Kim Newman

A clever, funny, suspenseful, interestingly cynical science-fiction horror movie with a great collection of monsters — courtesy of make-up geniuses Dave and Lou Elsey — and a cast whose enthusiasm is, appropriately, infectious.

The business of this story in both versions is suspense, and Watkins is very good at ratcheting screws . . . but also springs satisfying reversals and pay-offs.

Capping an unusual trilogy, MaXXXine is an intense woman-fights-back thriller. Mia Goth’s Maxine is what you’d get if the Robert De Niro and Jodie Foster of Taxi Driver were fused in the telepod from The Fly.

Tossing a malicious vampire kid among squabbling, not-exactly-un-dangerous humans is a recipe for a wickedly enjoyable thrill ride. One of the messiest vampire movies ever made, and winningly so.

Some Host or DASHCAM fans might be disappointed that Rob Savage has opted for something ostensibly more conventional — but The Boogeyman shows he can also make an involving, ungimmicky ghost story with perfectly constructed menace and mayhem.

A dark action-comedy rather than a spooky gothic picture, Renfield is pitched to please long-time Dracula fans while reminding new generations that this Count was the first and arguably best monster villain in Hollywood horror history.

The Godfather Part II of on-the-farm slasher-movie prequels, this is an American gothic shocker with a lot to say — and an awards-worthy lead performance from Mia Goth.

West’s frightfilms are playful — a stereotype is inverted as guys wander half-naked to their doom like stereotypical slasher starlets — but run to serious scares. X is a properly satisfying shocker.

Clouzot achieves an analysis of the human condition at least as bleak as Huston's The Treasure Of The Sierra Madre but without the grandstanding speeches and with more subtle performances.

King of the Monsters delivers what its genre requires. Truly awesome monster scenes fill the screen, often imbued with emotional resonance by music cues.

The hardest power to depict onscreen is the wisdom of Solomon, but Shazam! makes clever decisions, mixing middle school snark with disarming sweetness. And — yes — it delivers the requisite lightning-strike punch-’em-ups with considerable force.

It may be a touch overlong – perhaps because everyone has to stop running to sing songs at regular intervals – and the emotional beats familiar, with moments of poignance, tragedy, gruesome comedy (a decapitated zombie in a snowman suit) and absurdity.

Some will find this impenetrable and irritating, but audiences willing to tune into Hosking’s off-kilter style will be moved by the ridiculous love stories and relish the hilarious eccentricity.

Winning and confusing in equal measure, this Japanese animated feature is likely to attract devout admirers but also baffle a significant number of viewers.

By no means a conventional horror film, yet several degrees more twisted and gruesome than the average indie relationships drama, this is likely to appeal to more adventurous cult film fans.

The Endless is a demanding, rewarding picture with moments of unusual terror and awe, offering a science fiction/horror scenario on a literally cosmic scale which boils down to a study of a complicated sibling relationship.

A bravura monster movie which just doesn’t let up, ratcheting tension with nary a word uttered on screen. It also boasts great creature design and a breakthrough performance from young Millicent Simmonds.

It’s an entertaining, engaging, colourful picture in its own right with decently-handled action-adventure set-pieces and sly comedy, detouring from the expected thrills and spills into body-hopping comedy drama.

Well-acted, it lacks the standout performances or star presences which propelled the tonally-similar Ex Machina to more than cult success. While it will play to fans of cerebral science fiction, it may be less grabby for general audiences.

A little reticent in gore gimmicks for the Final Destination crowd, but considered as a middle school between Goosebumps and Clive Barker, it’s just the haunted lottery ticket.

Deliberately uncomfortable viewing, this is nevertheless a compelling exercise in gritty psycho-noir with outstanding performances and real dramatic weight. Director Ben Young is a name to watch.

Full of character-based suspense, it’s dramatic and ramped-up with tension. Existing between a Sundance and a FrightFest film, this is a challenging, horribly plausible future vision.

