The Story: Aliens staging an invasion of Earth attempt to understand the human experience so they can more efficiently take over the planet. The Lowdown: Sci-fi meets black comedy in a bizarre film that somehow manages to blend its tones effectively as it meanders through a lengthy narrative.

The Story: A middle-aged Japanese woman falls for a handsome American English instructor, but when he runs off with her much younger niece, she abandons her stable life to track them down. The Lowdown: A fascinating character study with a big heart and questionable story structure.

The Story: A scheming pharmaceutical exec sends his unwitting friend into a potentially deadly situation when he tries to cover up illicit drug sales in Mexico. The Lowdown: A tepid throwback to Tarantino knockoffs that weren't good enough to exist in 1998, much less 20 years later.

In Brief: The first of three attempts to adapt Richard Matheson's novel I Am Legend — and easily the most successful — The Last Man on Earth stars Vincent Price as the lone survivor of a plague that turns the afflicted into vampiric ghouls. A far more faithful adaptation of Matheson's story than The Omega…

The Story: When a transgender singer's boyfriend dies suddenly, she must confront the intolerance of both his family and a societal establishment that marginalizes her gender identity and denies her fundamental human rights. The Lowdown: A deeply moving film that represents the trans experience without relegating it to a sense of Otherness, distinguished by a remarkable star turn from actress…

The Story: Screen icon Hedy Lamarr's life is examined in detail, including a surprising aptitude for invention that demands a re-evaluation of her legacy. The Lowdown: An uneven documentary treatment that succeeds on the basis of its intriguing subject.

In Brief: For a film with such a strong local connection, it's somewhat surprising that Michael Mann's The Last of the Mohicans (1992) doesn't play in town more often. Possibly not the best work of either Mann (notoriously uneven) or star Daniel Day-Lewis (consistently fantastic), Mohicans is an accessible and entertaining historical epic. Bearing more in common with the 1936…

In Brief: Director John Cromwell could aptly be called a master of melodrama, though I wouldn't necessarily consider such a distinction a compliment. A perfect case in point would be Algiers (1938), an American remake of French director Julien Duvivier's Jean Gabin vehicle Pépé Le Moko (1937). Cromwell's take is inferior in almost every way — Charles Boyer is no…

The Story: A Lebanese Christian and a Palestinian refugee butt heads over a residential plumbing code, and their ensuing court battle throws the entire country into chaos. The Lowdown: Either a disturbingly dark comedy or a painfully prescient melodrama that exposes some undeniably universal truths.

The Story: A team of female scientists explores a mysterious area of alien influence from which no prior expedition has returned. The Lowdown: Writer/director Alex Garland hits a serious sophomore slump with this Tarkovsky-lite sci-fi adaptation.

The Story: Oscar-winning actress Gloria Grahame returns to the arms of her young ex-boyfriend as she confronts her faded glory and impending mortality. The Lowdown: A showcase for actress Anette Benning that fails to do justice to both its star and its subject.

In Brief: Henri-Georges Clouzot is noted as France’s answer to Hitchcock, but the argument could be made that he was, at times, even better. Along with Wages of Fear and The Inferno, Clouzot’s mastery of morbidity is at least on par with Hitchcock’s darkest corners. Possibly the director’s best-known work, Les Diaboliques (1955) is a…

The Story: The prince of a futuristic and cloistered African city-state rises to power, but a challenger to his throne forces him to confront his nation's isolationist policies. The Lowdown: Writer/director Ryan Coogler and an absolutely exceptional cast accomplish the seemingly impossible — a superhero movie that manages to be both exhilarating and thought-provoking, one that feels like…

The Story: This year's nominees in consideration for the Best Documentary Short Academy Award.The Lowdown: An unsurprisingly depressing slate of socially conscious docs that offer at least a modicum of highly tempered optimism beneath their technical proficiency.

In Brief: One of my principal complaints with François Truffaut is that he was a little too prolific for his own good. Case in point: Two English Girls (1972). Truffaut's second adaptation of a work by Jules and Jim author Henri-Pierre Roche, Two English Girls  lacks the inherent charm, narrative inventiveness and visual flair of that earlier film, favoring a muted presentation with…

The Story: This year's nominees in consideration for the Best Animated Short Academy Award. The Lowdown: A much stronger group of shorts in terms of technical accomplishment and narrative content than last year's batch, including one film that's very nearly perfect alongside the perfunctory Pixar picture and a five-minute Nike ad starring Kobe Bryant.