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Empty Quarter: Exploring Rural Oregon
Empty is right, and that’s not a put-down. This sparse black-and-white documentary by Alain LeTourneau and Pam Minty…
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Miral: Julian Schnabel Films His Girlfriends Life Story
A U.N. premiere! A Vanessa Redgrave cameo! Zionist hoodlums! While Jewish advocacy groups swarm to director Julian Schnabel’s…
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Hanna: Yet Another Girl Assassin
Joe Wright’s Hanna is a tech-savvy fairy tale, replete with a wicked witch, uncertain parentage, and chop-socky mixed…
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When We Leave: Immigrant Melodrama in Berlin
With her young son in tow, Umay (Head-On‘s Sibel Kekilli) walks out on her abusive husband and foregone…
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Rubber: Without Car or Driver, Tire Goes on Killing Spree
Written and directed by Quentin Dupieux, Rubber follows the exploits of a tire (listed in the credits as…
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Certified Copy: Juliette Binoche in a Hall of Mirrors
Abbas Kiarostami’s Certified Copy is exactly that: The Iranian modernist’s first feature to be shot in the West…
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Soul Surfer: The Upside of Losing Your Arm
Adapted from the memoir-ized 2003 tragedy-to-triumph of Hawaiian teen surfer Bethany Hamilton—who famously returned to her board a…
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Your Highness: James Franco Plays It Straight
Your Highness plays like a dirty-joke blooper reel made by the cast of a junky sword-and-sorcery epic, streaked…
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I Saw the Devil: Just Another South Korean Slasher Flick
The pan-genre über-hack of the new Korean zeitgeist, Kim Jee-woon has been deft in some arenas: 2003’s A…
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Insidious: The Haunting of Patrick Wilson and Rose Byrne
There is a great deal of prowling motion in Insidious: a recurring sideways dolly outside a haunted house,…
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Source Code: Jake Gyllenhaal in a Solid Sci-Fi Movie
Moon director Duncan Jones’ pseudo-cerebral, modestly budgeted sci-fi thriller is a propulsive ride worth your popcorn dollar, not…
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Win Win: It’s Wrasslin’ Time for Paul Giamatti!
Paul Giamatti continues contemporary cinema’s longest pre-midlife crisis in Win Win as Mike, yet another schlubby 40-something flummoxed…
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Nostalgia for the Light: Part of a Weekend Tribute to Patricio Guzmán
Chile’s self-appointed, one-man Truth and Reconciliation Commission, Patricio Guzmán has devoted the past four decades to chronicling the…
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The Penitent Man: Lance Henriksen Has a Message From the Future!
Shot here by Seattle native Nicholas Gyeney, The Penitent Man plays like an old episode of The Twilight…
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The Music Never Stopped: From the Case Files of Oliver Sacks
Based on a typically heart-wrenching case study by Oliver Sacks, this admirably modest adaptation tells the story of…
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The Time That Remains: Elia Suleiman Contemplates Israeli History
“Where am I?” a disoriented Israeli cabdriver asks his dispatcher at the beginning of Elia Suleiman’s The Time…
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Con Artist: Meet Fallen Art-World Star Mark Kostabi
Mark Kostabi is a talented artist and a smug, antagonistic douchebag, both of which made him an art-world…
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The Human Resources Manager: A Mortal Errand in Romania
Tender irony and dark humor abound in Israeli director Eran Riklis’ latest account of bureaucracy colliding with burgeoning…
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The Round Up: Again With the Holocaust Already
From France, The Round Up is a long, dull, straightforward dramatization of that country’s Vichy collaboration with the…
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Paul: The Hot Fuzz Guys Remake E.T.
This isn’t the third installment in the so-called “Blood and Ice Cream Trilogy” featuring Simon Pegg and Nick…