Kevin Harley

Like E.T. gone wrong, director Kiah Roache-Turner’s underdeveloped but briskly suspenseful, suggestive arachno-shocker sees a kid with family issues find solace in alien company. Only this spidery E.T. will gobble you up before it phones home…

The deaths are exuberantly grisly and explosive, too, the sound mix relishing every gooey squelch. Yet as predictable twists and an underused final cameo arrive, all the blood isn’t enough to cover up the nagging shortfalls of final-act invention.

You’ll flinch, yes, but you’ll forget it just as quickly.

Brown and the beast strike sparks as Fresnadillo’s initially lukewarm adventure gradually heats up.

Part Two is an inarguable marvel technically, almost leaving its Oscar-grade predecessor for dust.

While the visuals are refreshingly clean and grounded for a modern superhero film, the story is bogged down by exposition and egregious product placement.

First too slow, then too silly, Vaughn’s well-cast but wayward romp fires off half-baked ideas without the focus needed to make them stick.

A little more than a remake yet less than a makeover, Tina Fey’s watchable, well-cast revisit needed more daring to be wholly worthwhile.

King’s flair for transposing peak British TV comedy’s character to film is also apparent, thanks to a fine support haul of Peep Show and Ghosts alumni.

Davis, Dinklage, Zegler, and the Games thrill, but Snow doesn’t quite summon the substance needed to fulfil this long-haul prequel’s ambitions.

Fitful jolts aside, the devil trots out the old tunes wearily in this hoary and overcooked valentine to a horror classic.

The final minutes turn Talk to Me into something almost lyrical, a kind of urban myth you could imagine being shared between parties and campus halls. The filmmakers also blow out the candle at a flab-free 95 minutes. Turns out that’s enough time to get inside you and take possession.

Taut and sprawling, riveting and haunting: firing on all cylinders, Nolan tackles world-changing history with fearsome force and focus.

Mashing up Groundhog Day with Get Out, They Live, Sorry to Bother You, Westworld, A Clockwork Orange, blaxploitation films, "X-Files shit", and more, They Cloned Tyrone is a race-conscious conspiracy caper at heart, spruced up with some zippy patter and a razor-sharp cast.

As we watch Lee still encouraging ‘true believers’ well into his old age, it’s hard not to be moved.

Muschietti directs confidently, notably in an opening sequence that betters both Justice Leagues for fun. What’s less persuasive is the CGI, an eyesore that’s particularly gaudy when the finale’s ‘secrets’ drop.

Solid casting and scares mix with thin plotting and middling monster moves in Savage’s King riff.

Anderson visits fresh frontiers with a close encounter of the quirky kind, holding wit, whimsy and sly wisdom in supple balance.

Between bouts of partying and freeform dancing, newcomer Park Ji-min brings a near-musical virtuosity to this questing character piece.

Bigger, bloodier, blunter. Ghostface goes all-in for the kills in a brash but broad requel-sequel, sharpened by Barrera/Ortega’s ace pairing.

CGI/saga-building issues aside, the MCU’s fun sci-fi getaway stretches Ant-Man and answers any Multiverse niggles. Majors’ menace focuses the attention fiercely.

James Cameron mobilizes on all fronts for an imperfect but imposing blockbuster: dazzling, supersized, rippled with currents of sincere feeling.

Between a fallen king and a rising threat, Marvel’s cinematic Phase 4 ends on a tender and – mostly - triumphant high.

Though the action and characters are sketchily served, Brown’s match-dry lead, Bradbeer’s brisk direction, and fine support casting make a persuasive case for Enola’s return.

Fast, fierce, fuzzy: nicely unruly, naggingly undisciplined, Johnson’s live-action DC bow strains to entertain but struggles to breathe amid the noise.

For his part, Trachtenberg has resolved how to give the Yautja its due. Best post-Arnie Predator variant? Undoubtedly. Best Predator movie per se? Tough call, but trust this: Prey gets the job done.

Come for the wild ideas, stay for the warm wisdom in the Daniels’ heartfelt carnival of chaos. Yeoh aces every curveball.

Between hidden depths and dazzling surfaces, home truths and virtual wonders, Hosoda’s tale of teenage anguish, connectivity and emotional salvation enraptures.

