Amber Wilkinson

Marczak’s film becomes not just a document of a hunt but a psychological portrait of loss and a family’s attempts to come to terms with that.

Sierra’s film not only stands as a love letter to peaceful protest but also to intelligent law enforcement that took the opportunity to de-escalate and resolve the situation without violence. Whether audiences agree that it has ’changed the narrative’ or not, it is a powerful testimony to a community’s ability to take control of their part of the story and give it a happy ending.

[Teng] certainly succeeds in creating an impassioned triple profile of the men who are, if anything, increasingly determined to make a difference for the civilians and medics of Gaza, while viscerally bringing home the extent of the brutal tragedy on the ground.

Throughout the film, three things stand out: the love between Rushdie and Griffiths; the resilience they had in the face of his catastrophic injuries; and the author’s humanistic attitude and sly sense of humour, which have categorically survived intact.

[An] absorbing and eye-opening, if somewhat dense, documentary.

The script holds plenty of satire and laugh out loud moments, but Wilson and Huston keep it supple enough to bend protectively around the central love story, while allowing the morality tale element to still have bite.

Letting yourself be loved is not exactly an original message, but here it’s the comedy that counts and Schlesinger is generous with her script, giving even minor characters their fair share of jokes.

Throughout, Portman, Ortega and Zeta-Jones bounce the script around like a ping-pong ball, with all three displaying meticulous timing.

The flimsy narrative just about holds together but the jokes, while plentiful, often feel like rehashes of something the Zucker Brothers did better decades ago.

Characters longing for connection but simultaneously fearing it provides a strong framework on which Rachel Lambert builds an unpredictable relationship drama that feels both profound and fragile.

Emma Thompson again proves what a versatile star she is in The Dead Of Winter, not only convincing as a have-a-go heroine unexpectedly trying to save a damsel in distress, but also single-handedly rescuing this film from the worst of its formulaic elements. Indeed, lying beneath the icy surface of director Brian Kirk’s thriller is a lake of gooey warm sentiment that’s deep enough to drown in.

Hadi has an eye for detail, echoes and lyrical touches.

Klein has a strong grasp on all of the material, and editors Jake Keen and Alexander J Goldstein cut it together it carefully so that the past and the present often meet.

While not seeking to paint all Russians as ‘victims’ and explicitly acknowledging the situation is far worse for Ukranians, Talankin’s footage comes as a reminder of children as the innocent victims of war.

The British director marries Welsh mythology to more modern ideas about processing trauma, using sound to create a strange and unsettling psychological mood piece rather than an out-and-out horror. The result is engagingly enigmatic if slight in terms of plot and light on chills.

Offering an eye-opening insider perspective that comes as a reminder of what conviction politics looks like when it is maintained even under extreme pressure, as well as being a celebration of feminism, Prime Minister holds appeal for audiences well beyond New Zealand’s shores.

While director Justin Lin’s thriller-inflected approach is periodically absorbing, the scattered structure and episodic nature of the plot works against him as it slides towards an overly sentimental conclusion.

A distant lightning storm indicates nature is a force to be reckoned with but in Walker-Silverman’s films the energy of empathetic human nature is shown to be just as powerful.

A smart if broad comedy that is exposition-heavy in places, it boasts a strong ensemble cast who give it a shot in the arm.

While audiences will probably expect to laugh, they may be surprised to find themselves shedding a tear or two as well.

Chernov brings home the sense of violent stalemate so that, even when Andriivka seems within reach, peace still feels a long way off.

It’s not just the structure of the film that is clever, Sweeney varies his joke delivery, so that there is a mix of one-liners and more slow-burn humour alongside a raft of sight gags.

The film’s general comic tone makes its darker moments stand out.

All the micro-motivations and manipulations of life are present, from the desire to be loved and look after others to the urge to tear down a carefully constructed emotional wall.

Non-professional Sangare is magnetic throughout, whether on the saddle or an interview hot seat.

