Kim Newman

Cultural clashes all over the place in this sweet and gently comedy.

Poor remake of the Korean thriller.

This isn't afraid to be a horror movie.

The main problem is that the supposed good guys are all such reprehensible toads it’s impossible to care whether they get to bring down Willem Dafoe’s charismatic, polo-necked super-crook.

Genre thrills with a big dose of originality.

Often, stories with terrific narrative hooks run out of steam, but Lábrèche and Léonard keep coming up with satisfying plot twists which take the film into unexpectedly deep emotional waters.

Guest star Dan O'Herlihy steals the film as a Celtic joke tycoon (‘the man who invented sticky toilet paper and the dead dwarf gag’) who hates the way American kids are despoiling the religious spirit of Samhain and decides to teach them a nasty lesson.

It deliberately makes no sense, but it has more bizarro gimmicks to the minute than any other horror picture of 1979.

Some interesting creative choices make this more a curio than a great film.

Hellboy might not have the name-recognition factor of the Spider- or Batmen, but Guillermo del Toro brings the audience swiftly up to speed on artist-writer Mike Mignola's comic book anti-hero.

Written by Roddy Doyle this was never going to be a depressing tale of single parenthood. Instead we watch through rose-tinted glasses as the ever watchable Colm Meaney bonds with his family over his daughter's pregnancy out of wedlock in Catholic Ireland.

Bogdanovich’s perfect recreation of the sense of time and place, and his ability to mix wit with poignancy that make this such a charming, timeless film.

This gripping character study becomes more agonisingly suspenseful as it gets closer to an answer that can't be confirmed.

Macy hasn’t had a role this good since Fargo, and demonstrates again his mastery of the droopy-eyed, apologetically desperate, borderline bitter shrug.

Super sexy, silly Meyer fun where he takes his own self-styled genre to its heights/depths.

Well, even if it is essentially four hours about a selfish, silly cow, it's impeccably well made, and should be seen by anyone with even a passing interest in romance or movies.

Once you get past the ridiculous story this is a fine example of De Palma's lush overkill style and certainly has a redeeming thread of silly sick humour.

Kurosawa is always worth a look but this is a particular classic that has influenced so much to come, it's almost essential.

DiCaprio delivers a startling prettyboy-to-tough nut makeover – but he has to play it close to his chest here for the storyline to play out. Once you get past the trickery, Shutter Island offers sumptuous, enthralling, shivery gothic filmmaking with a hardboiled heart and a sly line in asylum humour. If a pot is being boiled, at least it’s an intricately-decorated pot on a spectacular fire.

It sets some sort of record for use of the expressions "nigga" and "muthafucka".

Genuinely disturbing horror but with Cronenberg producing a slightly deeper edge in his portrait of a troubled family.

Earlier Clancy films alternated between the dull and the ridiculous. First-rate writers like Steven Zaillian and the great John Milius have managed to make this considerably meatier.

Whether horror fans are ready for high-notes or musical buffs will appreciate Dario Argento levels of gore is an open question, but this is a rich, demented experience.

Very 'talky', but the three lead females are excellent, as are the costumes and sets.

As horror, it's a worn-out succession of gory, meaningless, hard-to-enjoy deaths, and too much of the running time is given over to puppets arguing with each other.

Mad Max 2 with Thought for the Day thrown in. There’s some ace post-holocaust action, but you can’t help feel you were invited to a party with fizzy pop and cream cake and got suckered into a sermon instead.

Worse than Scary Movies 1 through 3… And they were terrible.

Fascinating, funny, wicked and to the point, this is an excellent film about a week every Briton over the age of 15 will remember vividly.

A small but perfectly formed crime drama. And, without making a fuss, a proper nail-biter, too.

Sharper than a stake in it's genre references, The Monster Squad appeals to cinephile as well as teen sensibilities.

A curiously compulsive drama that for all its inevitable Dead Sailors’ Society trappings is still highly entertaining.

A successful mix of literary adaptation, meta-fictional discourse and inside-showbiz comedy. Both funny and clever.

Effective melodrama with some satisfying emotional confrontations, particularly from Lana Turner.

The tension revs along nicely and - if you're not heisted out already - there's some suspense to be had.

Day is on top form as the boastful sharpshooter, but she's ably matched by her supporting cast and the music.

