In Brief: Some have called Edgar G. Ulmer’s Detour (1945) the ultimate example of film noir. While I wouldn’t necessarily go that far, it is unquestionably a tour de force and a nigh-unassailable classic of the genre. A Poverty Row cheapie shot in six days on a practically nonexistent budget, Detour bears all the hallmarks of…

The Story: The Washington Post's publisher must decide whether or not she will publish the Pentagon Papers at great personal and professional expense.  The Lowdown: Spoiler alert: She does.

The Story: An Olympic skier's plans for law school are derailed when she gets sucked into the lucrative world of high-stakes poker. The Lowdown: The only thing Aaron Sorkin leaves out of his directorial debut is something to be desired.

In Brief: An obscure but enjoyable bit of film noir role-reversal, Suddenly (1954) sees Sterling Hayden and Frank Sinatra flip the script slightly. We've all seen Sinatra as the conflicted hero trying to stop an assassination in The Manchurian Candidate, but here he's a deranged psychopath trying to murder the president — and Hayden, having played killers and madmen in movies…

The Story: When the heir to the vast Getty fortune is abducted, his mother must negotiate his release — both with the boy's captors, and with his notoriously penny pinching grandfather who refuses to part with the ransom money. The Lowdown: A compelling story delivered as overblown melodrama, weighed down by a handful of conspicuously weak performances, threadbare…

In Brief: Visionary author H.G. Wells may have vacillated between optimism and cynicism throughout his career as a sci-fi prophet, and both ends of that spectrum are encompassed in his script for Things to Come (1936). adapting from his own essay, Wells paints a bleak picture of a not-to-distant future decimated by war and returned to a primitive…

The Story: A cleaning woman at a government facility falls in love with an amphibious humanoid creature. The Lowdown: Maybe the only true fish-out-of-water story ever committed to celluloid, this heart-wrenching love story is also del Toro's most sincere love letter to cinema — and easily among the best work he's ever produced.

The Story: A middle-class suburbanite undergoes a radical shrinking procedure intended to reduce his environmental impact while concurrently increasing his wealth. The Lowdown: A largely unobjectionable satire that falls short of living up to the potential of its high-concept conceit and the talent of its creators.

The Story: Four high schoolers in detention discover an antiquated video game console that magically transports them into an adventure game that they must complete in order to return to the real world. The Lowdown: Occasionally entertaining and only infrequently stupid.

The Story: Twin brothers hit the road in search of their biological father. The Lowdown: Mama Mia! by way of Due Date, this farcical road trip barrels past the exit for Comedy Town and gets lost in a quiet backwater called Boredom, USA.

The Story: Winston Churchill faces public and political opposition as he guides England into the fight against fascism in the early days of World War II. The Lowdown: A remarkable performance from Gary Oldman counterbalances Joe Wright's ham-fisted direction, redeeming this intimate portrait of a leader facing the gravest of dilemmas.

The Story: Rey trains in the ways of The Force under a reclusive Luke Skywalker as General Leia Organa leads the last vestiges of the Rebel Alliance in a desperate fight against overwhelming opposition. The Lowdown: All the Star Wars action you were hoping for, plus an extra 40 minutes and some Porgs.

The Story: An aspiring actor befriends a scene partner, and the duo move to L.A. to pursue their dreams — until a harsh welcome prompts them to take matters into their own hands. The Lowdown: Based on the true story of the creation of a true cinematic nadir, James Franco has made a very good film…

The Story: A young college student finds herself plagued by mysterious seizures and unexplained phenomena when an attraction to a pretty classmate places both girls in harm's way. The Lowdown: A remarkable twist on horror and coming-of-age stories that refuses to allow its audience the comfort of the conventions expected of those genres.

The Story: A young Afghan girl must take extraordinary measures to support her family after her father is arrested by the Taliban. The Lowdown: A compelling glimpse into life under a fundamentalist theocracy that offers a depth of cultural awareness and respect for its target audience's intelligence not commonly found in films aimed primarily at children.