Martyn Conterio

This might not be the film you’re quite expecting from the director of arthouse dramas focused on modern life in Brazil, but it fits right in as a variation and continuation of Mendonça Filho’s pet themes.

Not without flaws, but nothing to get too worked up about, Alita: Battle Angel is cynicism-free, first-class popcorn entertainment spearheaded by a knockout performance from Salazar. A star is born.

Martin’s film is a thoroughly sobering watch and leaves us with tough questions about how the West chose to deal – or rather not deal – with Assad and the refugee crisis.

Jackson and his entire production team have produced a film which is both a form of cultural monument and a monumental cinematic achievement.

Gonzalez can be masterful in conjuring sexy imagery, febrile moods and erotic frissons, but his grip on the storytelling here is weak. Knife + Heart struggles to regain its initial momentum, falling flat until a lively climax.

Once we start to understand Ayka’s life and reasons for behaving how she does, the film gains tragic dimensions and its humanist voice grows into a desperate cry.

Makes for a generally powerful statement on human misery and grotesque inequality, though some third act creative decisions and maneuvers cause a wobble or two.

The Wild Pear Tree isn’t a showy or boldly radical work, this is still Ceylan’s brand of poetic landscapes and intimate dramas, but it does represent an intriguing artistic progression, so any claims of ‘more of the same’ are redundant.

Serebrennikov...has a great eye for composition and crafting a set piece, but the meandering pace and loose approach to storytelling makes his second feature akin to an album front loaded with banging tunes and the rest is filler.

Husson’s film is first and foremost an appalling account of stomach-churning misogyny and the sickening horrors Kurdish women met at the hands of their vile captors.

The film’s displays of humour give away to harsher scenes of brutality and intense moments where rural calm is suddenly disrupted by mortar explosions and transformed landscapes dotted with corpses.

The final moments veer too far towards the melodramatic, especially when the rest of the movie has exhibited a preference for the intellectual powers of argument, logic and reason, however the sense of desperation and accompanying symbolism is tragically potent.

Involving and well made, rather than something flat-out great and essential.

That Lee has crafted a funny film full of snazzy editing, stylish imagery and a tremendous blues rock score, yet is laser-focused on a very serious subject matter, demonstrates his mastery of the cinematic medium.

Birds of Passage is an enthralling, powerful statement and lamentation on the drugs trade’s inevitable encroachment upon on indigenous peoples and how gangsters casually destroyed them.

The film is freaky, experimental, sometimes hilarious and unnervingly intense.

Ghost Stories is uncomfortably timely, reminding us the haunted past is always haunting the present.

The film is packed with laugh-out-loud moments, full of deadpan observations – a quintessential Anderson touch – and exciting sequences.

Escalante is a master filmmaker when it comes to creating atmosphere.

Cruise rides the Breaking Bad and Narcos train, only not as well as either.

Anderson's comic slasher doesn't quite earn its wings as a potential future classic, nevertheless it's very funny and another welcome indicator that antipodean genre cinema is where it's at right now.

Dirty Grandpa wants to be as filthy as a Tijuana peep show featuring a beleaguered performer and put upon donkey, but ends up as sickly sweet as a Werther's Original.

As a return to the dark, primal and transgressive terrors of the original movie, Alien: Covenant is a success.

Nothing else this year can match Another Evil for its expert chills, comic dialogue, Office-level cringe and disturbing themes.

Verbinski doesn't skimp on thrills, mind you. There are jump scares galore, acts of literally penetrating violence and the denouement goes for full-on operatic perversity. Fans of Gothic horror - treat yourself and take the cure.

Covering depression, grief and pregnancy as body-horror, the end result is a palpably unusual mix of comedy, pathos and gruesome violence

My Father, Die's pummelling violence and existentialist leanings would be too absurd if set in County Kerry or County Mayo, but the doom-filled lyricism - its bloodied, weary soul - might best be described as Beckett with gunplay.

Challenging, daring, provocative, disgusting - We are the Flesh is all those things and then some, but also superbly crafted and always visually compelling.