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Provocatively, one of the most eloquent feminist film-makers extant is an Iranian muslim, Samira Makhmalbaf. Her latest entrancing— and most expansive—movie is set in the rubble of Kabul, where a young woman dreams of becoming Afghanistan's first female president. Men—Taliban mullahs and foreign invaders—have ruined this country, is her subtext, but Makhmalbaf is too artful to be merely polemical.

In remotest Russia, a father suddenly returns to the wife and sons he left 12 years earlier, and takes the two boys into the barren countryside on a fishing trip. Whether you read it as psychological thriller or allegory on human existence, Andrei Zvyagintsev's devastating directorial debut has established itself as a modern classic. This elegant film is charged with mystery, and dread that descends like fog.

John Frankenheimer's ruthlessly constructed, hugely entertaining actioner is essentially three stand-out car chases (Paris by night, Nice, and Paris by day) surrounded by a heist movie, a silver McGuffin suitcase, a sassy Provo pin-up (Natascha McElhone), an ex-CIA hitman (De Niro), the Russian Mafia, Sinn Fein and the Northern Ireland Peace Process. Naturally.

Kerry has a long face. At the time of writing Bush leads in the polls by 10 per cent. Despite everything. If only the volatile, human Howard Dean hadn't scared the Democrats into playing safe. Moore's documentary mostly doesn't, but if it can't swing the election, history might deem it a failure, a rebel yell forgotten at daybreak. We live in interesting times, which sucks. Considering all the Vietnam literature/cinema, Moore isn't doing anything new. He's doing necessary protest for the 21st century. He manipulates our emotions brilliantly, and is certainly a force for good.

Although panned on its 1967 release, Roman Polanski's third English-language movie, a horror comedy, is a delightful oddity. There's a dream-like, gothic quality to it as Prof Abronsius (Jack MacGowran) and assistant Alfred (Polanski) root out a nest of the undead in wintry Transylvania. The climactic Vampire's Ball is strikingly mounted, and it's easy to see how Polanski fell for leading lady Sharon Tate.

It's scripted by David Mamet, but what raises Danny DeVito's 1992 biopic is Jack Nicholson's role as the irascible union boss/Mob associate who 'went missing' in the '70s. Charting five decades, from bullying rise in the trucking game in the 30s, through troubles with the Kennedys, to Hoffa's presumed assassination, it's an ambitious undertaking, often muddled. Nicholson, though, hidden behind false nose, bulldozes through like Cagney. Neglected, but one of the performances of his career.

After the footsore Godzilla, Roland Emmerich gets his eye-catching world-trashing set-pieces on track again as stormy weather lays waste to planet Earth. Dennis Quaid and Jake Gyllenhaal are father and son wishing they'd worn bigger galoshes, and the 'message'is right-on (if inaccurate), but it's all about the gosh-wow effects.

Ridiculously entertaining car chase and all, William Friedkin's brutal, dumb 1985 crime flick resembles his French Connection resprayed for the West Coast. The movie benefits from LA shimmer and deployment of under-used actors: Willem Dafoe plays a ruthless, faintly perverse counterfeiter and William Petersen is the lawman in tight jeans crossing the line in pursuit of him. Listen for the Wang Chung soundtrack! Maybe not.

Described recently as "the ultimate good-bad rock movie", this 1994 movie (along with the 10m-selling album) brought the liquid-hipped one to middle America, mutating his funk into warped guitar rock. The story? Bad boy with warring mixed-race parents, Prince takes it out on girlfriend Apollonia, till she whips her top off. Then everyone's happy, so they jam.

TARANTINO RECENTLY suggested Scorsese's best days are behind him. Kundun, Bringing Out The Dead, Gangs Of New York—it's not just that these movies struggled to connect with audiences, Scorsese himself seemed unable to get a firm grasp on them. Is this still 'the greatest living American film-maker'? At least this long-overdue three-film box set reminds us how he earned that title. Check out his 1969 debut, Who's That Knocking At My Door?