Children's author and illustrator Beatrix Potter may've had a penchant for fluffy bunnies and bonnet-donning ducks, but Renée Zellweger plays her like a bull in a silk bustle in Miss Potter. It's perfect casting for this charming and inspiring story of a woman who strains against her corseted existence in the 1900s, to fulfil a childhood dream.

In the endless stream of films made from literary properties, how many actually deliver the experience of reading a great novel? Providing richness of detail and metaphor, elegantly blueprinted themes and impressive mastery of a constantly shifting tone, "Little Children" does just that. It is a deeply satisfying film that should be an easy sell to serious moviegoers.

Surprisingly ignored by the Sundance jury (though ranked first in an Indiewire poll of journalists at the festival), the Brooklyn-set Half Nelson pays fond tribute to, even as it slyly subverts, the inspirational classroom fable.

"Children of Men" is the best movie of the year, and I'll stand on "Babel's" table at the Golden Globes in a pair of gift-bag Jimmy Choos and say that.

Marcelo Gomes makes an impressive if sober feature helming debut in "Cinema, Aspirin and Vultures," set in Brazil's desert-like sertao in 1942 as the country prepares to enter war against the Axis. The friendship that springs up between two young men, one German and the other Brazilian, is etched with a quiet delicacy that deepens to touch their souls.

Johann Hohenfels (Peter Ketnath) ekes out a living in rural Brazil selling aspirin through a film show that wins over the locals at any of the remote villages where he chooses to stop. On his travels he picks up Ranulpho (João Miguel) and offers him a job as his assistant.

"The Lives Of Others" starts out dark and challenging then comes to a startlingly satisfying and warmly human conclusion that lingers long after the curtain has come down. Written and directed by first-timer Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck, the film supplies a precise snapshot of the omnipresent and omni-feared secret service of communist East Germany, the Stasi.

Partition is an epic romantic story of two people caught in the events that divided India and Pakistan in 1949 – the partition. Determined to leave the ravages of war behind, Gian Singh (Jimi Mistry), resigns from the British Indian Army to live a quiet life in his Sikh village in Northern India.

A vivid and mind-bending look at the glory days of the American punk rock scene (you remember those times, when Henry Rollins had a neck and the Bad Brains were what it meant to be "black metal"). This is the 80s like you have never seen them, brilliantly brought back to life in this fascinating new film featuring interviews with the likes of Black Flag, SS Decontrol, and the Dead Kennedys.

Yor, an extremely blond prehistoric warrior, comes to question his origins, particularly with regard to a mysterious medallion he wears. When he learns of a desert goddess who supposedly wears the same medallion, Yor decides that he must find her and learn his true identity. Along the way, he encounters ape-men, dinosaurs, and a strange futuristic society.