Anderson delivers a satisfyingly quirky, cinematically masterful valentine that contains more seeds of truth about the human heart than a hundred big fat Greek comedies.

It's a film of sneaky power, peculiar delights and, finally, the ability to dazzle.

In an unassuming way, the film sizzles -- a perfect embodiment, as it happens, of the marriage of the bad man and the man of letters.

Leconte's signature on the film alone makes it worth seeing.

This is grand, inspiring entertainment of a sort that Hollywood aspires to and rarely achieves.

Recoing's performance is chillingly low-key -- sometimes you can swear that he believes his own fictions -- and Livrozet, making his film debut, has a perfect long-in-the-tooth charm.

Possesses a tone that wobbles masterfully between whimsy, dread, affection and horror, building on rich performances and an understated showiness to cast a queer and tingly spell.

Watching this tender little movie with its teasing humor, its deeply felt performances and its focus on slight moments rather than gigantic sea changes is like hearing a tasteful sonata instead of the usual vulgar symphony that the cinema offers up.

Don't go if "Star Wars" isn't your bag: You'll only resist and resent it. But if you're a fan, it's hard to see how you'd be disappointed. Me? I can't wait for May 2005. "Episode III": Hot diggity!

Bouncing giddily from subplot to subplot and wisecrack to wisecrack, Mamet and company (and this is one of the truest ensemble works in years) satirize the slippery morals of the film racket and the surface-only decency of small town America.

Thoroughly unique work of art.

This is harsh and acid stuff, but it's exhilarating on a number of counts. For one thing, Jenkins moves with real authority between scenes of low life, tender intimacy and gripping violence; made on the cheap, her film has the iron certainty of the best art.

It's the most charming and buoyant film Spielberg's ever made.

It's a movie about having a sibling and all of the pain, joy, love and anxiety that that entails: a movie, in other words, for almost everyone.

It's as full a movie as you can imagine -- exhausting and exhilarating and continually fascinating.

Phantom may not be the best entry in the series, but it's the most technically accomplished, and it makes you as hungry for the next film as you've been for this one.

Exciting spectacle of a master director reining in his abilities to create a work that is etched in acid, burnished in smoke.

So filled with riches that it seems a bit unfair to single out Szabo and Fiennes, no matter how outstanding their work.

We laugh, yes, but we're touched, too, a delicate balance that the film manages again and again, right through to its bittersweet conclusion.

A hard and bright and tough film in all the best ways.

One of the best children's movies in years. Spunky, inventive and filled with life and wonder.

A pure, sweet romance that moves along with bouncy comedy and a touch of grown-up realism and rue.

It's a film in which complex issues are boiled down to human essences, not so much simplified as dramatized in the very best way.

The exquisitely exact photography and sound design represent the highest level of craft of Van Sant's career.

It's a wonderfully crafted work, handsome, lively, stirring and utterly convincing in its depiction of the perils and thrills of sea life. But I'm not sure that my personal enthusiasm for it will translate entirely for viewers whose favorite movie about the high seas is, for perfectly good reasons, "Pirates of the Caribbean."

With its sweet soul and sharp mind, it's one of the most heartening films of the year.

Wide-eyed, deadpan and, more often than not, note-perfect.

This is a first-class film that will appeal to anyone who wants to see a plausible, witty, absorbing human story told well -- indeed, told gorgeously.