One of Tom Hanks' overlooked performances because this bizarre thriller-comedy ends so strangely but there's much to like here.

This is a harsh, unsentimental science fiction film, though the performances suggest small surviving flames of empathy and yearning amid the tough, practical attitudes.

More "Moonlight" than "Twilight," The Transfiguration is a defining vampire film of the mid-2010s. An acutely observed study of social/emotional deprivation, but also a gripping, disturbing horror movie. And, yes, it’s ‘realistic’.

A classy French-Belgian horror with an unusual female perspective on monstrous taboos. Shocking but not sensationalist, this is a strong cannibal movie worth chewing over.

It is, however, creepy, suspenseful and nerve-wracking - and marks Gillespie and Kostanski as genre auteurs in the making.

Featuring excellent work from grandstanding Cox and just-lying-there Kelly, The Autopsy Of Jane Doe creates a successful feeling of mounting dread punctuated by crashing thunder and surgical viscera.

A trim, evenly-paced 80 minutes, XX is one of the more consistent contemporary horror anthologies.

This psycho-thriller showcases an awards-worthy performance from James McAvoy. Shyamalan papers over plot-holes with dry black humour and well-judged suspense, and — as always — holds back some surprises.

Once past a first reel which deliberately sticks to torture porn conventions, Pet is redeemed by a series of developments that take the film into surprising story and character areas.

Origin of Evil doesn’t stretch the conventions of teen-appeal spookiness too far, but is solidly put together, mounted with a pleasant conviction and runs to several fine performances and some decent scares.

If you can take the assault on your senses it’s worth sticking with for a core of genuine, affecting drama and dollops of sly, quotable humour.

A quality ghost story with an unusual backdrop and great performances.

It’s an intense, imaginative piece of work – which treads over familiar ground but modestly ventures a bit further in the climax.

Though a little too languid at two hours, The Love Witch is appropriately seductive.

An intense, streamlined exercise in gruesome thrills, with a tiny glimmer of social context (it’s all about the economy) which doesn’t take away from the exciting struggle to get out of this house of horrors.

Antibirth is intentionally ramshackle and hallucinatory as storytelling, seen through the viewpoint of characters who are mostly too stoned to concentrate – but it’s also highly crafted and unsettling.

You have to be in the right mood for it, but this is one of the season’s finest films.

The funniest, most deliciously venomous Jane Austen movie ever made, and conclusive proof that, a) Kate Beckinsale has been seriously undervalued by the movies and, b) Whit Stillman is a major, distinctive talent.

A riotous, rough-hewn and rousing punk reinvention of ’70s-style grindhouse exploitation-with-a-brain-cinema.

A notable, unusual existential thriller that is psychologically acute without the need for Oscar-clip self-pitying speeches, it’s also terrifically suspenseful with a provocative punchline.

So many films address the premise because it’s always thought-provoking and affecting. This also has a bleached, depopulated, effectively catastrophe-struck feel and an intriguing adult-and-child road movie storyline.

It has a nice line in wry chatter and a pleasantly old-fashioned ‘lost posse’ plot with engaging, odd characters striving against the wilderness while swapping cynical frontier wisdom.

The ending is haunting and affecting.

It might also be the case that the film is more taken by emotions, beauty and passing fancies than plot and character.

A well-above-average ho-ho-ho-horror film with a shivery sense of winter weirdland and anarchic ultra-violence, it’s also a strong candidate to become a holiday favourite thanks to a perfectly judged punchline.

Even if this is less satisfying overall than Skyfall, there are sequences that rank with Bond’s best.

Impressively nightmarish.

A science-fiction, action-heist, superhero comedy soap opera, this straddles as many genres as the Avengers films have characters but manages to do most of them pretty well. Extremely likable, with a few moments of proper wonder.

Like it or not, Six has contributed something fresh and demented to pop culture.

