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.

As blades pierce flesh and Carpenter’s iconic theme swells, the film wrestles with provocative imagery it’s not entirely in possession of, but which is nevertheless rich and layered with meaning. Whether transcendental, idiotic or both, the effect is overwhelming, a catechism for a series that has defined modern horror.

The humour is scant and there's no real risk of peril (Grant George's nephew and his dastardly plans seem more psychopathic than threatening). Yet when you have a film that's colourful, easy on the eye and full of positive messages about friendship and trust, then kids will be happy.

With references to other sci-fi films, however, it's obvious Project Almanac is aware of its genre clichés, strengths, and faults, and that makes for a genuinely fun time for film buffs.

The blend of influences does feel hackneyed, at certain junctures.

This is a punchy and promising debut from Pront.

It's an enjoyable jumpy imitation.

Sadly, In Secret's script is so loaded with dud lines that any of the more successful elements are quickly erased from memory.

A resolutely offbeat film which offers a richly rewarding and affecting viewing experience if you’re willing to embrace it’s esoteric flourishes.

As much as the sequel aches to remind audiences of what they liked first time round, it struggles to establish itself as its own unique entity.

While the first half has a brisk, upfront approach, the final hour is gobsmackingly dull - with emphasis on the smacking.

There’s just enough thrills and gills here to satisfy both monster-movie junkies and advocates of multi-million dollar US/Chinese co-productions.

Unlike some of the other blaxploitation titles from that time, Foxy Brown is more than just a curio piece. That’s partly down to its iconic lead, but it’s also due to a strong feminist attitude which exists within that riotous, eager-to-entertain, exploitation framework.

What’s most repugnant about Project X is its utter lack of moral consciousness, with the overriding message being that such disregard for property and community deserves little more than a slap on the wrists – a message that couldn’t be more ill-advised in a time of such amplified social despondency.

That’s not to say that it’s a complete wash-out. The film comes to vivid life during Remo’s ridiculous yet hugely entertaining training sequences, and there are flashes of inventiveness and personality elsewhere. It’s just a shame that more often than not, the film feels like a stunt performance showreel – complete with distracting pre-CG concealing wire work – with not enough investment in character or pacing.

Skillfully mixing elements of horror while never alienating its core PG demographic, The 'Burbs also benefits from a wonderfully playful score by the late great Jerry Goldsmith. While the film bottles it slightly at the end with the obvious, neatly-tied-together resolution which would have benefited from maintaining an ambiguity, the enormous sense of fun established by Dante and his cast in the run-up more than makes up for any shortcomings.

The Son, though perhaps not as original and accomplished as The Father, is nevertheless an affecting, empathetic and intelligent drama.

Where Snyder’s previous film at least tried to consider the ramifications of Gods living among us, Justice League is about nothing other than the vapid, commercial need to make a Justice League film.

It's a rancid cocktail of misogyny, homophobia, and much more besides, that never convinces as scathing satire as much as back-slapping celebration.

The Leisure Seeker is dry-eyed even at its most moving and a celebration of love even as it reaches its end.

Dark, lurid, sadistic and powerful, it is at the least a fascinating and bold debut, and promises better to come.

Neither player wins the audience's allegiance during the oft-strained game of seduction - much less convinces as a human being.

It's a muted affair all in all; the script thin and relatively drama-free, which proves irritating considering the assured performances and flashes of brilliance that do flair up.

Red Joan is unlikely to appeal to younger audiences and many may find the wartime plot, setting and slow-paced romance old-fashioned, but it will win fans because there is much to admire: The solid acting, Lindsay Shapero’s deft screen adaptation, Zac Nicholson’s evocative cinematography, accompanied by George Fenton’s original score.

It may be stuck in the past, with its hoary clichés about the call girl with the heart of gold and the incurable romantic, but the whole thing fizzes with such joie de vivre that the anachronisms only add to its overwhelming charm.

A rollercoaster ride of tongue-in-cheek cliché, there's plenty of fun to be had with this cheekily reverential horror; yet, a dependence on the sexualisation of the female form anchors the film firmly within 'knowing' horror misogyny.

Postman Pat: The Movie is a disappointment; a modern-day reinvention of a traditional, much-loved classic that differs so far from its comfort zone that it'll have a difficult time winning audiences, let alone maintaining there attention.

Like much of his recent scripted work, it's a mannered affair that's vague and clumsy.

So much is thrown at the wall that some of it's got to stick - comedy for comedy's sake, if you will - and while that doesn't make for a great film necessarily, it certainly doesn't make for a bad one.

There are the occasional moments when Bushwick lets on that it knows that this is all truly awful.

A super sweet, affecting comedy with a magical premise and a terrific central performance from Larson herself.

Grimsby fails in its satirical mission due to a hodgepodge of generic action and ill-advised comedy.

Rape scene aside, Nowhere is stunningly beautiful to watch. There’s not one frame that hasn’t been intricately stylised. Araki brings his trilogy to a head in a bundle of celluloid confusion that encapsulates nihilistic teenage mentality and delivers an expressionistic banquet for your eyes to devour (and your brain to decipher). It’s a wild, enjoyable teenage riot.