While Will and Harper’s friendship gives the film its strongly beating heart, the casual reactions of strangers often also prove to be moving.

Instead of treating the star’s life chronologically, they move between a consideration of his career and his spinal injury advocacy work in the wake of the devastating 1995 horse-riding accident that left him paralysed from the neck down. The result has the engaging feel of a dialogue between the pre- and post-accident Reeve and his family as his views and his life shifted as a consequence.

Tears may well be shed but it is the actors who are delivering the goods rather than the script.

McBaine and Moss offer a celebration of the young women attendees alongside a consideration of the everyday sexism many encounter.

Hvistendahl gives her ensemble time and space to deliver the conflicted emotions they are feeling, a mixture of shock and longing playing out on their faces and in their movements.

The ending is simultaneously satisfying and slyly subversive, allowing an unravelling of ideas that should lead audiences to think about what they have watched.

[Boden and Fleck] marry splashes of dry humour to gallons of blood, and feature every musical genre from punk to hip-hop while connecting the stories to a strange green glow in the sky. If the end result never quite achieves the style and bite of the likes of Tarantino’s Pulp Fiction, it is still a lot of fun.

Frida is not just a broad brush affair; the artist is noticeably present.

While the first half of Rotting In The Sun may be overly self-indulgent, once Silva gets himself out of his system, he gives his skills and Saavedra an opportunity to shine.

Allen-Miller achieves the Holy Grail of all great rom-coms in making us desperate to see the pair get together for good, while simultaneously not wanting this first flush of romance to end.

As with a lot of first-time feature filmmakers, Smith shows a tendency to want to throw everything a her film stylistically – including, at one point, the random use of bright yellow subtitles – which makes certain sections feel unnecessarily skittish.

While Holofcener doesn’t ultimately dispute that it’s nice to be nice, she does suggest that it’s worth remembering constant positivity has its own negatives.

Oldroyd attacks with a pace that makes his plot twists more shocking and shows an economy that harks back to the golden age of noir.

Through it all, Connelly and Englert completely sell their conflicted yearning for one another’s love but because this section is a late arrival, the revelations have to come thick and fast..

The Pod Generation blends its tech parody with more quirky observations of the anxieties of impending parenthood and, if Barthes doesn’t always sink the satire’s talons in quite as far as she might, the film’s sweet-natured hopefulness and charming central couple should see it win over distributors and audiences.

This heartfelt if, at times, slightly uneven drama marks the debut fiction feature from documentarian Roger Ross Williams and is a warm and celebratory film.

The winning performances and Haapasalo’s careful attention to them help to compensate for the sometimes frustratingly fragmented nature of the storytelling.

If Sick of Myself runs out of narrative road towards the end, there’s still a decent quotient of dark humour along the way.

Comedy is a serious business and it is Earl and Hayward’s deadpan delivery, coupled with Archer’s maintenance of a documentary shooting style in the face of the ridiculous, that ensures the situation generates physical and verbal laughs.

The subject is an important one but would benefit from a shorter running time.

We are encouraged to find these people stupidly brutal or comedic without being given the slightest idea as to why they might be that way.

Although the access is intimate, what emerges is not particularly surprising.

It feels as though it would have been better served as a six-part sitcom, where its sentimentality, broad comedy and fantasy elements wouldn't rub up against each other so badly.

Their improvisation has been honed to the point where the jokes land solidly without losing naturalism.

Johnson and co-writer Mark Heyman may be exploring familiar territory but they do so with a warmth, subtlety and honesty that marks it out.

The film hinges on the bond between dad and daughter and on the expressive face of Fanning, as we see her shift from a sort of nervous adoration of the unpredictable, if loving, Joe, to something more steely and independent.

This is an impressively clear-eyed and deeply moving portrait.

The plot strong-arms the characters into increasingly contrived and overly familiar positions that leave you longing for the more relaxed vibe of Shelton's earlier films.

Forbes has a delicate but unsentimental approach, which gives her film the same infectious energy that blesses and curses Cameron. The end result feels good without feeling superficial.