Earning a coveted Oscar nomination alongside “Toy Story 3” and “How to Train Your Dragon” for Best Animated Film is French director Sylvain Chomet’s minimalist, melancholy homage to legendary French comic actor and filmmaker Jacques Tati, creator of “Mr. Hulot’s Holiday,” who died in 1982. Read more

In British filmmaker Mike Leigh’s “Another Year,” having a partner to share the vicissitudes of life is what makes the difference between loneliness and happiness. Read more

Ben Foster’s most critically acclaimed role to date was as a quietly tortured military man who delivered news of soldiers’ deaths in “The Messenger.” So his participation in a straight-up action flick, “The Mechanic,” is a bit of a shock. Co-starring with stuntmaster Jason Statham in the remake of Charles Bronson’s 1972 original, Foster toughened up and decided he wasn’t about to let something like vertigo — or even the possibility of death — prevent him from doing his own stunts, too. Particularly one of the movie’s most stunning: a free-fall off the side of a 450-foot building. Read more

The assassin at the center of The Mechanic is a man of precise action and few words. The 1972 original starred, naturally, Charles Bronson. Now the current remake recruited an actor who’s perhaps destined in fill Bronson’s shoes: the reticent Transporter and Crank star, Jason Statham. Read more

“Rise Up” is a documentary about reggae music, the heartbeat of Jamaica. The genre has become popular worldwide due to the extraordinary talents of Bob Marley and other reggae players. But, far from the fancy international venues and festivals where the top players perform, there are new reggae beats emanating from the impoverished ghettos of Kingston. Read more>>

Academy Award winner Halle Berry stars in this all-too-familiar melodrama about a troubled woman with multiple personalities but what makes it unique is that one of her personas is a bigoted white Southern woman. Read more

Just nominated for an Oscar as the obsessive ballerina in “Black Swan,” Natalie Portman goes gross in this pre-Valentine’s Day romantic comedy with a role-reversing twist. Read more

Why Christian Bale and Melissa Leo will probably take home statuettes this year. Read more>>

Anthony Hopkins will perhaps always be best known for having eaten someone’s liver with some fava beans and a nice Chianti. But frightening audiences Hannibal Lecter-style is so 1991: In “The Rite,” Hopkins’ latest film, the devil literally makes him do it. Read more

“This will make Beethoven!,” boasted Walt Disney while he put the finishing touches on “Fantasia” (1940), with its 20-minute passage from the composer’s Symphony No. 6 (”The Pastorale”).
There’s a stronger argument to be made that Ludwig van makes “The King’s Speech.” Read more>>