The same ragtag energy which propels it can occasionally become distracting, and there are sequences in the script which feel gratuitous. However, its independent spirit shines through gloriously, reminding the viewer that, really, a decent story and some talented actors is all that’s required to make a movie.

In its depiction of a part of Europe struggling to keep up with neoliberalism, R.M.N. exposes the dark mirror of liberal, globalised western European metropolitanism.

Director Akay is not messing around with his disgusted assessments of conservative Turkey in 2020.

Most importantly, Red Rocket is a humane comedy, a portrait of romantic douchebaggery and an America of flailing last chances.

Mistress America is, despite it's wobbles and preference for humour over depth, a delightful diversion from Baumbach's typically weighty output and a star-show for the pair of performers at its centre.

Much like the multitude of heady jazz numbers that flow throughout the film, Paris Blues is a cool, breezy and laid-back character-led romantic drama with strong turns by the four likable leads, not least the late, great Paul Newman, effortlessly exuding that trademark piercing blue-eyed intensity and magnetism.

This isn’t a film about sexual assault as a rare aberration, but about a culture which collectively diminishes any notion of consent and encourages a rush to experience.

The stakes are upped and character count doubled, but this doesn't mean attention to detail is spared. The visuals are sublime with different animation styles used to tell different stories.

While Chastain, and the surrounding cast, drive the narrative there is no denying that as time runs on it begins to unravel frustratingly, reaching an unsatisfying conclusion. Yet, Chastain's performance is one that lingers in the mind.

Wilder’s supreme skill at balancing light with dark is almost unsurpassed, and is the perfect fit for the chameleon-like talents of both Lemmon and MacLaine.

True Grit’s brilliantly crafted moments of wild and frenzied action, hilarious dialogue (courtesy of Portis himself) and beautiful cinematography (from cinematographer Lucien Ballard) helped it to compete with the hugely popular film’s of Leone.

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.

Iran is a complex and bureaucratic country, but it is also the role of social media and so-called ‘fake news’ that lend A Hero a contemporary relevance, even as it feels like an ancient morality tale.

The pint-sized simplicity of this acutely well told and acted tale should not be underestimated.

The film is both a biography of Cave's life and a beguiling vision of a musician considering the meaning of his own art.

It's a feel good movie but also a refreshing blast from the past, expressing a nostalgia for a time when political quietism and apathy had not won the day and a Billy Bragg song made more than historical sense.

Kreutzer employs a variety of subtle anachronisms – servants wearing modern glasses, a concrete wall here and there – to allow herself and Krieps the freedom to introduce a modern sensibility that sticks a middle finger up at the polished production design of most films of this genre as casually as Elisabeth does at the decorum of her courtly life.

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.

Fire at Sea is a film that expertly plays with contrasting moments and themes.

The movie is a gas. It moves with, well, dispatch, clattering along in its own eccentric way.

Ahead of the pack must be the winning duo of Cary Grant and Audrey Hepburn, whose performances in director Stanley Donen’s masterpiece Charade is as intoxicating as a dry martini.

The directors’ regard Hatidze with reverence and respect, allowing her the space to feel the tragedy and confusion of her plight and to sit with her melancholy as her life is changed by forces she cannot control.

What stands out most in Siegel’s The Killers is its unfaltering commitment to pulp fiction.

It’s the committed turn from Day-Lewis and Hanif Kureishi’s socially-astute, Oscar-nominated screenplay that manages to compensate for the film’s technical shortcomings, alongside the (then) landmark casual representation of a gay relationship on screen.

John Frankenheimer’s 1962 film is a stately and moving depiction of the man’s capacity for dignity and improvement.

Through this absorbing, sometimes disturbing documentary, Spender reveals much about Italy's underworld, as well as the people's passion for spectacle, their machismo, pride and their rivalry.

The Club is an enthralling parable that's calibrated to shock and amuse in equal measure.

After Yang is a moving, subtle and grounded piece of science fiction that doesn’t necessarily get to the core, but certainly hits the heart.

The Brood sees the undisputed king of body horror honing his visceral eye, whilst at the same time offering up several truly iconic images that have quite clearly endured.

One More Time with Feeling is a bold poem in itself, a portrait of the artist struggling to understand the essentially incomprehensible.

Featuring a cavalcade of colourful characters, lively merriment and a wit and charm like no other, Jour de Fête marks a spectacularly well fashioned introduction to Tati’s old-fashioned and playful sense of humour.

Sharing its name with a 1950 Joan Crawford film, The Damned Don’t Cry has thematic resonance with its namesake as a study of women’s vulnerability in a patriarchal society and the criminalising of marginalised lives.

The Fits is slimmed down but Holmer achieves a great deal with economical, nuanced storytelling where no image or sound is without meaning.

