John Bleasdale

As the film drifts through dream sequences and diversions, the dramatic power of the chase fizzles in the damp of the woods.

One feels its subject would have admired the boldness of its conception, if perhaps not its overly slick execution.

It's gorgeous, lush and fun, but there's an underlying silliness to the endeavour which, despite occasional archness, constantly threatens to trivialise events.

Two Days, One Night is well made, and Cotillard and the rest of the cast give assured performances, but its optimism is desperate. By no means the Dardennes' best work, one wonders if they shouldn't perhaps stray outside of their comfort zone.

Berg's Little Girl Blue inevitably concentrates on the tragic parabola of the life without fully getting to the heart of the art.

Though an entertaining-enough stab at a new kind of orgiastic extravaganza, Noé's Love is so mired in its own hang-ups and conservative gender views that it never gets past the first stroke.

As we pass from one story to another the relentless savagery does get a bit grinding. In addition, at two hours in length, Szifron's film is perhaps one skit too long. Regardless, Wild Tales is an inventive, occasionally hysterical ride.

Bradley Cooper’s soulful exploration of the depredations of fame is an effective melodrama boasting genuine star turns from himself and Lady Gaga.

Last Breath makes for a very decent entry into the survival genre of films like Touching the Void with the added appeal of the submarine movie and all the claustrophobia and intensity that comes with that.

The truth is that The Truth is an above-average French comedy and Kore-eda has succeeded in a finely wrought act of ventriloquism and diva worship. But the Japanese director’s fans can be forgiven for thinking above average is not good enough for such an accomplished filmmaker.

With a filmmaker as intelligent and controlled as Nemes, Sunset has the assurance that everything has a place and the confusion is intended. But even this has a paradoxical effect.

Benjamin is a charming metropolitan rom-com which is ultimately too lightweight to escape the gravity of its influences.

It’s a pity that on this occasion Scorsese makes an admirable and fine film, but alas not a great one.

Few American directors capture the contemporary urban nightscape as well as Fincher: a supreme genre filmmaker, which makes this perfectly fine film so disappointing.

The trajectory of success and excess followed by last act redemption is familiar to the point of parody, and the ploys with time come over as gimmicky attempt to inject an element of surprise into the otherwise predictable narrative.

An effective thriller, Sisters is an intense tightly executed slasher, which fans of the directors later work will revel in.

Guiraudie's humour is self-referential and at times hilarious. His tendency to shock might seem adolescent but he's also careful to identify taboos that perhaps shouldn't be taboos at all.

Both actresses are excellent, with Binoche given more to do and she flips between attempting to get into the skin of her character and back to her normal self. Stewart, on the other hand, has an easy naturalism as she moves from devotion to rebellion without ever being able to fully express herself.

Compared to the sophisticated and nuanced horrors of Black Mirror, Little Joe feels like a fairly straightforward riff on a very familiar idea.

There's a wry comic sensibility that sees Hughes himself as an absurdity who seems half aware of his own ridiculousness.

Homecoming gives an empathetic portrait of a family in a phase of change. Girls are becoming women; a mother is beginning to return to life. It has the promise of a prelude.

A dark and slightly hysterical portrait of fundamentalist fever.

It might be that there’s a meatier version of the film – a Carlos-style miniseries perhaps – but as it stands, shifting between a lighthearted caper and more consequential political tragedy, Wasp Network is an entertaining fumble.

For the most part Swiss Army Man is a visually unique gas and only feels bloated when it tries to hitch its wayward originality to some sort of real world application.

A mix of Loachian social realism and Death Wish-style violent fantasy.

Kore-eda has unquestionably added a new, intriguing angle to his meditation on family life in contemporary Japan.

For all the glib élan on display, there is very little being said, above and beyond the slickness of a well-tuned melodrama. The plot always risks revealing its essential silliness and there isn't much wit or humour to alleviate the mood.

An earnest, forensic examination into the slaying of the Israeli Prime Minister.

This is a timely and necessary reminder of Trump's practices, but like Michael Moore's Michael Moore in Trumpland, this seems like another missed opportunity, a wry exasperated sigh, when we desperately need some full on rage.

There is much to like about Elle, first and foremost a witty and bold performance from Huppert and the generally seasoned ensemble.

Mitchell’s third film feels like a script that was locked in a drawer after numerous rejections but now can be brought out and pushed through with clout earned from the success of It Follows.

Seidl is a filmmaker of both talent and merit, but the blatant manipulation of his subjects and the nakedness of his own intentions and dribbling fascination make In the Basement irrelevant as a comment on Austrian society as a whole, and only passingly interesting as an unsurprising picture of what some very odd people do in the privacy of their own homes.

It has to be said that Van Sant is not above doing one for the studio but quite what sins he had committed to be made to make this pile of sub-Nicolas Sparks tripe will be beyond most.

