Incrementally perfecting his stylistic and narrative approach, in Japon and Battle in Heaven, Carlos Reygadas examined our will to live, defined how compassion and sympathy can sustain itself in dire trying moments, and he painfully, unflinchingly reminded us that there is nothing romantic about cruelty found in nature (violence brought about by humans). In his third feature, he examined such themes under the weight of the world or the gods above -- in my books the cinematic miracle known as Silent Light defies classification as it reaches far beyond the film patronage experience. Working with DP Alexis Zabé, with Post Tenebras Lux (literal translation, Light After Darkness), we should expect strong imagery, a deeply personal journey and a composition that the filmmaker described as “an expressionist painting where you try to express what you're feeling through the painting rather than depict what something looks like."

We haven't been this excited about senior citizen couplehood since Bergman's Saraband. Not that we have any problems with the more extreme samples in his filmography, but we welcome this change of pace for Haneke. Kudos to the Austrian filmmaker for tackling a rarely addressed subject matter head-on and for employing octogenarian screen legends Emmanuelle Riva (Hiroshima Mon Amour) and Jean-Louis Trintignant (The Conformist). The film also happens to be a third pairing with Isabelle Huppert (Time of the Wolf/The Piano Teacher).

Firstly, Hoffman saddles back in PTA land and will be given more screen time than Hard Eight, Boogie Nights, Magnolia, and Punch Drunk Love put together. Secondly, the tech crew is comprised of Mihai Malaimare Jr. who is using 65mm, Radiohead's Jonny Greenwood is laying the track, Production Designer David Crank (Tree of Life) and Jack Fisk are fitting this with a 50's look. I'd have a hard time finding a more proficient working director than PTA (David Lynch needs to come out of retirement) - I'd measure his impeccable track record next to anyone out there. There will be plenty of award season kudos for this one and once a premiere date is announced, the buzz should be of biblical proportions.

With a cast and tech crew (Emmanuel Lubezki, Jack Fisk) worth boasting about, I'm betting this will be the least ambiguous film in Malick's slender, four-decade spanning filmography.

With Assayas currently on a roll with Carlos and Summer Hours, we imagine this coming-of-age project as in the vein of The Dreamers with perhaps some biographical elements embedded in the protagonist (first time actor Clement Metaye plus the co-lead is Lola Créton who is the latest icon in French auteur cinema as she was recently seen in Catherine Breillat's Bluebird and in Assayas' significant other Mia Hansen-Løve's Goodbye First Love.

To give you an idea of how long we've been waiting, we've had this on our Most Anticipated lists for 2010 and 2011. The trailer was enough to maintain its position among the Most Anticipated elite and we're confident this won't go the 2046 (five years in editing) route.

Currently in the "Woody Allen phase" of his career (unlike Woody, he left his homeland for more than pure economics) Abbas Kiarostami delivered in his third decade of work, an invigorating, intellectually stimulating piece of cinema with another career high with in Certified Copy. What I'm most curious about is how the kindness, civility and humanity in a post Tsunami Japan might be further illuminated/embedded in this work.

Now that devoted year of Martha Marcy May Marlene is complete, 2012 will see Borderline focus on what we expect will be an equally and exquisitely jarring sophomore follow up to Campos distinguished debut, Afterschool. The versatile Brady Corbet takes on the ballsy lead part, the excellent Daniel Bensi & Saunder Jurriaans offer the score -- described as a neonoir thriller, this soul searching in a part of Paris that is probably not mentioned in your Let's Go Guidebook will be among the most talked about films showing up in Park City.

Thank god we don't have to wait twelve years between films. Derek Cianfrance's second film was my top pick of 2010. After his critically lauded sophomore film tomahawk chopped critics from Sundance to Cannes to TIFF, Blue Valentine producers wasted no time in backing his next project: a drama about family and motorcycles? It features Ryan Gosling (his career best was with Cianfrance) and its got tech folks such as Cinematographer Sean Bobbitt (Shame) and Production Designer specialist Inbal Weinberg.

The naughts were good to us with Jacques Audiard - he handed us back to back to back cinematic gems in Sur mes lèvres (2001), The Beat That My Heart Skipped (2005) and Special Jury Prize winning A Prophet (2009). Audiard is arguably among the best French filmmakers in the biz, so how will he fare when he dabbles a bit more in CGI and with a spiked production budget north of 20 million? And will Oscar-winning lead actress in Cotillard knock it out of the park like Emmanuelle Devos did in Sur mes lèvres? We don't expect him to compromise on his trademark marriage of style and suspense.

Expecting this docu essay to be reminiscent of such canvases as Koyaanisqatsi, Microcosmos, Powaqqatsi and Baraka, we expect this to not only reveal some of the larger in scope ideas Malick has been toying with for Tree of Life, and we'll be pleasantly surprised if Voyage comes across as more than just a companion piece. Employing several formats (including IMAX) this features the work from renowned natural history photographer Peter Parks and "Planet Earth" cinematographer Paul Atkins. Plus we've taken a liking to Pitt's narration voice in PBS' e² series.

Unlike the folks at the Academy, Mungiu's 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days hit us like a ton of bricks and 2009's barely noticed Tales from the Golden Age was a welcome side project (five Romania filmmakers contributed). Mungiu's third feature film (his debut was 2002's Occident) should be up our alley.