Here, the working-class milieu invites imagination, adventure, and camaraderie rather than a Ken Loach-style crushing of hope, while a climactic confrontation on divided streets is framed like a thrilling showdown in a black-hat-vs.-white-hat western. But it is the child’s- eye view, the wit, and the generosity of spirit on show that elevate Branagh’s Belfast.

Cruel and elegant, del Toro’s nightmares remain worlds apart from the pack.

The cast commit, but The 355 is no lucky number for Kinberg, who only delivers diminished returns on spy-thriller genre conventions.

Recasting studio formula in fresh, dazzling shapes and shades, Encanto is high-tier modern Disney.

The leads deliver to order in this flimsy but playful frolic. A tankful of banter keeps the engine ticking nicely.

Between Simmonds’ superb lead, the suspense, the slivers of hope, A Quiet Place Part II is worth making a noise for. Just pipe down in the cinema.

It might not venture into the unknown, but Raya takes spirited wing.

Between its genre know-how and furious anger, King’s biopic makes damn sure you feel the weight of Hampton’s loss – and the need for his legacy to be honoured.

Moving ever-onward from the sequels years, Pixar gets right back in the zone with Soul. Deep, witty, and fast on its jazz-loving feet, it doesn’t miss a beat.

A last, cheering hurrah from two dudes.

There’s a chemical imbalance here… Netflix’s super-drug thriller is less than addictive.

Even an axe-swinging Charlize Theron struggles to wallop much life – endless or otherwise - into Gina Prince-Bythewood’s comic-book riff, a derivative fantasy-actioner so laggy it puts you right off immortality.

With Moss’ brilliance in full view, Whannell’s taut exercise in suspense gives Universal’s monsters a jolt of life.

Adam Sandler is off-the-scale good in the Safdies’ latest: a scuzzy shot of adrenaline into the crime pic’s heart.

Sometimes fun, sometimes flatly awkward.

Despite mostly sparky cast-work, the Phoenix never quite rises as hoped in Kinberg’s affectionate but often perfunctory X-Men send-off.

Between its orgiastic carnage, orgasmic colours and very good dogs, Wick’s return gives hyper-stimulated action cinema a good name.

Peele doubles down on his genre love with a flawed but full-bore frightener, ripe for debate. Nyong’o is incendiary.

When the sentiment threatens to turn gloopy, Ali and Mortensen’s terrific leads steer Farrelly back on-track.

Despite the odd awkward tonal gear shift, Knight’s origin story makes refreshingly light work of its uphill climb, fuelled by wit and warmth. And – crucially – with better songs on the retro-tape deck.

Too rackety and hackneyed to scare, The Nun groans next to the likes of Hereditary. Only the moody, menacing abbey inspires the right levels of belief.

This is the rare comedy sequel that doesn’t just equal the original: it betters it, with bells and ball-sacks on.

The end-stretch is overlong, but the Flash animation style pops with colour, the music is fun, and off-the-scale creature cuteness abounds.

Over-ambitious perhaps, but Freyne’s intensely executed ‘infected’ fable packs tension, resonance, and clout.

Reid’s a fine lead, but DuVernay’s usually firm footing wobbles in the CGI clouds of Disney fantasy.

Despite the candid vérité stylings, art-dance powerhouse Grace Jones remains a magnetic enigma in Sophie Fiennes’ docu-study.

Defiant, determined, Vega delivers a star-making performance in a drama of embattled grief, directed with heart.

Aiming straight for mounting dread, Parker gets the job done aggressively.

Del Toro’s Valentine to boundary-crossing love pours from the screen in ravishing torrents of feeling and style. And Hawkins is sublime.

Anderson crafts another classic of obsession and strange love, played by dynamite leads: Day-Lewis retires in style, Krieps is revelatory.

Scott steers his ideas-rich, character-based thriller with brisk authority. Plummer and Williams bring their all.

Does for Norman’s place what Room 237 did for the Overlook: reopens old haunts for welcome re-investigation.

A meditation on repressed desire with deep secrets, Thelma throbs with hypnotic intensity: it burns slow, but its magnetism holds right up to the teasing climax.

Ragnarok is both the MCU’s funniest outing yet and its clearest beneficiary of a playful, character-ful director’s voice since Guardians.

Lowden and Findlay excel in their roles, but Mark Gill’s Moz-movie needed more: both more music and more “people who are young and alive”.

In Soderbergh’s self-aware hands, it’s a character-centric, director-driven, genre-savvy invitation to take pleasure in a job well orchestrated, right up to a judicious closing shot that leaves you wanting to linger awhile with its motley crew.

