• It’s that time of year again when this critic must sift through the hundreds of films consumed in the past twelve months and make choices—some easy, some more difficult—about the year’s best batch of films. A Separation – Asghar Farhadi’s marital drama snatched top prize at this year’s Berlin Film Festival, and for good reason. Back in February, I wrote, “One of the film’s best qualities is that it treats heavy subjects in a down-to-earth