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Review: Sister

Increasingly popular among American independent filmmakers, the school of miserabilism — starkly dramatizing the poor, wretched, and unjustly deprived — has thrived in Europe.

By: PETER KEOUGH | October 18, 2012

Review: Somewhere Between

Upon her adoption of a Chinese baby girl, filmmaker Linda Goldstein Knowlton wondered how, in years to come, her daughter would view her racial identity.

By: BETSY SHERMAN | October 18, 2012

Review: Girl Model

As seen in David Redmon and Ashley Sabin's somber, sometimes poetic, Fred Wiseman-like documentary, the international model trade ranks just above human trafficking in legitimacy.

By: PETER KEOUGH | October 10, 2012

Any real-world comparisons between the Sarah Palin-like Laura Pickler (Jennifer Garner) and her African-American opponent, Destiny (Yara Shahidi), are encouraged in this over-churned movie that presents itself as a "cutthroat story of greed, blackmail, sex, and butter."

By: BRETT MICHEL | October 11, 2012

Review: The Other Dream Team

American audiences will be delighted to see how the Grateful Dead helped pay for the 1992 Lithuanian Olympic team, including supplying tie-dyed T-shirts. But only Lithuanians will thrill to the movie's climax...

By: GERALD PEARY | October 10, 2012

Review: Keep The Lights On

Ira Sachs's picture is many things: a snapshot of gay culture at the turn of the century, a brutally personal dramatization of his relationship with author Bill Clegg, a messy look at the realities of addiction, a formally audacious work in the tradition of New York indie cinema.

By: JAKE MULLIGAN | October 10, 2012

Review: The Paperboy

A Russ Meyer roughie meets The Help in Lee Daniels's lurid follow-up to Precious , in which a paperboy (Zac Efron) gets promoted to driver when his brother Wade (Matthew McConaughey), a Miami Times investigative reporter, returns home to exonerate a convicted killer (John Cusack).

By: ANN LEWINSON | October 11, 2012

Review: Seven Psychopaths

As in his debut In Bruges , Martin McDonagh here plays self-reflexive games while undermining the gangster genre.

By: PETER KEOUGH | October 11, 2012

Review: Taken 2

Retired CIA operative Bryan Mills (Liam Neeson) is still trying to remain an active part of the lives of his ex-wife Lenore (Famke Janssen) and his daughter Kim (Maggie Grace).

By: BRETT MICHEL | October 10, 2012

Review: Wake In Fright (1971)

Combining elements of Heart of Darkness , After Hours , and Groundhog Day , Ted Kotcheff's brutally brilliant Outback thriller follows the moral degradation, or perhaps redemption, of a snooty schoolteacher (Gary Bond) traveling from the backwater where he's assigned to Sydney for his Christmas vacation.

By: PETER KEOUGH | October 10, 2012

Review: Argo

Escapist cinema
There are many heroes in Ben Affleck's spunky, polished political thriller. But the biggest hero is Hollywood itself.

By: PETER KEOUGH | October 12, 2012

Review: Pitch Perfect

Jason Moore's musical doesn't hit all the high notes, but guilty pleasures are seldom perfect.

By: MONICA CASTILLO | October 04, 2012

Review: Escape Fire: The Fight to Rescue American Healthcare

Matthew Heineman and Susan Frömke's documentary tackles a familiar topic but doesn't weigh in on the Obamacare issue so contentious in the upcoming election.

By: TOM MEEK | October 02, 2012

Review: Head Games

Legendary documentarian Steve James ( Hoop Dreams ) again turns his camera on the dark side of America's obsession with sports, this time looking at the rash of suicides and dementia linked to concussions.

By: JAKE MULLIGAN | October 02, 2012

Review: Solomon Kane

The last time Pete Postlethwaite died onscreen, he was being gunned down in The Town .

By: BRETT MICHEL | October 02, 2012

Review: The Oranges

Julian Farino's inept, unfunny romantic comedy reprises The Graduate , 45 years later.

By: PETER KEOUGH | October 02, 2012

Review: Won't Back Down

Daniel Barnz's picture turns the American education crisis into a dumbed-down, Capraesque crowd-pleaser, with a malicious agenda to boot.

By: JAKE MULLIGAN | October 02, 2012

Review: Alps

Like his last feature, Dogtooth, Greek director Yorgos Lanthimos's new film breaks down the conventions of identity, language, and social roles with black comic — and tragic — effect.

By: PETER KEOUGH | October 02, 2012

Review: V/H/S

As horror movie premises go, "found footage" tends to possess the most capacity for both pure, stomach-churning terror and woefully laughable shtick.

By: ALEXANDRA CAVALLO | October 02, 2012

Review: How to Survive a Plague

In 1987, 26-year-old Peter Staley, a closeted Wall Street trader, was diagnosed as HIV-positive. Given less than two years to live, he addressed the International AIDS Conference . . . three years later. He's still alive.

By: BRETT MICHEL | October 02, 2012