Youssef himself with his crooked smile and exuberant enthusiasm comes across as someone who in a normal state of affairs would be just another amiably slick joker. But in this context he takes on the bravery and the bearing of a hero.

Though the film tries for ironic detachment – twelve chapters with a prologue and epilogue – it ultimately can’t wink away its own heartfelt compassion and sympathy, even as it refuses to provide any trite solutions.

Drawing from the style of Chinese ink brush paintings, and aided by the rain that pours constantly, the film has a watery, fluid look and texture, each exquisite frame a moving painting.

Happy End may be something of a greatest hits mixtape, but it's also an arresting offering.

Lilting looks set to linger on in the memory of those who seek it out for weeks, months and perhaps even years to come.

This Is Congo is an angry film, yet one which is never blinded by its anger. McCabe offers no solutions – the UN Peacekeeping Force are rounded on at one point by furious locals – and no grounds for optimism. Yet even in its attempts to understand and to communicate that understanding, there is a defiance against the easy fallback of despair.

An expertly handled and brilliantly performed feel-good comedy with an original twist.

If the overall plot is a little two-dimensional, a little ‘tell me something I don’t know’ in its mining of upper-middle-class callousness, it’s hard to fault the magnetic craft of this exquisitely unpleasant picture, like a broiling jacuzzi of hallucinatory sex and violence that you might briefly dip a toe into, if you dare.

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.

For much of its brisk eighty-two minutes running time, Emelie (2015) is a devilishly good thriller of notably transgressive bent, giving the slasher and home invasion formats a rare matriarchal focus.

Full to the brim with sharp wit, emotional sincerity and overflowing with love, Supernova sees the star power of Colin Firth and Stanley Tucci align.

Too Late to Die Young is Castillo’s remarkable endeavour to relive memories, sensations and lived moments from a time and place she has long since left behind.

While it hardly pushes the envelope in terms of developing Marvel's homogenous narrative conveyor-belt, it does do so in other areas, suggesting that the MCU can see beyond the confines of its first two phases.

With The Postman's White Nights, Konchalovsky offers up an intimate and moving pastoral.

To follow-up a successful film is a daring achievement in itself, but to surpass it is something else, and that’s what DuBois does here.

Laverty and Loach have created another hard-hitting, powerful film, spiked with humour and moments of rare but profound humanity.

In seeking to understand both abuser and abused, Slalom offers a truly nuanced picture of abuse without sacrificing indictment.

Pink Flamingos remains a delightfully repugnant cinematic treasure. Watching Divine as she struts her stuff amongst the genuinely dumbfounded residents of downtown Baltimore, perfectly encapsulates with Waters was reaching for with the film.

Okja is exuberant and wild filmmaking.

Clearly modelled on a familiar western narrative, Pablo Fendrik's The Burning (2014) both embraces and playfully inverts the tropes that define its genre classification.

Beneath the veneer of fake tan, rippling muscles and feigned ecstasy lies a striking amount of heart, soul and sincerity of emotion.

Not since Jane Campion’s The Piano has a costume drama presented such a gorgeous view of love from a woman’s point of view.

In arguably a career-topping performance, Timothy Spall plays the cantankerous painter as a complex, grunting, snarling and utterly single-minded creature.

Mulubwa’s performance gives I Am Not a Witch its furious heart, but Nyoni weaves her spells subtly and has produced a film of intensity, satire and grace.

Shiva Baby is ostensibly a comedy yet has all the tension of a thriller. At its most emotionally fraught, it uses the visual and aural grammar of horror cinema.

The Defiant Ones combines Stanley Kramer’s trademark liberal politics with a picaresque adventure that is deftly entertaining, tense and heartfelt.

No Man of God sets out to demystify serial killers and achieves its aim.

With his first big screen endeavour, Patrick, Peaky Blinders director Tim Mielants has crafted as unusual an exploration of grief and loss as you are ever likely to see.

Thompson's strikingly assured and unflinching debut pumps new life into a well-trodden genre.

Archipelago is a sharply observed and excruciatingly honest exploration of family relationships and the mess that we call life. Hogg has proven herself here to be one of Britain's most important film-makers.

With Sorkin's signature whip-crack dialogue driving an astonishingly assured directorial debut, Molly's Game is an exhilarating, superbly crafted crime drama.

Never has the banality of the plight of refugees been laid out so plainly as in this heartbreaking, Kafkaesque documentary.

Quickly paced and oozing with visual ingenuity, The King and the Mockingbird is an off-kilter but enormously enjoyable passion project whose stance as the vanguard of gorgeous, purely hand-drawn animation is as notable as its notorious production.

A hugely accomplished debut, and an innovative approach to filmmaking, Cummings will be one to watch for sure.