Other than a sinking feeling, there’s not much else The Chamber is going to give you.

The final twist is so manipulative and cynical as to be actually enraging.

American Honey ticks off all of the indie clichés. Fireworks? Check. Standing up in convertible with your arms outstretched? Check. Grubby children? Check. But all of this could be forgiven, or at least put up with, if the film wasn't so long and meandering.

The trademark brutal violence remains effective, and Zahler maintains a pervasive feeling of dread throughout his films, but Dragged Across Concrete shows the limits of taking the game long.

Intermittently entertaining and laudably short, for all its best intentions Cymbeline is cursed by doing again what others have done better.

Some of it is funny. Some of it is moving. More of it is plain dull.

It’s just Huppert on autopilot and like that dry white wine, you can have too much of it.

As fate closes in on the lovers, the silliness of their own behaviour and Marguerite & Julien in general prevents any pathos from entering the scene. The taboo of incest never troubles as one never truly believe that they are brother and sister - or in love - or anything else.

Ultimately, though it hints at moments of wit, Cuck never feels serious enough to be a convincing character study and not garish enough to head into genre territory. Ultimately, this sordid tale feels both real and inconsequential.

A neat little thriller which unfortunately never achieves plausibility.

The material is weak, overly familiar and cliché-ridden. Dolan throws the cinematic sink at it but his latest feels like a shorter, not particularly watchable sequel to August, Osage County.

Both leads produce solid performances despite a sloppiness in both the direction and the writing.

It soon becomes difficult to dismiss the suspicion that Goldthwait had set out to make a comic horror but forgot to insert any laughs.

Hill does his best but Jim is woefully underwritten, a shuffling loser who various other characters try to bolster with the dignity of a back story that doesn’t seem to fit his actual behaviour.

Doremus doesn't appear to take the world he has created at all seriously. The rules shift and bend, are observed - or aren't - according to the exigency of the narrative, which ultimately renders the whole exercise fundamentally unconvincing and fatally irksome.

When Good Kill takes aim at US foreign policy and the advances in military technology, it creates moments of chilling and powerful drama, but this is dissipated and compromised by its mirror-punching domestic drama and its bizarre need to bring about something like a happy ending.

Its aspirations to high-end production values and the inventive use of urban cityscapes filmed from carefully selected futuristic angles are all very well, but it could have done with something a little looser, more punk, more grimy, more stoned.

In its determined avoidance of sensationalism, it finds itself stranded in an empty space so understated, it is genuinely difficult to understand what, if anything, it is saying.

Superficiality soaks the entire film.

It is as glitzy and gaudy as the festival itself, with its vacuous politics drowned out by the thunderous sound of it slapping its own back.

Everything seems designed to disturb or perhaps infuriate the viewer.

There are some dumb thrills to be had but there is also the sense here of an ambition not quite realised.

Sadly, the intriguing set up - along with Del and Bonnie - is left behind for a too nakedly state-of-America musing, with everyone Charley happens across having some social ill to portray.

Although there is certainly tension at moments and Driver once more proves himself an actor of great promise, Hungry Hearts falls between two baby chairs - neither satisfying as a thriller nor convincing as a drama.

The Danish Girl is as handsome yet disappointingly flat as a painting on a chocolate box. It should certainly be applauded for bringing to light an unsung hero of the transgenderism, but in its unremitting tastefulness and sentimentality - even a beating has beautiful setting and a lovely bit of blood - it ultimately left this reviewer as cold as a dip in a Danish bog.

It's all so random and the 3D Kodachrome colours, poised performances and careful framing can't disguise the fact that The Beautiful Days of Aranjuez has very little to say.

Adapted by Cianfrance himself, The Light Between Oceans feels overly tied to its previous form.

Despite its manifold flaws, Jackie & Ryan is still oddly watchable.

There are the occasional moments when Bushwick lets on that it knows that this is all truly awful.

The Wait consistently defies common sense in order to sustain the thin narrative.

Your appreciation or otherwise of the film is going to be greatly influenced by whether or not you’ve seen the original, and as such Final Cut doesn’t really elbow its way to the front. However, if you can stand the slight whiff of decomposition then this deconstruction is fun and clever.

Wilde has already proven herself as a director with her brilliant debut. Even the hackneyed sci-fi concept behind Katie Silberman’s screenplay wouldn’t have been too much of a problem if it wasn’t for the performances.

Penn's film doesn't entertain greatly nor does it have much coherent to say.

Visually arresting and well-acted, Dogs shows promise but one would have hoped for some new tricks.

Ozon's Frantz is, sadly, an underwhelming tale of a European union that didn't quite make it, its chocolate box sheen belying the emptiness at its heart.

That the drama should hinge on a series of bizarre novelistic coincidences and the irrational dopiness of the characters with whom we're supposed to empathise drains the film of realism and sends us into Mills & Boon territory.

