Jonathan Romney

Taut, no-frills execution – notwithstanding some gorgeous but altogether untouristic landscape photography by Jeanne Lapoirie – helps to foreground the performances poignantly and compellingly.

Haynes makes intriguing work of subtly metafictional psychodrama in May December.

The Zone of Interest is a challenging rather than conventionally provocative film but, by any measure, essential viewing and a work that will be a vital focus of discussion both in the cinephile world and beyond.

Some cinema hits you in the gut – this film places you right inside the gut, and while it’s not always a pleasant place to be, it’s a visit you’re not likely to forget.

It’s McKirnan’s unflappable performance and energetic humour that hold it all together.

It’s clear that this one is waving a flag for the positive possibilities of an empathetic, culture-centred approach to mental care.

Tótem embraces chaos and bustle in an ensemble drama of a family living through crisis. This thematically rich piece offers a set of vivid character studies, while musing on life, death and time – largely from a child’s perspective.

As Maria, Burow shines in a phenomenally demanding role that challenges us to tune in empathetically to a character whose actions and motives are rarely less than problematic, but are always limned with a fine brush.

Undeniably well-meaning and impassioned about the country, its people and its struggle, documentary Superpower is a cluttered account of the war so far, the facts distractingly filtered through the dominant idea that the Hollywood actor is there on the ground, filming history as it happens.

While, on one level, it seems to belong to international cinema’s increasingly prevalent strain of climate catastrophe dramas, on another it’s a brittle character piece, a comedy of social embarrassment with a dark and ultimately tragic undertow. Until, that is, a coda ties it off in another register entirely.

Suzume is hardly a film for all tastes, but is certain to thrill anime buffs across all ages and continents.

While Disco Boy doesn’t entirely weave all its threads to satisfying effect, the film crackles with ideas.

The Adults is a gift to its actors, allowing them to explore the tensed-up taciturnity of emotional repression but also to go haywire with the voices and the crazily choreographed body language.

This is a film with some grace and exuberance, but a cavalier attitude to period verisimilitude only adds to the impression that, when it comes to facing ugly historical reality, Kiberlain’s approach is naïvely inadequate.

The film refrains from diagnosing or analysing – either Keiko’s psyche or her condition – but describes and evokes her world with subtle detached insight. It does so on a miniature scale that some might find frustrating or non-committal, but that allows director Miyake to give us Keiko in close-up, yet in a manner that’s scrupulously non-intrusive too.

The situation of Israel’s Arab population is treated with poised satirical acidity in Let It Be Morning, a film mixing social comedy with a touch of absurdism that, though rooted in real-world conflict, has distinct echoes of Buñuel’s The Exterminating Angel.

Its dramatic heft and its stars’ upfront audacity make it a sexy proposition in every respect.

At moments, however, the pacing treads a fine line between stately and somnolent. What consistently mesmerises, however, is the lead performance by Krieps.

Mixing often horrifying war footage with testimonies from a wide range of Ukrainians of varying ages, Freedom on Fire is an urgent, somewhat hectic, at times cluttered film – but that’s partly explained by the fact that Afineevsky has been able to assemble it so rapidly, only six months after the invasion began.

Tantura makes for a fascinating, troubling watch, although it doesn’t altogether come across as rigorously objective, given rhetorical touches in both music (ominous ambient drones, ironically boisterous kibbutz songs) and visuals (thriller-style close-ups of Katz’s cassettes playing, a pointed insert of a see-no-evil monkey statuette).

Above all, there is the generous, often mischievous performance by Cámara, with a promisingly vivid juvenile lead from Nicolas Reyes as young Quinín, and a nice ensemble buzz from other family members, including Patricia Tamayo as mother Cecilia; otherwise it all comes across as a fondly soft-focus blur.

For all the film’s provocations, both serious and mischievous, it’s a remarkably elegant, subtle piece.

A complex work of novelistic density, this is among the boldest and most accomplished statements from one of the world’s exemplary filmmakers.

There’s more than a hint of other-worldly tragedy here, limned in parallel with the allusions to political conflict whose root causes no-one can quite remember.

Given that it’s about a tequila factory, Mexican drama Dos Estaciones is as sobering as they come – but it’s also a bracingly potent distillation of drama, psychological portraiture and passionate flouting of clichés, both national and sexual.

The Blue Caftan is a keenly tuned, non-judgmental exploration of an enduring relationship that has thrived despite the stresses of conflicting desires and the pressures of social norms.

British director Joe Hunting has made a tender, affecting documentary about love, friendship and people finding a place where they can be themselves.

By the time we reach a genuinely unnerving climax, Alper has pulled off something special – a film that works at once as a highly-charged suspenser, a savvy piece of tightly-enclosed world-building and a sharp critique of machismo, populism and their very tangible dangers.