Christopher Machell

With One Fine Morning, celebrated French director Mia Hansen-Løve presents complementary accounts of infatuation, love, and loss in a nuanced, moving study of the ways that love can sustain and consume us.

Austere, emotionally taciturn and with shades of Bergman, Dreyer and Jan Troell’s The New Land about it, Godland is the Icelandic director’s most accomplished work to date.

In politics and the media, opportunistic hate-mongers whip up bigotry against gender non-conformity, while everyone in contemporary cinema is beautiful but no one is horny. In this context, Please Baby Please is a vision inspired by the past, but is undoubtedly a document of the present.

As historical noir, Martelli’s film is thrilling, but as a document of the comforts of complicity and the terror of resistance, 1976 is visceral.

While The Five Devils doesn’t quite have the clarity of vision of her previous picture, its emotion, erotically-charged themes and puzzle-box structure leave much to recommend.

Pearl is notable as a pandemic film, situating itself in the middle of the Spanish flu outbreak, though much like its engagement with sex, violence and entertainment, and its treatment of women, the film sets the table for a discussion but doesn’t quite make a full meal of it.

Six films in, Bettinelli-Olpin and Gillett deserve credit for crafting two set pieces that manage to emphasise their characters’ vulnerability and paralysing fear in surprising and unique ways.

The screenplay balances the big narrative beats that this kind of broad crowd pleaser demands, along with posing more difficult social questions to which there are no easy answers.

The components are all here for a compelling psychological drama, led by two excellent performances, but a conflation between narrative obfuscation with thematic depth undermines Esme, My Love’s final emotional impact.

As a mechanism the film functions very well indeed – but as a film, as “a machine that generates empathy” as Roger Ebert had it, Quantumania falls vastly short. Still, one might argue that we do not board roller coasters expecting art, and so as an entertainment at that level it is hard to deny that this latest entry fulfils its purpose handsomely, providing all the thrills and spills of the fair.

Religious allegories, monochrome photography and folk horror trappings will draw in viewers as much as its meandering contemplations and languorous pacing may test their patience.

Bebjak’s film is far from bad and its three-tiered narrative is often compelling, buoyed by fine performances. But its treatment of women and shallow exploration of its themes sadly bring down its initial promise.

[An] astonishing feature debut.

Polley is not especially subtle in her allegory, and nor does she need to be: the exceptionally well-made Women Talking gets to the point in its sheer, righteous invective.

EO is at once a cinematic curiosity, a compelling drama and a harrowing portrait of cruel whimsy.

As a neo-noir Holy Spider offers a tightly-woven procedural crime thriller, bolstered by a superb central performance from Amir-Ebrahimi and gorgeous, lurid aesthetics. A steadier hand marshalling its themes and a more disciplined third act might have tipped Abbasi’s third feature into being something truly special: as it stands we are left a very solid, smart and satisfying thriller.

Whereas Bait was a lament for a way of life swallowed up by mindless urbanite tourism, Enys Men is a hymn to sublime, endless time and the hauntedness of existence.

Director Carla Simón’s Alcarràs is at once a paean to family, community and a dwindling way of life, and a complex and heartbreaking study of the victims of progress.

Beyond its gender-swapped lead role, Peter von Kant never truly ventures into new territory and so never quite justifies its own existence.

At 150 minutes, What Do We See When We Look at the Sky? could easily have been shorter and still achieved its intended emotional and aesthetic effects. But a river isn’t less pleasant for meandering before it reaches the ocean: if this is how it has to happen before we lose the thread of Lisa and Giorgi’s lives in the flow of others, then so be it.

At almost four hours in length, Mr. Bachmann and His Class is long, but its enormous characters and emotions more than fill the space, headed by an astonishingly charismatic and inspiring teacher in Dieter Bachmann.

As the credits roll on one of the most spectacular and unengaging films of the year, The Way of Water’s vision is as clear as mud. As Cameron has become more fascinated with the technology of storytelling, it seems he’s become less so by the actual storytelling.

As just another entry in the MCU, Wakanda Forever is a very solid film. Entertaining and intelligent, it builds on the themes of its predecessor. Yet, navigating more than defying the Marvel machine, Coogler’s sequel becomes more than the sum of its parts. And so Wakanda Forever’s most important legacy is as a fine and fitting tribute to its erstwhile hero.

As a fable Amerikatsi hits the big emotional notes: it’s an American tale in reverse, told sincerely and personally. Sentimental, yes, simplistic too, but also honest and even affirming.

Panahi’s courageousness as an agitator is matched only by his inventiveness as a filmmaker.

Okuno’s Watcher is smart, engaging and intelligent, and it’s especially refreshing to see this sort of mid-budget, grown-up genre film getting a proper theatrical release.

With surprises, compelling performances and strong visuals across the board, Barbarian warrants recommendation but with serious caveats.

Vesper is throughout a gripping post-apocalypse fable. Despite its mythological derivations, Buozyte and Samper’s world, grounded in blood, mud and viscera, is often uncomfortably close to our own.