|
| 21. |
|
10/10/12 |
Excellent |
 "...a startling example of Ava DuVernay's ability to conjure drama that at once takes place in a character's head and in a recognizable real world. It's beautifully nuanced..." |
| 22. |
|
10/04/12 |
Excellent |
 "...proceeds as a portrait of a place that time is in the process of forgetting, until the city's mayor, Dave Bing, hands the filmmakers a structuring news event." |
| 23. |
|
10/04/12 |
Weak |
 "...all of the segments aim to mimic the filmed artifacts of the social life and communication of the 'video or it didn't happen' generation." |
| 24. |
|
10/03/12 |
Weak |
"The stylistic consistencies between the segments only draw attention to the inconsistencies in performance... bad acting quickly undermines the 'authenticity'..." |
| 25. |
|
09/20/12 |
Good |
 "...admirably inside baseball... I could watch Phil Niekro reminisce about being owned by Bill Buckner for days. If you know what that means, you probably could, too." |
| 26. |
|
09/20/12 |
Moderate |
 "Chbosky stresses the teenage tendency to assume that every new thing they're feeling is unprecedented in human history..." |
| 27. |
|
09/13/12 |
Poor |
 "...a truly stunning misuse of talent and resources, and for others, it's the film of the Toronto Film Festival, if not the year.... inconsistent, tone-deaf..." |
| 28. |
|
09/13/12 |
Outstanding |
 "The film's ambiguity could hardly be unintentional, but more interesting is Anderson's use of sumptuous technique to tell a story defined by withholding." |
| 29. |
|
09/12/12 |
Outstanding |
"...a free-form work of expressionism... a film of breathtaking cinematic romanticism and near-complete denial of conventional catharsis." |
| 30. |
|
09/05/12 |
Excellent |
"...evocative... a portrait of a place that time is in the process of forgetting... Detroit's story is a microcosm of America's -- just, for now, slightly more desperate." |
| 31. |
|
09/05/12 |
Moderate |
"...an incidental time capsule of a pre-Internet adolescence... Chbosky plays this CW serial stuff for maximum earnestness, keeping the tone just-moist-eyed throughout." |
| 32. |
|
08/30/12 |
Very Good |
 "You watch both fearing that something spectacularly tragic could happen, and knowing that if this film exists, it probably didn't." |
| 33. |
|
08/30/12 |
Moderate |
 "...makes a persuasive case that the warm-bath introspection of the 'This American Life' brand, and Birbiglia's own shaggy-dog storytelling, are ill-matched..." |
| 34. |
|
08/29/12 |
Very Good |
"Mads Brügger gives what has to be one of the riskiest and most committed performances of the year.... How long will he be able to pull this off?" |
| 35. |
|
08/22/12 |
Moderate |
"...primarily a coming-of-age story, with Birbiglia the director weaving his character's nocturnal dramas into the narrative... These sequences ride a weird tonal line..." |
| 36. |
|
08/16/12 |
Moderate |
 "...reads as a prescient encapsulation of the current moment's economic tumult, with public space defined by reckless power brokers and performance-art-like protest." |
| 37. |
|
08/15/12 |
Moderate |
"...simultaneously irritating and fascinating. But much of the film fails to function as drama and never more so than in the interminable final scene..." |
| 38. |
|
08/09/12 |
Moderate |
 "F-bombs and bestiality jokes aside, it's basically a small-town fable in which just-folk human beings are temporarily corrupted..." |
| 39. |
|
08/08/12 |
Moderate |
"...basically a footnote, a goof on our broken political system that's good for a certain novelty, but as a challenge to the dominant order? It's ultimately impotent." |
| 40. |
|
08/02/12 |
Very Good |
 "Klayman champions Ai while politely revealing that he's not a saint; in fact, his gluttonous human appetites (for food, for women) border on self-destructive." |
