Green Zone (2009) NYT Critics' Pick

Matt Damon stars in the Paul Greengrass film “Green Zone.”
A Search for That Casualty, Truth
By A. O. SCOTT
Published: March 12, 2010

“We’re here to do a job,” says an American soldier in Baghdad, about a month after the United States-led invasion of Iraq and a third of the way into “Green Zone,” Paul Greengrass’s breakneck tour of street-level mayhem and official deceit. “The reasons don’t matter.” More

Mother (2009) NYT Critics' Pick

Kim Hye-Ja in “Mother,” directed by Bong Joon-ho.
Fierce Love: Better Not Make This Mom Angry
By MANOHLA DARGIS
Published: March 12, 2010

The last monster to run wild through Bong Joon-ho’s imagination was an enormous creature from the watery deep. A different menace storms through “Mother,” the fourth feature from this sensationally talented South Korean filmmaker, though she too seems to spring from unfathomable depths. Unlike the beast in “The Host” — a catastrophic byproduct of the American military — the monster in “Mother” doesn’t come with much of a backstory, which suggests that she is a primal force, in other words, a natural. More

Pho

Skinny duck pho -- Duck, beef & shrimp.