Hotel Transylvania 2, much like its predecessor, never aims too high, so the fact that it comes as such a pleasant surprise makes it all the more entertaining.

Few of Planetarium's many strands are neatly tied together. There's an ambition to almost every shot as Zlotowski creates a rarified version of nighttime Paris.

When you're pining for Bill Paxton and the relative emotional realism of Twister, you know you're in trouble.

Everything looks incredible, but the players are all just ciphers for ideas that Snyder lacks the wherewithal to execute.

San Andreas' whirlwind of action and devotion to the disaster movie playbook will satisfy those looking for a loud, effects-filled ride. Those inspecting it any closer will find a cookie cutter studio blockbuster which stretches disbelief to its limits.

A grandiose title which suggests some kind of a smutty coming-of-age epic, but in reality only manages to deliver the grubby goods sporadically.

A drab and airless affair, it effectively ignores the substantial political commentaries inherent in its story, and fails to land the emotional punches of the one it's intent on telling.

Doremus doesn't appear to take the world he has created at all seriously. The rules shift and bend, are observed - or aren't - according to the exigency of the narrative, which ultimately renders the whole exercise fundamentally unconvincing and fatally irksome.

The Girl in the Spider’s Web demonstrates how uncertainty is a detriment, just as it proves Alvarez will always be a stylist worth watching.

Vita and Virginia is a remarkably chaste and safe film given its wealthy subject matter.

While not entirely successful, the film’s sense of finality gives the main players space to grow, unhampered by the usual carousel of upcoming sequels and spin-offs.

Despite its myriad issues, Glass is often a hoot to watch – particularly once Elijah comes out of his self-induced fugue to wreak havoc on the facility, with Jackson hamming it up with infectious relish, bouncing off the gurning McAvoy.

In an age where many horror franchises attempt to adhere as close to the original film’s formula as possible, Hooper’s The Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2 is a fun reminder of a time when makers were able to rewrite their own rules and go for broke. This was never going to top what had gone before, and by acknowledging that, the filmmakers have crafted a wonderfully demented alternative in its place.

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.

A dry and surprisingly dull film, it is a comedy which doesn't induce a single laugh and a drama that doesn't engage emotionally or pull on the heartstrings at all.

While the core concepts of Transcendence and the questions they pose are inherently interesting, the manner in which the themes are explored feels extremely superficial.

Like The Da Vinci Code and Angels & Demons before it, Inferno stumbles into the same pitfalls of convoluted plotting, kindergarten art history and conspiracy theories of the daytime-slot-on-the-Discovery-Channel sort.

Spall and Redgrave are both magnificent, rising above the material in a way only talented actors can. One wonders what they could have done with more interesting and passionate material.

Directed by Sean Anders, the film goes out of its way to contrive its central masculinity crises in ways that quickly settle for lame, lowest common denominator jokes.

This is the kind of oddball midnight movie that could easily gain a cult following and there are delights to be had in the midst.

After all is said and done, ‘The House that Lars Built’ is an impressive construction for an obnoxious purpose. In fact, the best criticism comes from Talking Heads and their song Psycho Killer: “You’re talking a lot but you’re not really saying anything.”

Clooney only shows flashes of comic moxy, and everything is drowned in a now tiresome fetishizing of the 1950s aesthetic, with gizmos and supermarkets, office furniture and hairdos glossily remade.

There will be those for whom Angel of Death provides precisely what they are after, but a couple of brief flashes of quality aren't capable of making the film anything close to creepy enough.

Pompeii make tick all the necessary movie checkboxes, but its execution is unoriginal and uninspired.

Whatever strange alchemy went into this film, nothing is so strange as how compelling it proves to be when you approach its premise with complete seriousness.

Arnie completists will enjoy seeing the Austrian Oak in good form, but as a whodunit thriller Sabotage is found severely wanting.

The only thing Joffe's Before I Go to Sleep has going in its favour is that it's too brief to really lull you into slumber - despite its best efforts,

Horrible Bosses 2 is by no means an atrocity, but it's tired and unexceptional, which is perhaps worse.

Maniac Cop deserves to be re-evaluated as a quintessential 80s B-movie – low on brains but high on charm – and lucky viewers should keep an eye out for cameos from The Evil Dead (1981) director Sam Raimi and the Raging Bull himself, Mr. Jake LaMotta.

Despite its claims to zaniness and colouring outside the lines, probably the most damning indictment of the silly Suicide Squad is that it's unrelentingly bland.

Other than a sinking feeling, there’s not much else The Chamber is going to give you.

Abattoir doesn't have a jaw-dropping...shock scene, but the ending does pack an emotional punch, of a type so few and far between in the annals of horror cinema.

Double Impact is a perfectly fine film, and is easily one of the best to come out of Van Damme’s back catalogue. If you want a film to have whilst drinking some ‘manly’ beers with ‘manly’ friends, then you could do much worse than .

