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Melissa Anderson, Village Voice

1. Americano 2012 Americano, which Demy also wrote and stars in, is an ambivalent, occasionally touching work of homage to his parents, yet one whose clumsiness only underscores the superiority of their directly quoted films. full review
2. The Babymakers 2012 Its 95 minutes feel like a trimester... full review
3. Bestiaire 2012 Bestiaire is, most profoundly, about the dynamics of looking, an exercise in studying gazes that are either unidirectional or, superficially, at least, reciprocated. full review
4. Girl In Progress 2012 Unconvincing, flawed matriarch Mendes and junior showboat Ramirez appear to be acting in entirely different movies. full review
5. How to Survive a Plague 2012 Dispensing with voiceover narration, How to Survive a Plague is instead a compilation of first-person remembrances, a time-toggling polyphony emphasizing both individual struggles against illness and collective action-the we of me. full review
6. The Island President 2012 Shenk's film is close enough to his subject to catch the leader who rails against carbon-dioxide emissions puffing on cigarettes in parking lots. full review
7. L!fe Happens 2012 A blonde-brunette buddy comedy with a charmless cast (Rachel Bilson plays the third roomie, a Christian virgin) and banter as flat as Deena's favorite no-strings imperative, "Bone and bolt." full review
8. Lay the Favorite 2012 A wan comedy about gambling that takes no risks ... full review
9. One for the Money 2012 Punitively dull. full review
10. Oslo, August 31st 2012 As this elegiac movie reminds us, even a shattered life matters, leaving behind an indelible, intricate imprint. full review
11. We Have a Pope 2012 Until the potent concluding scene, the humor and shallow profundities of We Have a Pope pivot on the cuteness of geriatrics, especially when they're spiking a volleyball in slo-mo. full review
12. Another Happy Day 2011 Hoping to distract us from the zero ideas found in his film, Levinson demands that his cast act loudly and unbearably... full review
13. Being Elmo: A Puppeteer's Journey 2011 Constance Marks's documentary on Kevin Clash, the kind, gentle man who created the Muppet beloved by every single child in the world, rushes through the intriguing points its interviewees bring up to devote more time to banalities. full review
14. Dirty Girl 2011 A feeble teenage-outcast movie set in 1987, Dirty Girl exists primarily as a vehicle for first-time writer-director Abe Sylvia's favorite Reagan-era jams. full review
15. The Hedgehog 2011 Mona Achache's first film follows two parallel storylines: one featuring a thoroughly insufferable little girl, the other a pleasingly grumpy middle-aged widow. full review
16. Last Days Here 2011 An affectionate look at a self-destructing maniac and his supporters that bluntly reveals Liebling's total abjection without mocking him. full review
17. The Other Woman 2011 Director Don Roos, who also scripted, wobbles tonally, sometimes disastrously. full review
18. Over Your Cities Grass Will Grow 2011 In equal parts mesmerizing and disorienting, Over Your Cities (the title comes from the biblical story of Lilith) plunges viewers into the earth, wind, and fire of Kiefer's massive-scale projects. full review
19. Pina 2011 Pina gives us the supreme pleasure of watching fascinating bodies of widely varying ages in motion, whether leaping, falling, catching, diving, grieving, or exulting. full review
20. We Were Here 2011 A simple, powerful act of bearing witness, We Were Here is a sober reminder of the not-too-distant past, when gays were focused not on honeymoon plans but on keeping people alive. full review
21. Young Goethe In Love 2011 That this film was originally titled Goethe! should give you a sense of how much silly Sturm und Drang boosterism awaits. full review
22. Blood Done Sign My Name 2010 Too often, the film props up caricatures and constructs in its superficial gloss on history. full review
23. Cherry Tree Lane 2010 full review
24. Client 9: The Rise and Fall of Eliot Spitzer 2010 Gibney's assiduous presentation of a payback plot against Spitzer is matched by his diligent investigation into the workings of the Emperors Club VIP. full review
25. Jean-Michel Basquiat: The Radiant Child 2010 [Davis'] homage -- tender, never hagiographic -- also contains some biting analysis of the racism, both overt and insidious, that the artist was up against. full review
26. Night Catches Us 2010 Writer-director Tanya Hamilton's striking debut is the rare recent American-independent film that goes beyond the private dramas of its protagonists, imagining them as players in broader historical moments. full review
27. Vidal Sassoon: The Movie 2010 Craig Teper's obsequious documentary on the stylist who popularized geometric haircuts in the '60s is in desperate need of shaping and trimming itself. full review
28. The Art Of The Steal 2009 The Art of the Steal presents its aesthetes versus Phila-stines argument cogently, convincingly, and engagingly. full review
29. Down Terrace 2009 Verbal aggression makes for the biggest laughs and the surest signs of moral decay. full review
30. The Good Heart 2009 Kári's smug little arthouse offering ends up covered in Nicholas Sparks goo. full review
31. Kings of Pastry 2009 Though Chris Hegedus and D.A. Pennebaker's food-fetishizing documentary offers a welcome break from the sensibilities and manufactured crises of Bravo and TLC shows, it, too, squanders opportunities to go beyond easily digested human-interest drama. full review
32. Making the Boys 2009 Crayton Robey's documentary on this queer cultural touchstone admirably presents both sides of the divide. full review
33. Serious Moonlight 2009 Serious Moonlight has a backstory much more intriguingly dramatic than what's onscreen. full review
34. Wonderful World 2009 More impoverished than the budget is Wonderful World's script, a shopworn tale of redemption in which the constantly outraged, pot-puffing misanthrope learns that "magic is everywhere." full review
35. American Violet 2008 A docudrama with a good heart but a heavy hand. full review
36. Eldorado 2008 Lanners's film is smart and confident enough to acknowledge that certain lives are dead ends, while others get tired of just spinning their wheels. full review
37. Our City Dreams 2008 Like rushed gallery-hopping, Chiara Clemente's doc on five multigenerational, multinational women artists, all living in New York, provides only a cursory view of what's on display. full review