The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the witch and the wardrobe (US, 2005)

How can such a big budget movie have such ropey special effects (they’re not all bad but some of them are back-projection city)? Anyway, it gets the effects it deserves. (OAR) http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0363771/

Pan’s Labyrinth (Mexico-Spain, 2006)

A brilliant fantasy combining the brutal realism of the Spanish Civil War with a young girl’s escapist (after a fashion) fantasies. There’s a brilliant line describing fascism (accepting orders unthinkingly) and Sergio Lopez plays evil brilliantly. Visually stunning (all on E15m apparently) and emotionally gripping. One of the movies of the year. (Pictureville) http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0457430/

Night Watch (Russia, 2004)

I think this is the first contemporary mass audience Russian film I’ve seen and it yields nothing to Hollywood and, because of its national difference, is more interesting than much Hollywood genre fare. The battle between good and evil is given an interesting twist as it seems the evil ones are the equivalent of the [...]