To the Wonder is about a way of seeing—both seeing the world around us, and seeing ourselves properly, something he embodies not just on screen but in his working process. It's no coincidence that it begins with the point of view of Marina and Neil's own cell phone camera (as they travel by train "to the Wonder"). It's the focusing of our attention via lenses on life: perceiving the beauty in the pretty and the ugly, the thrilling and the mundane, and seeing how it all points heavenward. Christ in all; "All things shining" (The Thin Red Line).

It seems our collective cultural memory is ever more truncated. Who of us can remember the Best Picture winners from recent years? Or if you watch the Oscars more for the fashions, who can remember what anyone wore? Memory can be as untrustworthy as it is beloved, as fragile and dangerous as it is indispensable. Perhaps because our frantically paced, fragmented contemporary world reinforces the tenuousness of recollection more than ever, many of this year’s films seemed to wrestle with that very theme.

My best films list will be finished early next week (still a few films to see!) but I’ll go ahead and list my picks for the five best documentaries of the year. Many of these are available on Netflix Instant, and I heartily recommend them to you.

A tender, nuanced portrait of modern city life in Tehran, A Separation is not a political or statement film. It's a film about people and their struggles, specifically two families whose fates become perilously intertwined.

The latest film from Danish provocateur Lars von Trier (Breaking the Waves, Dogville), Melancholia opens with a stunning overture, to the music of Wagner’s Tristan und Isolde, depicting the cataclysmic collision of Earth and a fictitious planet named Melancholia. This sequence, which includes gorgeous slow-mo shots and painterly tableauxs, “gives away” the ending from the outset: the Earth will die, and everything in it. Our foreknowledge of this impending apocalypse colors our perceptions of the family drama that follows—which concerns sisters Justine (Kirsten Dunst), Claire (Charlotte Gainsbourg) and their extended dysfunctional family. The juxtaposition of the ridiculous, petty shenanigans of the family and the reality that everything is about to end serves as the film’s central conceit, and it works brilliantly.

Never Let Me Go is a film that sticks with you, packing a punch perhaps more in remembrance than in the actual experience of watching it. It's a startling, unexpected film, mostly in the matter-of-fact manner of its genre-bending exposition. It's a love story set against a sci-fi backdrop, with the elegance of an Austen novel and the quietly somber mood of an Ozu film. It's a jarring experience, and a profoundly moving one.

So much of Exit Through the Gift Shop is shrouded in mystery. The documentary film’s (purported) creator, Banksy, is an elusive British graffiti artist whose identity is unknown, even though he’s the darling of the international art world who routinely sells screen prints for six figure prices. In his first foray into film, Banksy presents us with a characteristically enigmatic but well-executed piece of pop art, billed as “the world’s first Street Art disaster movie."

I love Martin Scorsese. And I loved his latest film, Shutter Island. My full review of the film, in which I focus on its noir treatment of post-war American anxiety and quote Emily Dickinson, can be found on Christianity Today.

The Box is actually quite entertaining and surprisingly thought provoking. It has a great spiritual/philsophical/sci-fi craziness vibe to it (similar to Knowing, which I suggest you rent soon if you haven't seen it). If you liked Richard Kelly's earlier films (Donnie Darko and Southland Tales) you will like this one too. Plus Win Butler of The Arcade Fire composed the score! And it's great.

I love Jim Jarmusch. So I was delighted to be able to see his latest film, The Limits of Control, and write a review for Christianity Today. The film is a strange one, to be sure. It's like Lost in Translation meets Inland Empire, with a dose of 60s-inspired critical theory thrown in. It's made by and for hipsters, so expect a lot of ambiguity, ambient Japanese rock music, and Bill Murray (actually, just a little Bill Murray).