A beautifully stark, challenging drama about an aging mercenary, Anton Corbijn's The American, starring George Clooney and Violante Placido (above), is a work of pure cinema — a transfixing rumination on lone-wolf masculine loneliness, and a reminder that the inner lives of screen characters can be as gripping as any wildly manifested action. For the full original review, from Screen International, click here. (Focus, R, 105 minutes)