Stories about Queen Elizabeth I make extraordinary drama because her reign shattered the patriarchal myth that ruling a kingdom was a man's job.

Up in the Air directed by Jason Reitman (Paramount Pictures, 2009)The most unbelievable thing about Jason Reitman's slick black comedy is that there is anybody left in America who still likes to fly.

In 1929 Al Jolson told audiences of The Jazz Singer that they hadn't heard (or seen) nothin' yet, and he was right. They hadn't seen Judy Garland croon and dance down that dazzling yellow brick road to find The Wizard of Oz. They hadn't shuddered as the earth and sky trembled and quaked when God (or Cecil B. DeMille) gave Charlton Heston The Ten Commandments.

Where the Wild Things Are (Warner Brothers, 2009) Almost 45 years after Maurice Sendak's dark little fairy tale first saw the light of day director Spike Jonze has brought this magical children's story to the screen, and the result is equally unsettling and satisfying.

Directed by Drew Barrymore (Fox Searchlight, 2009) In Drew Barrymore’s new film about tattooed Texas lasses on skates, Ellen Page, who played a glib pregnant teen in Juno (Fox Searchlight), takes a turn around the track as a spunky, frightened, and impulsive roller derby princess.

There is something delightfully ironic about Nora Ephron's new cooking comedy, a quirky upbeat feminist tale in which a postwar Connecticut housewife and her 21st century protégé both achieve fame and fortune by heading back into the very kitchen so many mid-century housewives were attempting to escape.

Directed by Neill Blomkamp (Key Creatives, 2009) Two very different sci-fi films opened and closed Hollywood's Summer blockbuster season this year. The new Star Trek (Paramount Pictures, 2009) got things off with a bang in May, and District 9 (Key Creatives, 2009) is winding things down with a bit of a whimper this August.

Directed by Pete Docter (Pixar, 2009) Ask anybody under 30 and they will tell you that Pixar is the animation studio. But the company that has stunned us with now 10 lush and dazzling computer animated films is also the studio that tells stories from the margins, putting a sympathetic (if not human) face on a menagerie of aliens, freaks, and monsters.

Directed by Stephen Daldry (The Weinstein Co., 2008)

Directed by Christine Jeffs and Megan Holley (Overture Films, 2009)