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Ian Buckwalter, NPR

1. The Cabin in the Woods 2012 For all of its many intellectual pleasures, and smart commentary, Cabin in the Woods is a visceral roller coaster of a movie at heart. And like the best thrill rides, when it's over, you just want to get back on and go again. full review
2. Cheerful Weather For The Wedding 2012 The dominance of the madcap side of the film's split personality lays an airy veneer over Dolly and Joseph's woes, making them seem inconsequential - as unsubstantial as an observation about wedding-day weather. full review
3. Dark Horse 2012 Despite its flaws, Dark Horse largely succeeds as yet another installment in Todd Solondz's career-long examination of the lust for love and security among the deeply damaged. full review
4. The Do-Deca-Pentathlon 2012 Do-Deca-Pentathlon showcases the deft way with interpersonal relationships that's making the Duplasses two of our premier chroniclers of just why it is that we can never seem to get along. full review
5. The Grey 2012 The Grey has a certain muscular pull: It's a tough-as-nails study of hardened men struggling with the ostensibly conflicting pulls of stoic masculinity on one hand and love, faith and fear of death on the other. full review
6. Haywire 2012 As with any great action movie, what we're really here to see is the star showing off whatever skills got them on screen to begin with. And Haywire never disappoints. full review
7. High Ground 2012 Brown takes advantage of the opportunity to present a broad array of feelings, less on the nature of these conflicts in particular and more on the mindset of the soldier in war - and the difficulties faced when no longer in the midst of the conflict. full review
8. Keyhole 2012 Maddin looks to the past of film the same way he often obsessively examines his own, and the two can't really be separated. full review
9. Little Birds 2012 Despair may be an emotion of emptiness, of the absence of hope, but that doesn't mean a movie about someone spiraling down into that emotion has to feel so empty as well. full review
10. Marley 2012 Stylistically unremarkable, playing it safe with structure, the film is still quietly revelatory. full review
11. Nobody Walks 2012 Russo-Young's characters simply feel like complex, confused people trying desperately to be happy without also destroying their lives with their poor impulse control. full review
12. The Perfect Family 2012 The film's gentle, sentimental approach prevents it from ever really getting at the pain that's been swirling around this imperfect family for years. full review
13. Red Hook Summer 2012 From a storytelling perspective, Red Hook Summer is an absolute mess. full review
14. Sassy Pants 2012 Sweet and well-intentioned, Sassy Pants is difficult to dislike, despite its missteps. full review
15. Tim and Eric's Billion Dollar Movie 2012 Even with a measly $3 million dollar price tag, Tim and Eric's Billion Dollar Movie feels like the work of comedic outlaws getting away with something. full review
16. Conan O'Brien Can't Stop 2011 Just as he promised, amazing things happen. full review
17. Dirty Girl 2011 It's probably appropriate that a film about adolescent identity crises has trouble figuring out what it wants to be. full review
18. The Perfect Host 2011 Around every corner is a new twist, a strategically placed misdirection or another switch of predator and prey. But while the gamesmanship is satisfying in moderation, it becomes a little monotonous in excess. full review
19. Trishna 2011 Something in Hardy's tragic inclinations obviously appeals to Winterbottom; this is the third time he's adapted one of the author's novels, with the liberties he takes with the source material increasing each time. full review
20. All Good Things 2010 There's plenty of information on what (might have) happened, but not much thought given to why. full review
21. And Everything Is Going Fine 2010 Soderbergh imposes a shape until the film begins to feel less like puzzle pieces in search of their place and more like one seamless picture: with this collage of the artist's past work, he's created an entirely new final monologue for Gray. full review
22. Bill Cunningham New York 2010 The equal billing in the title is no accident: Cunningham's story is the story of New York itself, about the ways it has changed through the decades and how that history was captured on all those miles of film passing through Cunningham's camera. full review
23. Black Death 2010 "Going medieval" on your enemies isn't just a figure of speech in Christopher Smith's stylish spatter-horror exercise, which uses desperation-fueled religious fervor to interrogate the intersection of fear and faith. full review
24. Casino Jack And The United States Of Money 2010 The narrative trots all over the globe, including stops for labor exploitation in the Marianas Islands, dealings with Russian mobsters,ripping off Indian tribes in the desert southwest, and jetting to Scotland to golf with impressionable politicians. full review
25. The Romantics 2010 Niederhoffer wears her influences proudly on her sleeve, but crosses that line between homage and mimicry, making it difficult to hear her own voice as a filmmaker. full review
26. Rubber 2010 Either of the film's sides - the horror comedy or the post-modernist commentary - probably wouldn't be enough to sustain the movie on its own. But with both facets taken together, writer/director Quentin Dupieux can have his cake and deconstruct it too. full review
27. Fish Tank 2009 A bold new entry in the long-standing British tradition of disquieting social realism. full review
28. The Fourth Kind 2009 When the director divides the screen into quadrants for his big finish, the effect is just laughable -- but then by that point, the movie is too. full review
29. The Good Heart 2009 The movie's two bright spots are Cox and Dano, who perform excellently despite the dull inevitabilities the script forces on them. full review
30. Great Directors 2009 The film jumps around in dizzying disorganization, illustrating the fact that part of what a director provides to a film is not just vision and leadership, but also, as the word suggests, a narrative direction. full review
31. Paper Man 2009 Aided by subtly wounded performances by Daniels and Stone, and a surprisingly affecting comic turn from Reynolds, Paper Man makes up for many of its shortcomings with an abundance of heart. full review