A wholly captivating date movie for eternal romantics who also enjoy slime-and-tentacle transformations.

By turns funny, vaguely creepy and too cool for school, A Girl Walks Home Alone At Night is certainly unusual — but also seductive and strange enough to stick in the memory like a fever dream.

A spirited gothic tale, played with welcome black humour.

An unconventional sequel to an unconventional film, this works as a standalone picture with its own distinctive take on alien invasion but also expands what now seem like a franchise with potential to deliver more and varied snapshots of human behaviour in extreme circumstances.

William Eubank continues to work his particular mind-stretching mix of acute character interplay and cosmic conceptual breakthrough.

Writer-director Gerard Johnson and chameleon-like star Ferdinando continue to impress with their strong collaboration here.

A first-rate horror movie, It Follows adds a new monster to the pantheon expect pranksters to imitate the Follower for cheap shocks soon — and has a refreshing, unpretentious sense that a meaningful subtext doesn’t undercut spookiness.

A funny, affecting, twisted tale, which demands you pay close attention to every throwaway detail.

Of course, this is a film you have to meet half-way. If you’re willing to enter its world, it’s an immensely rewarding, amusing, wise, melancholy and involving experience.

An ambitious physics and time-bending, relationship drama with solid performances from the two main characters.

It may not be much more than six of the most imaginatively staged and filmed fight scenes in the cinema, but that’s almost certainly enough to recommend it.

One of the strongest, most effective horror films of recent years — with awards-quality lead work from Essie Davis, and a brilliantly designed new monster who could well become the break-out spook archetype of the decade.

The unfamiliar young cast all show a lot of potential in a well-thought-through, sting- in-the-tail plot. It’s a well-assembled genre movie rather than a great statement, but none the worse for it.

Even if you’ve skipped the Dardennes’ work until now, this is a talking-point movie — and an outstanding lead performance — you need to see. It’s a rare film of unforced simplicity that will stick with you for a long time. And it’s honest right to its perfectly judged ending.

Like "The Cover" and "Man On Wire," this documentary comes clad in the garb of a thriller. And a heck of a good one at that.

A character-driven thriller with more twists than an off-the-map dirt road, awards-quality performances from the three leads, a rare sensitivity to the after-effects of horror and a sure directorial hand. Mickle and Damici officially segue from ‘promising’ to ‘delivering’.

Hogg’s films are never conventional stories, but this is a rewarding and affecting watch.

A lean, tough, thoughtful thriller with depth, Blue Ruin establishes Jeremy Saulnier as a promising indie auteur and Macon Blair as an unusual leading man.

A mysterious and disorientating blend of giallo violence, cinematic experimentation and Lynchian psychohorror. Revel in its bonkers beauty.

On the strength of only two films, McDonagh and Gleeson are a director/star team on a par with Ford/Wayne, Fellini/Mastroianni or Scorsese/De Niro. Calvary is gripping, moving, funny and troubling, down to an uncompromising yet uncynical finish.

It’s the tangle of workings-out not the easy answer that are the proof of a theorem, and that magnificent, sparkling, insightful chaos abounds here.

A well-warranted remastering of his Aussie new wave classic.

A crunching, visceral transplant for this cannibal tale from its urban Mexican setting to an American milieu.

A rich movie, seductive when abandoning people for falling snow or bleak nature and funny, painful and unflinching when it gets physical.

A provocative, engrossing, often hilarious, frequently tough picture. Not for all sensibilities but it’s among von Trier’s more playful, purely entertaining films, with insight and humour in even the horrors.

An extremely entertaining, brilliantly acted, highly diverting film which — like all hustles — delivers less than it promises. Still, it’s worth being taken for the ride.

Even if you think you've seen this story too often, Big Bad Wolves will surprise and enthrall. A thriller which bites deep, it has a light touch which finds humanity even in the worst horrors.

