Phil de Semlyen

Like a hollow-point shell, David Fincher’s slickly enjoyable assassin thriller is explosive but empty.

Yorgos Lanthimos’s feminist Frankenstein comedy is scabrous, smart and obscenely funny.

Unfortunately, its 39 minutes unfold in such motor-mouthed haste, it feels like a dad belting through a bedtime story while the football’s on downstairs.

The First Slam Dunk’s nimble storytelling and canny editing makes it work as both a sports movie, where you’re invested in the result, and a coming-of-age drama, where you care about the characters.

A mockumentary as sparky, big-hearted and entertaining as its cast of bright-eyed kids and the wannabe thesps who coach them in the ways of ‘turning cardboard into gold’. The affection for musical theatre is so sincere, it’ll win over even the most Sondheim-averse.

Gran Turismo may ultimately be a glossy marketing exercise, but there are moments that’ll leave you with the right kind of whiplash.

Like Aftersun on a gallon of SunnyD, this warm and freewheeling comedy-drama about a girl connecting with the dad she’s never met proves that working-class stories don’t have to be all misery and angst. Sometimes, that kitchen sink can be filled with bubbles.

More than just another franchise reset, Mutant Mayhem wrestles with its own cultural relevance (or otherwise) in interesting ways.

Life in The Damned Don’t Cry is brutally unfair, and Boulifa offers no easy answers. But thanks to the compassionate filmmaker and his two impressive leads, it’s a compelling watch.

The cumulative effect is so stunning and antithetical to anything Hollywood is doing at the moment – the equally audacious Barbie aside – that it feels like a completely different art form. And, frankly, hallelujah for that.

Tom Cruise’s latest IMF outing is so relentlessly exhilarating, you’ll need a lie down afterwards.

The sheer ambition is still there, but the storytelling rigour – Lasseter’s great forte – is again missing in Elemental, the studio’s latest big-screen offering.

It’s a sensitive, careful film with real emotional intelligence, but no less gripping for swerving dramatic fireworks in favour of quieter, more observational moments.

In its quieter moments, No Hard Feelings gestures towards real emotion. More often than not, though, it gets sidetracked by chaotic set pieces, with naked fistfights (the actress, surprisingly, goes full frontal here), mace sprayings and even an ingenious homage to The Shining, working Lawrence’s knack for slapstick to the funny bone. It’s fleeting fun, when a bit more honesty and candor might have made it her answer to Young Adult.

Occasionally, the dizzying filmmaking style, a mix of practical stunt work and invisible VFX, feels like a video-game cutscene. More often, it just sucks the air from your lungs. The ending gestures pretty firmly at another sequel to come. It’ll have a tough job upping the ante on this.

It’s such a torrent of universes, ideas and styles that it should collapse under the weight of its own creative payload. But it all works – brilliantly.

Beautiful acted by Japanese veteran Yakusho, it’s a character study with real depth. Maybe not top tier Wenders, but still one to linger over.

If this is the end of the road for a British filmmaking great, it’s a thoughtful, heart-filled finale. British cinema’s old oak still stands tall.

Food is a gift of love here – and romance courses through this delightful film.

If Kidnapped aims to dive into the subconscious of its characters, it gets stuck on the surface.

Kubi is often wildly funny in Kitano’s straight-faced style, and it’s never less than a lot of fun. Fans of visceral, cynical action movies will lose their heads over it.

Like a kind of cinematic Lego set, Ben Hania takes the building blocks of filmmaking and constructs from them something cathartic, affecting and original.

The overall effect is one of wonderment, eccentricity and heartache that will connect deeply with anyone who recently spent an extended period stuck in close proximity with other human beings.

It’s hampered by a pedestrian script and an improbable ending, but always catches fire when the supercharged Law is on screen.

Serrated with political edge, Scorsese’s true-crime epic is impeccably constructed and utterly gripping.

A thriller of real psychological and emotional depth, Triet’s film is a treat. Watch it with a partner and argue about it afterwards.

Even with its cramp-preventing intermission, Occupied City’s epic runtime doesn’t deliver the same accretion of emotional power that makes, say, Claude Lanzmann’s nine-hour Holocaust doc, Shoah, so great. Instead, it begins to open itself up to monotony and worse, glibness.

Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret is full of delights, poignant, peppery and plain life-enhancing. For anyone navigating the rocky journey into young adulthood, or any parent trying to help, it’ll feel like a hand stretched out in solidarity. Just like Judy Blume intended.