Rob Nelson

Not every homo sapiens who sees Project Nim will be moved to pledge membership in PETA. Still, this documentary biopic of the '70s chimp picked to endure an "experiment" in simian sign language and general neglect pulls human heartstrings as wrenchingly as any creature feature in the 45 years since...

Graphic artist Mike Mills starts something new with Beginners. Playing an emotionally asphyxiated illustrator whose cancer-stricken dad comes out of the closet at age 75, Ewan McGregor looks positively yummy in Beginners, a gay-is-okay dramedy from the distributor that brought us The Kids Are All Right. In fact, this semi-autobiographical...

Agreeing at the insistence of a Corsican mob boss to suck and then slash a fellow inmate, newly jailed Malik El Djebena (Tahar Rahim) — poor, illiterate, a "dirty Arab" in the prison's racist pecking order — gets what's coming to him, but in a good way. Indeed, crime pays...

Pedro Almodóvar still believes in Pedro Almodóvar. "Everything's already happened to me," admits Harry Caine, the blind, middle-aged filmmaker in Broken Embraces. "All that's left is to enjoy life." ¡Sí! His own sights set low these days in his latest movie, reformed bad boy Pedro Almodóvar has at least hit...

For an issue-oriented doc with activist aims, the line between hope and despair — between placating an outraged audience and calling it to action — is a fine one, indeed. Any indie auteur feels tempted to salute grassroots heroism, his own not least, although the promise of “making a difference”...