Of the many problems the film has, it’s the different plots that never quite bounce off each other.

All of this is intoned with such a humourless sense of self-importance that anyone who genuinely loves their music (such as this reviewer who [full disclosure] would rate Funeral and Neon Bible as two of the best albums of recent years) finds themselves alternately stuffing their fingers in their ears or, when it gets too excruciating, their elbows.

A run-of-the-mill, plodding drama, the 'social realism' of which never feels particularly real.

Even at ninety minutes Popstar feels too long. The funniest moments are the songs.

Despite a first half of great promise, the film is ultimately ground down by the endless suffering even as it bloats with a bizarre lurch into satirical fantasy.

The fraudulent nature of the mystery makes Wonderstruck feel like a technical exercise: albeit one which is enlivened by some great visuals and excellent performances, particularly the wonderful Millicent Simmonds.

Aïnouz has eschewed the post-modern fun of Yorgos Lanthimos’ The Favourite for a much grimmer, darker vibe. This is the kind of film where torches most definitely gutter and men call out directives “on the orders of the king!” But for all the weighty gravitas of Simon Russell Beale as a conniving bishop and Eddie Marsan as a conniving noble bring to bear, the story never takes the history seriously enough either.

Not exciting enough to be taken as straightforward thriller and not engaging enough for a dramatic character piece, Egoyan's The Captive is held back by its own lame script and a distinct lack of necessity.

Amirpour is a talented director with a wonderful eye but her style lacks substance and her obvious influences - the Mad Max franchise and the wonderful LQ Jones film A Boy and his Dog - are so superior as to almost completely nullify her derivative contribution to the genre.

Jarmusch has opted for a stumbling dead so indulgently pleased with itself that it resembles little more than a precocious home movie filled with familiar faced pals all of whom find the joke funnier than any audience will.

Ultimately, Benson's Eleanor Rigby disappears into the gap between its rom-com and drama stools.

It isn't that it's hard going: it simply can't decide what it wants to be. [Cannes Version]

Osborne, who initially got his kicks with Kung Fu Panda, doesn't trust his source material and the film becomes about collecting the pages of the story and the effect the story might have on the people who hear it, rather than the telling of the story itself.

Scenes come and go with a weightlessness that has nothing to do with zero gravity.

Though the farce is occasionally funny, it's as bloated and windy as its comedy policeman Inspector Machin.

Côté employs a methodical reticence that often leaves the viewer guessing as to the significance of the images we are seeing.

The performances are fine across the board and Nørgaard keeps things moving efficiently, but this is stylish but televisual fare, ram-packed with familiar hardboiled and shopworn tropes.

There’s nary a memorable shot in the whole film. As for Ehrenreich’s performance, it’s honestly difficult to tell how good he is. Remarkably for a film called Solo, with so many characters each one nibbling at the scenes, he hardly has room to shine.

Clooney only shows flashes of comic moxy, and everything is drowned in a now tiresome fetishizing of the 1950s aesthetic, with gizmos and supermarkets, office furniture and hairdos glossily remade.

After all is said and done, ‘The House that Lars Built’ is an impressive construction for an obnoxious purpose. In fact, the best criticism comes from Talking Heads and their song Psycho Killer: “You’re talking a lot but you’re not really saying anything.”

Mitchell's understanding of punk seems to be the brandishing of two or three cliches, shouting a lot and name-checking bands.

The tone is mournfully serious and this contrasts with the inherent silliness of vampires. Milo, with his glazed expression and apparent absence of affect utterings, is a compellingly dour presence but doesn't prove quite enough to prop the film up alone.

The characters of Jimmy's Hall aren't really characters as much as archetypes: the saintly mother, the sweetheart, the hero, the villain. This is the kind of film where people don't argue - they debate - speaking in lines from manifestos and creating an incongruity.

The fact of the matter is that Refn has now become so predictably shocking that the truly shocking thing for him to do would be to make a film without attempting to shock.

Although the thriller like approach makes the unveiling of the story intermittently interesting, Human Capital stumbles on its blandly predictable, two dimensional characters and the implausible melodrama of its latter stages.

There's no doubting Hazanavicius' sincerity in trying to bring the Chechen conflict, the war crimes committed against the civilian community and the indifference of the international community to light, but it's this righteousness that gets in the way of The Search working as a film first and foremost.

It is difficult to work out what to dislike most about Victoria and Abdul: the literal foot-licking or the cliché-ridden plot, but the greatest shame is the waste of a genuinely fascinating piece of history and a world-class Judi Dench performance.

An unfunny undead comedy that in harking back to the days of the classic B-movie would be flattered to be classified as an E-movie.

The film isn't just bad - it's awful - ineptly directed (Olivier Dahan), terribly written (Arash Amel) and bafflingly acted by an assortment of miscast faces.