The Best FIlms of 2012

This new decade continues to offer up dozens of films that directly refute the seemingly endless cottage industry of “thinkpieces” devoted t...

The Top 10 Michael Powell (And Emeric Presburger) Films

I do not know if any director has had as formative an influence on the films I love than Michael Powell and his creative partner, Emeric Pre...

Capsule Reviews: Girl Walk//All Day, Sound of Noise, Sound of My Voice

Girl Walk//All Day (Jacob Krupnick, 2012) Watching Jacob Krupnick’s Girl Walk//All Day , my focus was initially drawn less to Anne Marsen’s ...

Barbara (Christian Petzold, 2012)

This wonderful German drama feels like a thriller that draws all of its suspense from the moral quandaries that flash across Nina Hoss' ...

The Color Wheel (Alex Ross Perry, 2012)

It is both immediately apparent and hard to believe that Alex Ross Perry’s second feature, The Color Wheel , is entirely scripted as the dir...

Capsule Reviews: End of Watch, Flight, The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey

End of Watch (David Ayer, 2012) Whether the cops in End of Watch talk like cops matters less than the joy of them talking like actual human...

Les Misérables (Tom Hooper, 2012)

When set against the experience of seeing a production of Les Misérables ,Tom Hooper’s adaptation single-handedly disproves Chaplin’s notion...

It's Such a Beautiful Day (Don Hertzfeldt, 2012)

Don Hertzfeldt brings a trilogy of short films about a psychologically impaired everyman named Bill to a close with It’s Such a Beautiful Da...

Consuming Spirits (Chris Sullivan, 2012)

A whopping 15 years in the making, Chris Sullivan's work of cross-format animation is not only a beautiful ode to outsider art but a dee...

Cosmopolis (David Cronenberg, 2012)

For the last decade, David Cronenberg has retreated from his body horror nightmares of modernity and moved into the traumas that inherently ...

The Ladykillers (1955) vs. The Ladykillers (2004)

For my latest Re-Make/Re-Model piece for Spectrum Culture, I compare the blisteringly funny, darkly funny Ealing Studios classic The Ladykil...

Capsule Reviews: The Deep Blue Sea, Cloud Atlas, Rust and Bone

The Deep Blue Sea (Terence Davies, 2012) Lit in a stuffy haze by Florian Hoffmeister, Terence Davies’ adaptation of Terence Rattigan’s play ...

This Is 40 (Judd Apatow, 2012)

In Knocked Up , Pete (Paul Rudd) and Debbie (Leslie Mann) played a side role to Seth Rogen and Katherine Heigl’s unstably formed relationshi...

Capsule Reviews: The Day He Arrives, Bad 25, The Sessions

The Day He Arrives (Hong Sang-soo, 2012) Hong Sang-soo’s The Day He Arrives begins with a man walking down a street and taking a left. It e...