How to sum up? You have to make synapse-spark connections, interpret events to your own satisfaction, pick up visual cues (a long stretch of the film is dialogue-free) and be happy with not knowing all the answers (you know, like in life — but not in most motion pictures). A perfectly judged, strikingly beautiful film, but also a lunatic enterprise which invites — even welcomes — befuddlement as much as wonder. A true original.

Not perfect, but a much more satisfying Earth-in-ruins film than Oblivion or After Earth. It is a little more conventional than District 9 (what isn’t?), but confirms Blomkamp as one of the potential science-fiction greats of this decade.

Very physical, with intense performances and half-serious period talk, it’s an impressive, haunting picture — though the sort of thing you have to meet at least halfway to enjoy.

A near-irresistible Friday-night-out monster picture in the tradition of Lake Placid or Tremors, with a boozy Irish charm that makes it a distinctive addition to the catalogue of alien invasions.

A mixture of tough and wistful and reflective and brutal, this is the ideal vampire movie for Twi-hards who’ve had their hearts broken for the first time and want to move on to a less cosy vision of eternal romance with a side order of addiction.

A uniquely British blend of excruciating comedy of embarrassment and outright grue, not quite as disorientating in its mood shifts as Kill List but just as impressive a film.

Thanks to Rushdie's sensitive handling of his own material, this is an adaptation big in both ideas and heart.

Though it rings ever so slightly hollow as cool shades into callousness, this exercise in sexy suspense and brain-scrambling mystery is a dazzling, absorbing entertainment which shows off Danny Boyle’s mastery of complex storytelling and black, black humour.

If there are post-Harry Potter children who don’t know or care about The Wizard of Oz, they might be at sea with this story about a not-very-nice grownup in a magic land, but long-term Oz watchers will be enchanted and enthralled. There’s even a musical number, albeit an abbreviated one. Mila Kunis gets a gold star for excellence in bewitchery and Sam Raimi can settle securely behind the curtain as a mature master of illusion.

Gripping throughout, with an impressive central performance, this is like a Dogme 95 redo of a Chuck Norris film - by heroic effort, the good guys find and kill a bad guy. How you feel about that is something Bigelow leaves you to decide.

Enormously entertaining, endlessly quotable, perfectly cast and packed full of the richest acting you'll see from an ensemble cast all year, but the result is ever so slightly hollow.

Skyfall is pretty much all you could want from a 21st Century Bond: cool but not camp, respectful of tradition but up to the moment, serious in its thrills and relatively complex in its characters but with the sense of fun that hasn't always been evident lately.

Intelligent science-fiction sometimes seems an endangered species - too much physics and there's a risk of creating something cold and remote, too many explosions and get lost in the multiplex. Looper isn't perfect, but it pulls off the full Wizard Of Oz: it has a brain, courage and a heart.

The final act has an inevitable wavering patch when the film is obliged to tut-tut about the shallowness of the stripping, drinking, bantering, carousing and whooping it has previously enjoyed, but this is terrific entertainment with a sideline in wry melancholia and testosterone-fuelled philosophy. Have 20 dollars.

Less confrontational than most Solondz movies, in that it refrains from violence or kink, but still unsettling and affecting.

A rough, exhausting, exhilarating action picture with a payoff which would have delighted Sam Fuller or Howard Hawks. The Stath - an actual Olympian, remember - is on top form.

A slick thriller which takes place in a moral vacuum. It's fascinating rather than exciting, but makes for chilly thrills with two strong, charismatic lead performances, a great deal of style and amusingly repulsive, ruthless twists.

Terrific performances, especially from the menacing, lazily charismatic Henshall, and debut director Kurzel's expressionist storytelling make for an Aussie film well worth hunting down. A tough but seriously rewarding watch.

More startling than an unexpected punch in the noggin, Na Hong-Jin's unusual thriller could have the highest knife count this side of Ramsay's Kitchen Nightmares. A violent thrill-ride to a dark new corner of Asian cinema.

This is a great director's greatest love story.