Phil de Semlyen

Frustrating, funny at points, heartbreaking and quite magnificently shot throughout, Leviathan is one of the films of the year.

It might veer towards hagiography at times, but its subject is so entertaining you don't even care.

A bold, honest film about family life that showcases a terrifically unpeppy turn from Bejo.

A stomping good documentary.

The performances are solid - Goodbye Lenin! actor Florian Lukas is the standout - but ponderous pacing makes this true-life tale a lot less enthralling than it might have been.

A curveball from the man who made "2012" and "Independence Day" and probably only a brief respite for the world's major cities.It's more of an interesting curio to a blockbuster career but there's fun to be had here if you look hard enough.

A treat for cricket fans who'll thrill to this nostalgic look back at one of sport's greatest teams.

Passionate and expertly crafted, this black-and-white opus is well worth seeking out.

Moving, complex and brutal, it's an outstanding film about men at war.

Like Orwell on helium, this reimagining of Stalin’s demise and the subsequent ideological gymnastics of his scheming acolytes is daring, quick-fire and appallingly funny.

McAvoy gets good performances from his cast, with Ross a boyish yet broken presence as the spiralling Bain, but ultimately the journey is more satisfying than the destination.

Compelling performances and beautifully told heroics but the pacing is flawed in terms of a thrilling cinematic experience.

If a subplot showing Orwell writing ‘Animal Farm’ as he becomes persuaded by Jones’s evidence doesn’t entirely work, there’s plenty in this thoughtful journalism drama that does. And not a single scene in a car park.

Patricia Clarkson steals the show, but everyone in Potter’s gifted cast gets their moment to shine in a sharp-edged, claustrophobic parlour piece that puts the boot into middle-class mores.

Courtenay is heartbreaking as a broken man crushed under the wheels of a callous system.

It’s an old cliché about biopics that if the story wasn’t true, you probably wouldn’t believe it. The Keeper takes it a step further: you know it’s true and you still don’t believe it.

Japanese superstar-in-the-making Ryusuke Hamaguchi’s (Drive My Car) latest film is a touching ecological parable full of little feints and narrative red herrings. Just when you think it’s heading in one direction, it slips off elsewhere, like a fawn in the woods.