For film snobs such as myself, you'd need a really valid reason to want to see a film with Reese Witherspoon and Matthew McConaughey toplining. Arkansas born Jeff Nichols is that reason. From the day in 2007 where I decided to pull out Shotgun Stories from my pile of screeners to the blissful satisfaction I received approximately one year ago when taking in Take Shelter on premiere night in Park City, in just two feature films, this gifted auteur has proven his worth as one of the most talented filmmaking voices in American Independent cinema. Worth noting: Michael Shannon is in this film too.

Coens' working on a musical biopic? We're in. In the mean time, we'll be checking out van Ronk's career (listen here) and watching companion film, I'm Not There.

Yet another QT signed revenge coming to us with the usual bells and whistles: scenes with instant re-watch value, classic characters (Waltz has the funnest character of them all), well-written spoken dialogue, an homage riddled score and a casting job that will pay out in spades. Should be a blast - but will this top Basterds or the Kill Bills?

Coming off her career best in Meek's Cutoff (which was one of our top films of the year regardless if you think of the title as a 2011 or 2010 release -- as we saw this in Toronto the year before), we hope that Reichardt has a long-lasting wind in her sails. Her she tacks the rarely explored subject matter of eco-terrorism and would be joined by actors (Dano for a second time in a row) in touch with their indie roots. Watch the doc If a Tree Falls: A Story of the Earth Liberation Front to get prepped for this work.

Once again working with Cinematographer Oleg Mutu (4 months, 3 weeks, 2 days), I'm expecting this depiction of WWII to employ the same sort of gritty realism found in his 2010 Cannes preemed My Joy, his feature film debut about a grizzly road trip gone terribly wrong was totally up my alley, but was dissed by fellow Cannes critics. The helmer describes his film as the tale “about a man trying to make a moral choice under the immoral circumstances” and with a harsh, wilderness backdrop we expect humanity to be put to test once again. We can't wait for this.

Based on the highly touted 2010 Blacklist script by Wentworth Miller, this has undergone a wave or two or changes since appearing on that list, despite the loss of Colin Firth, certain casting changes such as Wasikowska in place of Carey Mulligan might prove in the long-term to be for the better. We have high hopes that Chan-wook's first English language project carries some of his signature stylistic choices found in Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance, Oldboy and of course, Lady Vengeance, but expectation levels are in check.

Cult novel, an epic 30 plus years for Coppola to bring this to the big screen, a talented filmmaker whose best films are those about personal search/quests (Central Station and The Motorcycle Diaries), A grade ensemble and one of the better cinematographers in Eric Gauthier should make for a brilliant film.

We're huge fans of revisionist Westerns and Gangster Films in general, and such a blend in the hands of John Hillcoat and his creative partnership with musical genius Nick Cave (they last gave us gold in 2005's The Proposition) should make Wettest County one of the year's earliest must see pics of the year.

Fearful that Andrew Dominik's filmography would be a snail paced one, a big thanks goes to Brad Pitt who essentially put the Aussie filmmaker right back on the map after a less than 4 million dollar domestic gross for his poetic 2007 sophomore pic, The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford. We've been fans of the helmer since his debut film, Chopper and hope that this criminal underworld, James Gray-like nocturnal set street pic is steel cold and gritty. Animal Kingdom's Ben Mendelsohn casting choice is spot on. One of the many Weinstein Co. anticipated 2012 releases.

We discovered the absurdest humor of Roy Andersson late in his career with Songs from the Second Floor -- which oddly counted as only his second feature film in a four decade run which was interfered by his career of avant-garde commercial work. We loved parts of 2007's You, the Living and apparently this shot on the RED camera is the final part of a trilogy that Andersson mentions will be "enormous, deep and fantastic, humorous and tragic, philosophical, Dostoyevsky film."

The TIFF preemed The Patron Saints was my introduction to the extremely gifted husband and wife directing team of Brian M. Cassidy and Melanie Shatzky. Some called their vigorous docu-essay depressing, I couldn't have been more animated by this unclassifiable document and I can just imagine how much of an atypical role was designed & developed for their film lead, Melissa Leo. Expectations levels are high enough to think we'll find something more fierce than her performance in Frozen River.

Haven't been this excited for a farm-related drama since the Blu-Ray release of Days of Heaven. It'll be interesting to see how Bahrani and his wingman DP Michael Simmonds tackle a project which is bigger in production value than his previous three indie gems. With Man Push Cart and Goodbye Solo, Bahrani focused on the immigrant experience, and now with purebreds Dennis Quaid and Efron this looks like apple pie Americana. We're hoping something close in terms of family dynamics to Jeff Nichols' Take Shelter - worth noting is the participation of Goodbye Solo's Red West.

Thanks to one Republican party member for giving this project tremendous buzz when it was in the development stage - rumors that an the Academy award winning director had classified Bin Laden information in her possession is beyond ridiculous, but aligning herself with scribe Mark Boal assures an authenticity, fleshed out combat zone situations and characters (soldiers quirks have always been a point of fascination for me. We saw how great journalism and popcorn could be a winning formula on the smaller scaled The Hurt Locker, but working from a backdrop and a form she is accustomed to, this might be slightly less badass than her Oscar wining pic but a great pulled from the headlines account.