in clarity, it makes up for with a great, fiery passion.

It's the filmmakers' refusal to sugarcoat their tale's darker subtexts that makes Finding Nemo such a resounding piece of storytelling.

A joyous, amazingly detailed paean to imagination and personal expression that dares -- and succeeds -- to illustrate one of the most mysterious enigmas of all: the creative process.

This is the most impressive directorial debut since"Reservoir Dogs." Being John Malkovich is weird, all right-- the best kind of weird, the kind you haven't seen before.

Although it is technically a sequel, Before Sunset stands perfectly well on its own. In fact, the new movie plays better if you haven't seen the original for a while, so its details have grown appropriately fuzzy.

A visually thrilling experience.

A rich, marvelous movie -- the kind that enchants on so many different levels, it leaves you feeling giddy.

American Splendor reminds you that sometimes, simply getting out of bed each morning can be the most heroic of acts.

There's nothing about United 93 that qualifies as entertainment in the traditional sense: It is an unpleasant, wrenching experience, which is just as it should be.

This remarkable, continually surprising documentary turns out to be something far richer and more complex, closer in spirit to "Crumb," another devastating film about a family's gradual self-destruction.

It's a sign of just how much Coppola respects her characters that she doesn't make us privy to that final line: It is only meant for them to share. But like the rest of the ethereal Lost in Translation, you don't need to have it spelled out in order to feel it.

Beautifully textured and layered movie.

The result is one of the most visually astonishing martial-arts fantasies ever made.

As suspenseful as a full-blown thriller.

It takes some exceptionally intelligent and witty people to make a dumb comedy this funny and perceptive: Borat may be offensive (to some), infantile, low-brow or even just a stunt, but you won't hate yourself in the morning for loving it.

A brazen stunt that pays off. Writer-director Michel Hazanavicius, simultaneously channeling "Singin' in the Rain" and "A Star is Born," tells a story about 1920s Hollywood made in the style of that era.

A thoughtful, audacious meditation on love and relationships that finds a group of wildly disparate talents clicking together in perfect unison.

Letters From Iwo Jima, much like any war movie, honors the courage of men who took part in a war not necessarily of their making. But by placing us on the opposite side of the battlefield, the movie forces us to approach it from a fresh perspective.

I can't imagine anyone seeing Once and not instantly falling in love with it.

A unique bond still develops between the two outcasts, leading to an unexpected resolution that ends this subtle, deeply humane movie on an ambiguous, but unmistakably hopeful, note.

The movie implies that despite its thunderous success, the book also destroyed Capote, who crossed a line in his quest for personal glory for which he could never forgive himself -- no matter how many accolades it brought him.

The movie isn't a thriller, but it has the tension of a thriller, and its cool, icy tone, deliberate pacing and clean, antiseptic lines are reminiscent of Kubrick and Antonioni.

As this intimate, beautifully observed film unfolds, you realize that the story's themes -- the nature of love, the role of sex in relationships and the ways in which we learn to make peace with our guilty consciences -- are relevant no matter what age you happen to be.

For now, The Two Towers feels like the second installment in what next year, when Frodo finally reaches Mount Doom and the story draws to a close, we'll surely be hailing as a masterpiece.

The package is perfectly irresistible.

Rousing, exhilarating entertainment.

Unabashedly frank in its depiction of sex -- too frank, probably, for more discreet viewers -- but it's never exploitive or seedy.

It's impossible not to shake the feeling that we've been here before, and the movie never does convince you that a return trip was entirely necessary.

Luminous, melancholy and ultimately heartbreaking.

Doesn't feel so much like a movie as a glimpse into the extraordinarily messed-up life of a young man about to make the simple yet life-changing realization that actions have consequences, and that other people matter, too.

This is a quiet, powerful film about the lengths we'll go to for the sake of the people we love - and the depths we'll sink to for the sake of the ones we hate.

Shot in the style of a documentary, which lends the movie an aura of utter realism, Maria Full of Grace derives an unsettling power from the clinical details of Maria's ordeal.

The most compelling -- and horrifying -- portion of the film, which interweaves archival footage and stylish graphics with the interview segments, centers on the firebombing of Japan during World War II.

This poignant, wise and subtle picture -- which, yes, happens to be the best movie of the year -- should be approached with humble expectations. Lee's approach to this delicate material is suffused with melancholy, metaphors and small, telling touches that favor subtlety over exclamation points and rough-hewn simplicity over grandiloquence.

As usual for the Dardennes, the plot is slight but loaded with hairpin turns of tremendous emotional power.

And so the saga of Harry Potter comes to an end - not with a whimper but with a rousing thunderclap of incident, emotion, suspense and old-fashioned movie magic.

The movie is such an intense, disturbing and exhilarating experience, even five more minutes might have felt like too much.

Murderball invokes fascination toward its protagonists, because it views them with the same confidence and acceptance they view themselves.

