Tomas Hachard

Perhaps Karen Leigh Hopkins's intent was to subtly suggest the surreal aspects of the story, but ultimately she underplays her hand.

It unnecessarily hampers itself for over an hour for the sake of a gotcha moment before finally allowing its actors to explore something more than generic grief.

It only overcomes its deficiencies and gains a modicum of entertainment value precisely when it commits to its illogical storylines and exaggerated plot twists.

The female characters on Mad Men are probably the show's strongest asset, but here they're hollow to the point of insult.

The repetitive rhythms of Joaquim Pinto's daily routines provide the film with a feeling of serenity that stands in contrast to the man's underlying anxiety.

There's no attempt to convince us that the world is being corrupted by people who haven't accepted the Gospel; it merely assumes we agree with that idea.

It seems too enamored with the seductive notion of an honorable criminal, too ready to take Bulger's justifications as actual indications of his relative innocence.

The emotional and political point through all this isn't to be taken lightly, but because the entirety of the film has such a nihilistic temperament, its effect is muted.

It becomes clear pretty quickly that Mike and Carlos Boettcher's insider perspective allows for close to no context beyond what their cameras directly capture.

The film is concerned largely with intellectual horrors and portrays the fight against slavery rather neatly as a growing feeling of internal guilt that slowly turns society toward the light.

What Omar best portrays are the limitations that result from having an occupation, and the fight to overthrow it, dominate a person's entire life.

What's missing, in the end, is any provocative or poignant insights into the "truth" about Emanuel; all we get are vague hints.

Tze Chun's film exudes no flair in rehashing the violence and suspense of its predictable noir-thriller material.

The film's fealty to history is both unnecessary and a hindrance, pulling us out of a story that could have easily been set in an anonymous city hit by a nondescript hurricane.

Director Shaul Schwarz, sans judgment, presents us with two men who epitomize how accepted and engrained narco culture has become in Mexico.

While it tries to relate a story about the sloppiness of life, the way best-laid plans can go wrong in an instant, its script is neatly and tidily structured.

As the film moves from one musical performance to another, the result increasingly feels like a series of celebrity impersonations set to a best-of-punk compilation album.

A delicate documentary about a way of life that's slowly disappearing, yet gives way to nothing new.

It misfires in tone, depth, and political tact, dumbing down rather than providing new insights into the Israel-Palestine conflict.

Jill Soloway's film is dishonest in the way it attempts to mask self-pity as enlightened self-criticism.

Claude Miller's swan song not only shares its main character's name but also her tempered disposition.

The obstacles that the Kelly brothers encounter are as uninspired as the film's treacly lessons about brotherhood and staying true to one's principles.

Its self-seriousness never allows it to become the realist counterpoint to Aki Kaurismäki's tragicomic approach in Le Havre that one initially hopes it will be.

Our Nixon never completely overcomes the disappointment of its recovered video, but it nevertheless offers a compelling portrait of Nixon and those close to him, one that captures how willfully blind they often were to their excesses, and how paranoid they were about apparent threats to them and America as a whole.

The film is most interesting as an articulation of how its main character's initial status as an emblem of inter-religious understanding quickly dissolves following a suicide bombing.

This joyous documentary leaves us wanting to immediately seek out the incredible, sometimes unfamiliar music we've just heard.

Ably leads us through its extensive investigation, faltering only when the camera lingers on Jeremy Scahill for a touch too long at the expense of his interview subjects.

We may find out how Gedeck's character reacts to her isolation, but we're never privy to her actual feelings, largely because in a film about a sudden onset of solitude, Pölsler is far too afraid of silence.