Man of Steel [2013]

Director Zack Snyder, with the help of producer and “Batman” auteur Christopher Nolan, makes a mess of Metropolis, Smallville and the whole “Superman” franchise, duping six Academy Award nominees / winners to stand in front of green screens.

d: Zack Snyder | imdb.com | trailer | Career Arc: Superman

Contagion (2011)

Steven Soderbergh directs an international thriller about a pandemic that kills millions of people in a few months, capturing all the ensuing paranoia, as if Hitchcock came back to make one of those zombie apocalypse movies. But Jude Law is just awful.

d: Steven Soderbergh | imdb.com | trailer | Charlie Rose
Don’t touch anything. | I think I’m sick. | It came from here.

Searching for Bobby Fischer (1993)

Max Pomeranc plays Josh Waitzkin, a boy who loves chess but not at the expense of his own decency. The film is about competition — a subject handled with insight and care — kids dealing with adult emotions and adults behaving like kids.

d: Steven Zaillian | imdb.com | Wanna play? | Josh Waitzkin

King of New York (1990)

Christopher Walken is scary good as a drug kingpin on a mission to put competing dealers and gangs out of business, with the help of henchmen Laurence Fishburne and Giancarlo Esposito. David Caruso and Wesley Snipes lead the vigilante cops after them.

d: Abel Ferrara | imdb.com | trailer