Our movie critic's weekend selections

A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night Cool, supremely confident feature debut from Iranian American writer/director Ana Lily Amirpour, set in a Middle Eastern ghost town populated by pimps and prostitutes, junkies, and, yes, a vampire girl. She meets a guy who looks like James Dean, and they pair off, as sordid denizens lurk in the shadows and the spirits of Jarmusch, Lynch, and Leone hang in the night air. No MPAA rating

Birdman Back in theaters after four Academy Award wins, including best picture, Alejandro G. Iñárritu's breakneck backstage drama stars Michael Keaton as a faded Hollywood star trying to reclaim his career by mounting a Broadway drama. With Edward Norton, Emma Stone, and Naomi Watts. An exhilarating, out-of-the-blue masterwork. R

Red Army Madly entertaining documentary about the dynastic days of the Soviet ice hockey team nicknamed the Red Army, and the charismatic player at its center, Vyacheslav Fetisov. But this is much more than a sports movie: It's about Cold War politics, about national pride, about how we identify with sports and sports identifies us. PG-13