The Forbidden Room (2015) is Maddin's aesthetic nearing critical mass, a whimsical, genre-spanning opus that demonstrates the totality of his enigmatic style.

Tim Wardle engagingly recounts the fascinating story of a set of triplets who were separated at birth and reunited through coincidence when they were 19. The telling however slowly takes a darker turn as facts around the original separation are probed and frightening truths about science and human intent come to the surface.

Both tender and hilarious, Sisters is a raucous romp and complete catnip for fans of Fey and Poehler.

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

Fundamentally, On the Rocks understands that the rich complexity of long-term relationships – both paternal and spousal – can never truly be captured, only gestured towards. The result, on screen, is deeply warm, funny and comforting, and among Coppola’s finest work.

It's witty, smart and brilliantly played, plumbing the sub-aqueous depths of our psyches, our histories and desires.

As with much of Miyazaki’s own output, the film offers a winning heroine and a joyful dip into Japanese folklore, even if it does not stand up against the studios most celebrated works.

For most of his career, Paik was dismissed by critics and struggled financially, but as director Kim amply demonstrates, his work has had tremendous influence on both fine art and popular culture. Moon Is the Oldest TV is at once a celebration of that work and testament to its incalculable value.

The real success to Ralph Breaks the Internet is how, while having the most amount of fun possible, it’s also able to be cleverly subversive (no longer should the iconic Disney princess be reliant on men to strive) and deeply rooted in its themes of friendship, and all the ups and downs that follow.

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.

It’s wholesale thievery of what is a director’s famed aesthetic, for sure, but it does somehow fit the lyrical and haunting material, often beautifully so. Also, the shallow field of depth used to heighten – and blur – the boundaries between the magical world and the natural world is successful in creating rich atmospheres.

With Avengers: Age of Ultron, Whedon doesn't merely hit it out of the park, he Hulk-smashes it.

The Lost Leonardo is about obsession, ego, power and greed. For almost all of the film’s characters, Salvator Mundi represents nothing more than opportunity.

While it is serious, Hogg also manages to insert some oddball humour and a little hopeful levity into the proceedings. The fractures provide the absolutely riveting subject matter, but Exhibition shows the potential for healing and confirms its director's place at the forefront of intriguing British filmmakers.

It's a film that prompts an overwhelming emotional response as it weaves its dark magic.

A Jarmusch joint through and through, The Dead Don’t Die is as charming, affected and perplexing as we’ve come to expect from the long-time darling of US indie cinema.

Francofonia is a chatty and occasionally brilliant rumination on art, history and death.

Despite the multiple viewpoints, Monster is actually the anti-Rashomon, a jigsaw puzzle rather than a riddle wrapped in an enigma. The care and empathy with which the director and writer, as well as the performers, extend to all corners of the piece is extraordinary.

Tarkovsky possessed a sensibility for, and mastery over, the cinematic form that few directors – before or after – have been able to match; a mastery evident in almost every sublime frame of Mirror.

Kurzel is a master at building tension of a tragedy foretold.

Drily narrated by Udo Kier, Hitler’s Hollywood is not a film about the rise of Nazism, nor even a linear history of the era’s cinema. Rather, it seeks to capture its spirit, interrogate its aesthetics and finally, to try to understand the insidious power of its propaganda.

The film is a bravura depiction of the harsh brutalities of war that, though monotonous, is an entirely rousing entry in the annals of great WWII cinema.

The final few minutes will baffle some, infuriate others, but it will also be the wildness of the imagination which will have you pondering Evil Does Not Exist long after it has ended.

The slow burn lead-up may not be to all tastes, but if you can tune in to its broadcast frequency Midnight Special will shine its light on you too.

There’s no revolutionary moment of success in which the meanies are ousted and hip-hop declared godly. Music is like education in this: it’s all about the movement, not the destination.

A brutal, crackling and savage Hollywood satire Maps to the Stars knows exactly where it's going, carefully breaking every rule in the book. After carefully constructing his crystal kingdom, Cronenberg launches his stones with dark, mischievous joy.

Memoria is gloriously weird and it has that most magical quality of making you look at things in a totally different way.

Pig offers something strangely tender and even sometimes lyrical, wrapped up in the trappings of a noirish thriller that is as much a satire on the meaning of value and social status as it is a straightforward revenge film.

Comedy is used to undercut the most horribly tragic of moments...given the sadness all the more pathos and offering glimpses of hope in a narrative resistant to catharsis.

For a film that looks at a believably nightmarish future, The Congress sits out of its time; a feverish relic of a post-revolutionary cinema of the mind that attempts to transcend the confines of a bloated filmic space that appears no longer interested in discourse, and would rather parley its audience into a stupefied boredom.

Second Spring is a film about endurance and acceptance, tackling its subject matter with quiet poise where a lesser film might have fallen to mawkish sentiment.