A disjointed mish-M.A.S.H. of cliched comedy and misplaced observational wit.

Unlucky for almost everyone. It's a sad day when a Friday the 13th remake is shown up by a My Bloody Valentine remake – couldn't they at least have sprung for 3-D?

Thoughtful trial movie with a disturbing edge.

Dialogue is all-cliché, a decent cast get not much to go on (if Wonder Woman put Nielsen back on the map, this does her few favours), and even the action scenes have a rushed, unfinished feel.

Humane and harrowing, highly recommended. This one will stay with you.

Both leads excel at showing a true feeling (be it love or lust) but both covered in the guilty angst that one will betray the other. Edge of your seat stuff.

Like 2001, Star Wars and Jurassic Park, it ups the special effects stakes and gets closer to putting on screen the images you've had in your mind while reading epic sci-fi.

Cheerful, kitsch and camp.

As a one-off this could have inoffensively scraped by on thin charm alone. But don't forget kids, it gave rise to such monstrosities as Last Action Hero, Junior and Jingle all the Way…

Good central performances but short on plot.

With Redford giving one of his best comedic performances, helped by a Oscar winning script, The Candidate is witty and charming, while looking good and proving quite memorable, like Redford's lawyer.

Imaginative and surprisingly moving for a silent art movie.

As with "The Dark Knight," the only real caveat is that while it's exciting and imaginative, it's not exactly anyone's idea of fun. To keep in the game, perhaps the next movie could let the hero enjoy himself a bit more.

In 1956 audiences flocked to The Searchers precisely because it was a John Wayne western, and lapped up its mix of Injun-fightin' action, rough comic knockabout and intense, emotional storyline. Seen now, it is all that and much, much more.

Okay video-dungeon-style horror, a bit marooned on the big-screen but nevertheless murky fun.

It's a film you might argue with, but its sparing use of on-screen violence, some extraordinarily protracted scenes and sensitive handling of thorny subject matter make it also a film you ought to see.

The end result, while not entirely unrewarding, is another step away from the singular vision Cronenberg once expressed even in his marginal works.

The method is well-worn and the subject-matter familiar, but this is a smart, scary little picture.

Prestigious, well turned out piece of British historical drama with enough genuine intrigue and wit to persuade some audiences they aren't watching a history lesson.

The more intimate scenes are almost unbearably poignant.

If the series wants to become a franchise, a rethink and new blood will be necessary -- maybe Banderas can get mortally wounded in reel one of The Son Of Zorro, passing on the mask and sword to, say, Gael García Bernal.

Probably the best Western since "Unforgiven."

Though Spike Lee would clearly like this movie to remind you of ills-of-TV satires like A Face In The Crowd and Network (there's a spin on the well-remembered "mad as hell" speech), it comes out as a weird, unsatisfying hybrid of Robert Downey Sr.'s Putney Swope and Mel Brooks's The Producers.

A movie masterpiece.

Straining for significance at every moment, this is one of a wave of late '60s/early '70s Westerns that represent Hollywood's idea of the counterculture in love beads, feathers and picturesque gore.

Every bit as contrived as the leading lady's hairstyles, and rather less technically impressive, this is still trashy fun.

Silly but enormous fun, complete with gypsy musical numbers and an insane battle royal finish.

After Ned Kelly, Jagger needed a hit and Performance was it. Although playing a rock star probably wasn't the greatest challenge, he more than holds his own against Fox in a psychedelic classic.

Compelling 1970s take on the monster horror genre which remains fresh and hugely watchable.

Figgis, reunited with Gere after Internal Affairs, went through the Hollywood mangle on this one, and despite flashes of insight, anything worthwhile gets lost in a script that strains too hard for truth and provokes unfortunate big laughs.

Still the definitive werewolf movie.

Because it is a sequel, it's less satisfying than the more idea-driven original, but this is still top-flight kick-ass entertainment

Performances, plot and landings are nailed down, but there's not enough invention here for the film to achieve cult status.

A grand folly, but lots to love.

Some okay thrills with good performances and some smarts. But the last reel plunge spoils things. Myth for the new millennium: any average, out-of-shape middle-aged Yank, including the President, can get in a punch-up with a few well-armed, super-trained terrorists, and win.

The fantastic action scenes featuring Chan in his pomp are slightly let down by comic overkill.