Shipp Jr. thrills, but a busy script blurs too many nuances.

What keeps gratuitousness at bay is Zhangke’s controlled style and empathy for the have-nots

Gadot is a godsend, Pine charms, and Jenkins delivers old-school thrills with heart and conviction.

Violence seems inevitable but Von Horn plots cause and consequence with patient precision.

Dudok de Wit and Ghibli have birthed a pan-continental marvel: a fable-cum-fantasy of a life adrift, aching with tender beauty and awed by nature’s extremes.

Dagg keeps things simple, but his jogging camera whips up the urgency and he’s well-served by Sutherland’s rangy physicality.

With the scares stealthy, Gavin’s parable draws power from the heart’s shadows: the climax may alienate some, but its audacity is earned.

“Prepare for Gar-mageddon!” Or worse: more Smurfs films.

A genre-blender imbued with style and substance. Magnetic and elusive, Stewart matches her director.

Even the devout, surely, will warm to Dormael's alt-gospel: one of compassion, oddball fish gags and cheerier skylines.

Subtexts about grief and revenge help anchor the plot, though the more decisive clincher is Lowe’s guiding imprint – a mix of scathing vernacular wit and genre savvy.

Kijak finds poignancy behind the pomp as he builds to a fist-pumping finale.

A satire of capitalist can-do thinking lurks in The Wrestler/Turbo writer Robert D. Siegel’s script, yet Hancock (Saving Mr. Banks) lacks the stomach to do full justice to its vision of the American dream plummeting into a nightmare.

Gibson returns to film’s frontline with a ferociously felt anti-war movie, while Garfield invests his Doss with tremendous conviction.

Wanted director Timur Bekmambetov stresses spectacle over subtext – and, effectively, leaves the cast floundering fast.

Mackenzie goes western in satisfying style, while Bridges, Pine and Foster bring true grit to Sheridan’s tight script.

The drama gets overwrought but Shults stages the fallout artfully, stressing choppy montages and a nerve-rattling sound mix as tensions erupt.

Right from the first frame the urgency rarely wanes as Lee juggles fireworks, firearms and feminism.

If the final third’s sudden, Twilight Zone-lite genre relocation seems desperate, the hollow climax confirms suspicions: vital supplies of narrative oxygen are lacking here.

Prepare to be spirited away. A brain-scrambler to make hearts swell, Shinkai’s giddy romance brims with emotion and invention.

Noirish touches flesh out the wispy plot, yet it’s the old-school animation that engages most: lending clarity to the emotions at stake, ensuring our sickly hero’s resilience tugs on the heart.

Style is substance in Ford’s second film. Unlike many puzzle-piece movies, it thrills on every level.

Torn between mountains and karaoke bars, Tharlo looks as lost as his lamb: a parallel delicately developed in this warm, wise fable of uncertainty.

If some of the stormy relationship stories seem old, the wealth of archive material is gob-smacking: early rehearsals, gig footage and intimate phone calls.

Warm, witty, and occasionally wild, Waititi’s bush-bonding romp is a kind, generous-spirited winner.

Magical and melancholy, tender and robust: rippling reserves of theme and style compensate for wobbly pacing in Keiichi Hara’s adaptation of Hinako Sugiura’s manga Sarusuberi.

Direction and cast pack a wallop.

Lie Laas' furrowed lead and Nørgaard's taut orchestration of flashback-pumped plotting help flesh out old clichés – at least until the climax takes a glum turn for the overwrought.

Moore admits he’s out to “pick the flowers, not the weeds” and the end result is witty, moving and brimming with passion and purpose.

Tasked with brokering a peace between event-sized thrills, gaming lore and high fantasy, Jones embraces Warcraft’s world with laudable commitment: but when it comes to charging it with life, sheer bulk gets the better of him.

As we’re steered from nightmares to raptures, the mix of horror, sci-fi, puberty fable and gender-twisting perhaps strains the narrative. But two certainties hold: it’ll stick with you, and Hadžihalilovic is in total command of her evolution.

Wheatley, Jump, Hiddleston and co occupy Ballard’s towering inferno with brazen style. If the plot wobbles precipitously, chalk it up to the high-rise ambition of a genuinely wayward Brit-film one-off.

As Johnson enters Columbine-style turf, a clearer slant on our modern mindset is required than the one he offers.