As a cultural document A Separation is invaluable—it really is a bridge to modern Iranian society that very purely focuses on the dynamics of one family, any family, just like yours and mine.

As a portrait of woman on the verge of collapse, We Need to Talk About Kevin, rendered by a director and actress at their respective peaks, is a masterful character study.

Perhaps the issue is Close, straight-jacketed with a character who keeps everything so close to the vest (or under it), so on the down low and so minimal, that Albert is nearly inaccessible.

Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close touches us even though ultimately it doesn’t quite get where it’s going.

Carnage is a blackly funny, mean, fast game of verbal one-upsmanship, and gives us great actors at the top of their games.

With so much discussion today about high school bullying, the pressure to conform and the painful pressure to simply be oneself—in this case a dual minority—filmmaker Dee Rees’ semi-autobiographical film is a compassionate, fully felt and lovely coming of age story with an unlikely, yet highly likable, protagonist.

Shame, about a sex addict in a downward spiral, is an incredibly sad film. As a character study that charts the disintegration of an outwardly successful alpha male undone by impulses imploding beneath the surface, this frank, adult film calls to mind Last Tango in Paris, Carnal Knowledge, Bad Timing and other landmark movies about sex and obsession—it’s that serious, and that good.

When My Week with Marilyn’s closing credits rolled, I immediately wanted to see it again. How many movies today inspire that reaction?

A moving testament to the glue that binds a family in crisis, the dynamics between fathers and daughters, how love transcends tragedy and what happens when a guy who thinks he’s got it all discovers that nothing is what it seems.

A stylish and well-directed mood piece that doesn’t work as drama.