The work of a talented filmmaker coasting on his own fumes.

The movie is an absolute triumph of culturally relevant filmmaking – a film that will thrill and fascinate sport junkies and non-fans alike. If you like baseball, you will love this movie. If you hate baseball, you will still love this movie.

A savage, insane movie - in the best way possible.

He just wasn't the sort of hero the government pretended he was. This eye-opening, inspiring movie is a permanent corrective to that deception.

A terrific yarn, one so engrossing and surprising that the nature of the story's structure -- each question Jamal gets asked on the show corresponds with a traumatic or momentous moment from his childhood -- never feels like a contrived framing device.

The Straight Story truly is one from the heart, and it is wonderful.

One of the many pleasures of this beautifully composed, measured movie is how it reminds you of the power of pure storytelling -- an art that's too often overlooked in contemporary films in the rush for sensation and excitement.

A remarkable movie that merits a place alongside "The Executioner's Song" and "In Cold Blood" as an unforgettable depiction of tragedy in the heartland.

A treat to anyone who already cherishes Varda's films and a perfect primer for those who haven't yet discovered her work.

This is a talky picture, based on a historical incident where the outcome is already known – yet it still proves much more engrossing than crime dramas or bank robberies.

Where Traffic stumbles is in its inability to engage the heart with the same fervor it engages the intellect.

This rich, emotionally complex movie finds Almodóvar venturing into trickier, more fascinating territory, even if his themes.

The Master has become a contest between two gifted actors trying to shout each other down. The commitment to their roles is impressive, but it's tethered to a weightless, airless movie, a film so enamored of itself, the audience gets shut out.

Watching this essentially good but misguided kid slide into a hopeless future is both transfixing and heartbreaking.

This is the most vibrant, exciting and invigorating movie-movie of the year.

Even by Miyazaki standards, Ponyo makes less narrative sense than it should, and the pat ending is a bit of a letdown.

One of the first things that strikes you about these courageous people, who constantly confront volatile, gun-carrying thugs, is that they outgrew their violent pasts and now live contented lives with their families.

Remarkably astute and devastatingly funny.

It's a beautiful, strange tone poem about childhood and innocence, set in a strange but still recognizable world where the polar ice caps are melting, crayfish shacks float down rivers and enormous aurochs, an extinct breed of bison, are sloughing their way toward our tiny, adorable narrator.

A dreamy, passionate ode to freedom -- of thought, of expression, of every person's innate right to simply be.

It's an action picture that's been distilled and compressed to its tightest, barest, almost abstract essence, and it's absolutely thrilling.

One of the most rewarding and engaging movies of the year. Don't miss it.

If The Pianist isn't quite as devastating as "Schindler's List" -- the movie with which all other Holocaust movies must be compared -- it's because Polanski isn't interested in an expansive view of the war.

The Savages is ultimately about two siblings, both around 40, in the midst of learning it's never too late to start embracing life, no matter how rotten a hand you were dealt in the past.

Harrowing and grueling, Lebanon ends on a gentle, hopeful note.

What makes Exit Through the Gift Shop so fascinating -- and it is riveting, regardless of your interest in the art world -- is the eloquent way in which it illustrates how beauty and meaning really are in the eye of the beholder and how that eternal phrase still holds true: There's a sucker born every minute.

A dreamy, ravishing ode to romantic longing, and it is bound to frustrate people who like their movies to get to the point, or at the very least have one.

Knocked Up is filled with comic exchanges and bits of business that, while not essential to the central plot, keep the movie's comedic energy chugging (like Debbie's throwdown with a doorman at a popular nightclub who won't let her in because she's too old).

By the end, Turtles Can Fly becomes a lyrical and heartbreaking reminder of the human toll of war.

This delicate, transporting movie, which keeps dialogue to a minimum to tell its story primarily through images, is also a triumph of sheer cinematic craft that mirrors its characters' contemplative natures while extolling the virtues of lives simply led.

The film wouldn't work at all, though, if Sarsgaard didn't strike the perfect balance between snaky predator and love-struck fool.

Ever the satirist, Payne mines humor from his characters, be it Randall's cockeyed pyramid-scheme ideas or the banality of a ridiculous wedding toast.

There's a lot more at work in this raucously entertaining movie than cross-dressing clichés.

Take Shelter is paced slowly and deliberately, which is necessary to make believable whatever is tormenting Curtis.

Although it strikes a perfect balance between otherworldly, slimy menace and 1950s B-movie cheesiness, The Host's computer-generated mutant isn't what makes this frantic, wild picture so much fun.

Restrepo makes time to observe these men during brief off-duty stints -- at one point four use an iPod to form an impromptu, joyous dance party -- but the bulk of the film centers on their insanely dangerous and heroic work.

The movie plays out as a series of memories, so exact and evocative that watching it becomes an immersive experience.