Ultimately, though it hints at moments of wit, Cuck never feels serious enough to be a convincing character study and not garish enough to head into genre territory. Ultimately, this sordid tale feels both real and inconsequential.

Budgetary restrictions offer a narrow visual scope which isn’t helped by the plodding, stagy pace (maddeningly slow at times).

It's essentially a collection of shoddily edited action sequences, underpinned by a monotonous narrative that has no purpose, let alone moral heart to reward viewers' waning attention.

Sculpture is the art of turning lifeless stone into something that looks alive, flesh, living bodies and movement. Jacques Doillon's Rodin, in competition at Cannes, does precisely the opposite, turning living beings - passionate artists, no less - into lumps of lifeless clay.

With no fun to be had, The Gunman also lacks essential thrills. If Sean Penn is winging for an action-hero renaissance like Neeson's, he'll be in need of material a lot more compelling than this.

It's hardly original nor necessary, but it's a fun and absorbing escapade on the Seven Seas.

Terminator Genisys' ambition overrides sense and depth in the pursuit of a new direction, and then unwittingly proves how little life there is left in this franchise.

It is dull, cynical and utterly mirthless.

Not great, not hilarious, but not terrible or awful either.

Were it not for these overwrought provocations The Golden Glove could have been Akin’s most accomplished work in years. Aesthetically speaking it remains a marvel.

In an almost impressive display of ineptitude, Dominion combines the very worst vices of its predecessors in addition to a few new ones for good measure. As well as non-existent characterisation or thematic coherence, quaint concepts like comprehensible scene geography and narrative tension have all but disappeared.

Like most of Howard’s films, Hillbilly Elegy is perfectly watchable, unchallenging and largely forgettable awards fodder.

Tod Williams, a journeyman best known for Paranormal Activity 2, has managed to transfer King's very popular brand of horror with a good deal of success.

What the director and writers have done is turn something that's considered by many to be dumb-but-fun into an overlong, unfunny film that's just plain dumb.

An unfunny undead comedy that in harking back to the days of the classic B-movie would be flattered to be classified as an E-movie.

Winterbottom's The Face of an Angel makes for compelling viewing, painting an arresting character portrait even if it avoids the direct engagement with the original (and much-discussed) crime that some people may have been expecting.

There's no doubting Hazanavicius' sincerity in trying to bring the Chechen conflict, the war crimes committed against the civilian community and the indifference of the international community to light, but it's this righteousness that gets in the way of The Search working as a film first and foremost.

The attempt to make an intimate, multi-stranded story out of this royal episode is appreciated, especially given its subplots which effectively compare with Kristina's own struggle between independence and duty, but the gripping central performances lack a proper foundation.

The Vatican using VR technology to seek out victims of the demonically possessed is an intriguing and weirdly logical progression for the 21st century (move over exorcists, now we have techxorcists), but what generally lets the movie down is its bland dialogue, bland casting, and routine approach to frights.

Despite a liberal dose of full frontal nudity, The Canyons fails to fully revel in its sleaze, struggling to even work as a deadpan satire on the kind of vacuous and deadened Hollywood types Easton Ellis brought to life in the pages of his debut novel, Less Than Zero.

Another limp, almost laugh-free comedy to add to Diaz's long list of failures, Kasdan's Sex Tape fails to ignite the obvious chemistry between her and the usually solid Segel, himself in possibly his least entertaining performance.

Not exciting enough to be taken as straightforward thriller and not engaging enough for a dramatic character piece, Egoyan's The Captive is held back by its own lame script and a distinct lack of necessity.

The jokes are far from fresh, yet the shock laughs are on a par with their inaugural outing and will undoubtedly appease fans of the original.

The problem with The Guardian is that though all the ingredients are there, they fail to come together in the final mix.

In many ways this is an adult Frozen with Gothic sensibilities by way of The Lord Of The Rings, making for a derivative pastiche of the past two decades' cinematic fantasy offerings.

Jones has great talent as a director, but even with good performances by the cast, Mute is let down by a weak and bland script.

Venom is a desperately confused piece of work which has only a few compensatory pleasures to offer along the way.

The film should scratch an itch for the Bowie obsessive hungering for a decent take on the overall mythology, but at the same time, it may leave that very audience wondering when, if at all, the South London lad will get a more comprehensive big screen outing.

As fate closes in on the lovers, the silliness of their own behaviour and Marguerite & Julien in general prevents any pathos from entering the scene. The taboo of incest never troubles as one never truly believe that they are brother and sister - or in love - or anything else.

Stands out as a prime example of what not to do when trying to construct a watertight feature-length narrative on the foundations of a simplistic platform game.

There is a tender story about paternal love and the desire to do right by one's family within A Second Chance but, regrettably, Bier's brand of melodrama derails it before it begins.

The brutalisation of three female characters is horrific, but it would be a presumptuous leap to suggest the film itself flexes a misogynistic creed. Such assertions would woefully misconstrue Bakhia's thematic subtext, which is an examination and comment on the male mind warped by patriarchal thinking and a manipulative form of self-exculpation/cowardice.