Throughout 2012 I found myself drawn more toward world cinema--particularly European films--and less to American ones. Reasons are numerous, among which the number of rote big-budget efforts, repeated from one movie to the next, totally predictable, with nothing to surprise viewers, let alone engage them. Full disclosure: I don’t live on the planet where audiences flock to the "Harry Potter" and "Twilight" franchises, nor Pixar-created

Fanciers of period pieces, stay away. The Marie-Antoinette of Benoît Jacquot’s film is no dimpled and fashionable clueless Austrian princess busy trying on new wigs. Instead, she (Diane Kruger) is red-eyed with distress and worry, not so much out of awareness of gathering storms but because her bosom friend, the haughty Duchess of Polignac (Virginie Ledoyen) is not present enough. The time is 1789, the date, July 15. History