If anything, this is too faithful to the book, sometimes getting bogged down in detail as Katniss struggles to her goal. But its epic sweep, grand designs and unyielding central performance make this a compelling finale.

Really smart people on a really smart person: Fassbender, Winslet, Sorkin and Boyle await Oscar nominations. But for all its relevance and grandeur, Steve Jobs is ridiculously entertaining. You might say, user-friendly.

Nicholas Hoult does his best to bring Niven's weapons-grade scumbag to life, in a film hobbled by amateurish acting and absence of production value.

A fittingly poignant treatment of an inspiring subject.

Unshowy to a fault, Hytner delivers a fine, moving comedy of English manners between a writer and his eccentric tenant, which slowly deepens into an exploration of human bonds.

Unashamedly romantic and achieved with a beautifully subtle, old-fashioned elegance, it’s a graceful coming-of-age tale ripe for awards.

A likable horror-comedy with a satisfyingly high splatter count.

The tone is pseudo-Sopranos at times, but the oppressive ambience is grippingly sustained.

Even if this is less satisfying overall than Skyfall, there are sequences that rank with Bond’s best.

The inside track on one of sport’s biggest scandals, nimbly shot and sharply scripted, powered by an outstanding performance from Ben Foster and the quiet integrity of Chris O’Dowd.

It may be a little overwrought for some tastes, borderline camp at points, but if you're partial to a bit of Victorian romance with Hammer horror gloop and big, frilly night-gowns, GDT delivers an uncommon treat.

A bold portrayal of a boy soldier in a brutal, bloody conflict, anchored by commanding performances from Idris Elba and 14 year-old newcomer Abraham Attah.

There is delight and distress in equal measure: for his talent, mischief, waywardness, for the disillusionment and tragedy of his later years. Unique.

While strong on establishment prejudice, the coverage of clashing egos and agendas isn’t always incisive.

While it’s a bit of a slow burner, Mendelsohn is so compelling, there’s really no need for things to speed up.

Goldstein is enormously endearing, while Drever milks the mundanity for laughs and unexpected sweetness.

Jonny Owen’s winning doc appeals beyond football tribalism with a universal underdog story, boosted by a thumping disco score that gives a thud to the match footage.

While Ascher brings the experiences to life in a way that could conceivably induce nightmares in casual viewers, the potency of these scenes is ultimately diminished by repetition.

The film strains in two different directions, half trying to stay true to its based-on-fact roots, half wanting to ditch all that and become a ridiculous farce.

The interviews are as entertaining as the slick interplay on the ice.

Among the excellent principals, top-billed Turturro enlivens things wonderfully, but the real star, Buy, is magnificent.

It’s extremely antic for the most part, covering a lack of real story with a lot of distracting quirk. Yet when Petit’s foot slips out onto a wire thousands of metres from the ground, it’s quietly mesmerising.

A truly insightful art film that still manages to be easy-going and unpretentious.

While the storyline is a little underpowered, it's so packed with vinyl gems (Edwin Starr, The Salvadores, Frankie Valli) that Northern Soul fans will be doing backdrops in the aisles.

As you'd expect, Meyers handles the material with assurance and charm, and there's fun to be had in the odd-couple dynamic at her film's heart.

Silver remains exceptionally clear-eyed. The result is a powerful, gripping and deeply shocking film, and a contemptuous critique of Florida’s stand-your-ground law.

Inspired, innovative, stunning, with unforgettable performances and images, this is up there with the great screen Shakespeares. The playwright surely would be thrilled with it in its full-blooded vigour.

Big sci-fi ideas done on a budget doesn't quite translate into a compelling thriller.

This is not about where the Spicers end up, but how they get there, and you endure every stressful, exhausting and spectacularly tender moment of that voyage with them.

A beautifully murky, hard-edged thriller. Quite simply, one of the best films of the year.

Some plot developments are more convincing than others, but it’s still a compelling drama with an impressive turn from Garfield as well as Shannon and Dern as Garfield’s concerned mother.

A gripping and unheralded story that doesn't quite get the telling it deserves.

Tougher than a box of nails, this is a brassy revenge thriller that refuses to pull its punches.

It’s a sad, emotive, important subject but it deserves a more detailed, heartfelt film than this.

This slight, lightly charming comic adventure is most obviously appealing for the "Best Exotic Marigold Hotel" set — though Bryson himself was in his forties when he made his journey.

