Robbie Collin

You sense that Washington and Zendaya do both believe in the material, and they certainly throw themselves at it with gusto, but their best moments here are invariably the ones in which they’ve not been given anything to say.

Unusually for a contemporary western, News of the World makes no attempt to reinvent the wheel. Instead, it hammers it diligently back onto the axle, before striking out on a journey whose contours and pitfalls we already know well. Nevertheless, it’s a pleasure to experience it once more with companions like these.

In some passages, the film abides by the biopic rulebook more carefully than it needs to; its best moments are the ones where King and his cast create some tension then simply let it cook.

Wheatley and his collaborators have produced something that some of us thought would be impossible: an outrageously entertaining film that feels utterly rooted in the bleak era in which it was made. Lockdown project or not, it’s a milestone.

Glass could hardly have asked for two more game accomplices than Clark and Ehle, who play the…well, the you-know-where out of their respective roles, and are both naturally attuned to the film’s murkily sensual, dread-laden wavelength.

There is a special cupboard in Purgatory for films that are blissfully unaware of what they’re actually about, and a place is reserved on its shelves for Love Sarah.

The irresistible comic elegance of the premise – a remarried widower is tormented by the ghost of his first wife – is lost in a mass of pointless embellishments and tinkerings.

The shape of its story is ultimately conventional, and the way in which it’s told can sometimes feel familiar – like a Sunday evening drama smuggling in big ideas. But the line it draws between the earthy and the ethereal stays with you: it’s a well-timed double dose of consolation and escape.

Its supremely frank and unflinching treatment of its essentially taboo subject gives it a certain brandy-slug of consolatory warmth, despite the bitter chill that blows through most of its scenes.

It’s a punchy, propulsive watch, blown along by snappy editing and a hip-hop-driven soundtrack that stresses that there’s still much fun to be had when hefty themes of inequality and geopolitics are being tackled. And honestly? There really is.

Great animation can communicate wildly complex ideas with head-spinning clarity and wit, as Docter capably proved with Inside Out – a film which staged the interplay of emotions in an 11-year-old’s head like a vintage sitcom. If anything, Soul pushes this capacity for revelation even further: there are moments of true Blakean mystery and wonder here, expressed with a crispness that feels like a lightbulb snapping on above your head.

So if Wonder Woman 1984 is playing near you, should you pounce? If it even remotely appeals, I’d say absolutely – even though the film itself, a direct sequel to 2017’s Wonder Woman, is a bit of a marshmallowy muddle.

It’s a project driven by ideas but made for a mass-market audience, which are always welcome in principle. The problem here is the good ideas are all extremely familiar, and the handful of new ones aren’t much to write home about.

Redemption may have eluded Michael Corleone, but his third film was more fortunate.

In a story that could have offered a parade of vivid character roles, only Foy and Glen really register: a kindly park ranger (Hakeem Kae-Kazim) deserved more screen time, while the various surly faces on the Manhattan carriage-toting scene are only thinly defined.

Mank feels like both a film for the ages and one hauled up from them: a forbidden tale grave-robbed from the Hollywood catacombs.

It’s the opposite of what a Borat film should feel like: business as usual.

Rocks would rather reckon with – and in the end, celebrate – youthful potential itself, and its extraordinary ability to flower in even the most unpromising soil.

The Trial of the Chicago 7 is both a courtroom drama for the ages and an urgent shot across the bows.

There may be no more fitting snack for a film that exudes casual bon-vivant allure, but is fundamentally nibbles and froth.

It's as simultaneously chilling and warming as a slug of ice-cold vodka, and just as liable to make your mind swim and eyes prick.

The film makes no attempt to grapple with the American school shooting as a nihilistic cultural phenomenon.

Thanks to both its mesmerising cast and McQueen’s flawless command of atmosphere and mood, it pulls off what I can only describe as a kind of cinematic jiu-jitsu – heaving you back to that precise moment in history, then lifting your soul out of your skin in one seamless move.

King’s fluid direction of her four actors means the snug setting never feels dramatically constricting, while their jostling performance styles make each combination of voices feels like its own distinct treat.

The sheer compassion of Zhao's direction is one of the film's most elemental pleasures, while McDormand is one of those rare actors who can somehow make the act of listening as thrilling as a barnstorming speech.

One of the finest films of the year: a shiveringly passionate period piece.

A surging tsunami-crash of creativity and beauty.