Few films are either as magical or as enchanting as Guillermo del Toro’s Pan’s Labyrinth. At the same time, few fairy tales are as perverse, terrifying or as deeply disturbing.

Children of Men is a stunning powerhouse, and it is almost impossible to grasp all it is attempting to say in just a single viewing.

Almodóvar has crafted an instant classic. Volver is miraculous, a joyous enterprise running the emotional gauntlet like no other melodrama I’ve seen in ages.

In a year of so many retreads and also-rans, where much of what’s hit the multiplex looks exactly like what was there just a month ago, The Prestige offers entertainment and wonderment unlike anything else currently in theatres, and that might be Nolan’s greatest magic trick of them all.

I can’t stop shaking.

V for Vendetta is a bold, unflinching portrait of a world viewers might not want to look at too closely. It is a place where the sights and sounds are so harsh and hard they make some cringe and weep for all they’ve suffered and lost.

Good Night, and Good Luck. is the must-see event picture of the Fall. It is breathlessly exciting, reexamining with acute detail a moment in our nation’s history that should not, cannot, be forgotten.

Serenity is one of 2005’s most irresistible pleasures filled with strong performances, breathtaking action sequences, remarkably affecting emotional nuances and a collection of surprising twists and turns, Whedon crafting one of the most blissfully entertaining movies I’ve seen this year.

I can’t say it is perfect, and not all of the questions it raises are answered, but the same can unquestionably be said about the man it chronicles, Grizzly Man the type of human adventure that makes going into the cinematic wilderness fascinatingly worthwhile.