Jordan Hoffman

Sprinkled among the desultory morass are occasional firecrackers of brilliant schtick-based comedy.

The public and private Rachel are, at first, quite different, until her eventual decision to be an out-of-the-closet believer. Even with this rancid script and amateurish direction, McLain sells this inherently undramatic turn as an emotional triumph.

It is a striking work of storytelling. By assembling the scattered images and historical clips suggested by Baldwin’s writing, I Am Not Your Negro is a cinematic séance, and one of the best movies about the civil rights era ever made.

Moore doesn’t want to tear Trump down so much as he wants to build Clinton up, and however much of a dingus he may be (some of his jokes really don’t work), he is sincere in his optimism and empathy. That’s something that you just can’t fake.

Much will be said about Gray’s cinematic craft (as is often the case when a director works with cinematographer Darius Khondji) but beneath the slow roll down the river pierced by arrows from unseen, defensive natives, there’s a fascinating, mercurial screenplay that offers just enough to keep you journeying for more insight.

For all of Mills’s cinematic tricks, he’s emerging as a great realist film-maker.

Clinton, Inc.’s director, Bill Baber, can’t even slander a dead woman without coming off like an idiot.

A few small hiccups aside, 13th is very much not a Michael Moore film. It is organised, detailed and powerful.

Masterminds is a bit of an interesting case study, as it is basically a Coen brothers film but put through a mechanism that removes all the wit, visual style or excitement. In its place are tortuously dull set-pieces, rambling dialogue and banal stagings.

Macdonald grants us insight into the process and, as expected, it’s hardly as haphazard as sceptics might think.

Split goes all-in on McAvoy slipping from persona to persona, and luckily he’s got the acting chops to sell it.

We get the playfulness of seeing quirky magic powers mixed with the familiarity of how a time loop plays out. Add in Burton’s authorial visual stamp and what we’ve got is an extremely pleasing formula. It gels as Tim Burton’s best (non-musical) live-action movie for 20 years.

Everything about this picture is at such a deliberate arm’s length that it is hard to know what is meant to be whimsical and what is serious melodrama.

Kasper Collin’s I Called Him Morgan isn’t just the greatest jazz documentary since Let’s Get Lost, it’s a documentary-as-jazz.

Carrie Pilby the film is 100% Carrie Pilby the character, a living quirk machine that in a lesser actor’s hands might be insufferable.

The movie is rich on its own as a character piece about the difficulties of being bi-racial, especially at the very specific location of Columbia University.

What we have on our hands is a dud, but there are a few grace notes that save it from being an unmitigated disaster.

God, it’s so obnoxious. And the worst thing is that it works. I was smiling and applauding at the end, then I had to take a long walk alone to wonder what was wrong with me.

If anyone other than Hawkins were in this film, it would be very hard to recommend. With her in virtually every scene, it is a lovely, tiny character study.

By keeping its characters at such a far remove, the film doesn’t condemn them nor cheer them on. At least, not on paper. In actuality, with all the crafty editing moves, slick music cues and stylish production design, Nocturama does the one thing it shouldn’t: it makes domestic terrorism look cool.

There’s a fine line between a slowburn and dull, and this Magnificent Seven frequently finds itself on the wrong side.

Klown Forever has even less of a plot than the first film, which is a bit of a problem.

To make the movie work, the audience needs to put in a little effort, but a philosophy of connectedness is present.

Don’t Breathe is a master class in tension, and while its script could have been written on the back of an envelope, its editing and use of sound design is a triumph for film theorists.

One sees film-making like this and can only say: no más.

Surprisingly, many of Bekmambetov’s updates work well.

Little kids will be bored, as there are only a few scenes with any action, and of those, only one, featuring an enormous skeleton with swords sticking out of its skull, has any oomph.

Seth Rogen’s naughty food cartoon Sausage Party is, like much of his best work, deceptive packaging.