Visually striking, intellectually challenging and emotionally harrowing.

An exposition-heavy opening gives way to a modestly effective Australian mash-up of sci-fi/horror hybrids.

The film veers from quasi-real to cartoonily silly and scenes either drag or whirl by too fast.

Spectacular and well-acted, this suffers from much the same problem as the situation it depicts — too many people on the mountain and too many threads to follow so that affecting individual stories get lost in the snow.

Anchored by another great turn from Matt Damon, The Martian mixes smarts, laughs, weird character bits and tension on a huge canvas. The result is Scott’s most purely enjoyable film for ages.

This spends more time on the tensions between the dominant trio than their landmark campaigning.

A thriller in the key of Woody. The “same old, same old” but still entertaining.

Despite its sketchiness, this offers a vivid insight into the rejuvenation of a decaying city through fury, activism and music.

If only he had probed a bit deeper, and widened his scope beyond the predominantly white, male subjects (including our own Rob Brydon, Steve Coogan and Stephen Merchant), this could have been a fascinating film as well as a funny one.

Helgeland’s savvy new take on this well-known story proves that crime can pay, while Hardy is astonishing and magnetic in two truly towering performances.

While it’s a woefully incomplete middle chapter, at least it’s never boring.

Sadly, proof that they will make absolutely anything these days.

Delve into the story at your own risk, but embrace the unrepentant stupidity of it all and there’s a zen-like joy to be found in this screenvomit of adolescent violence.

Hardly groundbreaking but this high-school actioner ghosts by on its charm and sense of fun.

A smart riposte to the ’hood drama stereotype. Dope is funny, stylish and mostly exuberant fun.

A tough yet tender and beautifully crafted human drama that more than earns those Loach comparisons.

Full of restraint, from both its director and leads, this is a quiet gem with the power to move.

Zac Efron makes a convincing bid for movie stardom — and Ratajkowski proves she’s more than just a pretty face — in this flawed but fitfully entertaining film, even if it all goes a bit Pete Tong at the end.

While there are fun moments, the whole is an odd mix of grotesquerie and cutesiness.

Potent and visceral in its depiction of street life and blinged-up excess alike, Straight Outta Compton delivers big beats of both kinds.

While the Norman vistas are glorious, the storytelling lacks wit and charm.

An engaging, if familiar, mix of teen rites of passage, the fun of friendship and mooning over a cool girl. Still, Nat Wolff and Cara Delevingne make for a watchable duo.

Tom and Anna are so thinly sketched that by the time the painfully slow set-up starts to pay off, we no longer care who does what to whom, or why.

Less a reboot, more a hit-and-miss cover-version. The cast are game, Applegate especially, but the laughs flatten like a deflated tyre.

Cavill and Hammer are made for each other, but the film can’t always find the pyrotechnics to match their chemistry.

Noah Baumbach’s great run continues. Sharp, fast and witty, it’s old school screwball comedy with a cool modern twist. And Greta Gerwig is a bona fide genius.

At times it feels as if five different films are going on at once, but Schumer’s whip-smart delivery and no-holds perkiness keeps it all in place. Just as her director wilfully mines his own life for laughs, there is a whole lot of Amy in Amy.

Carol Morley’s film has a lot going for it, not least a thick, vaporous atmosphere, alive with unease and sexual anxiety, and an eye-catching debut from the casually charismatic Florence Pugh.

As an origin story that’s all origins and no story, there’s a hollow, stale feeling to this occasionally admirable attempt to Nolanise Marvel’s dysfunctional family.

The truly effective emotional arc is handed to the furry member of the cast.

A flawed yet fascinating Aussie indie.

Holly Hunter goes toe-to-toe nicely with the superbly understated Al Pacino loner obsessed with a long-lost love — one of his most rewarding outings in a very long time.

Minnie’s inner life, a fantasia of animations appearing Crumb-like around her, is dazzling, and there’s plenty of naked emotion amid the sex, drugs and hand-drawn penises.

Familiar formula yet Morgan Matthews’ feature debut adds up to a satisfying whole.

Late director Albert Maysles (Gimme Shelter) beautifully captures her personality and her passion for creativity.

It’s genial, with appealing stars and fair giggles.

Impressively nightmarish.

Easily, almost nonchalantly, best in franchise, Rogue Nation dispenses with the dead weight of realism or relevance for state-of-the-art thrill-making in a classical mould. The series has finally found its voice.

It feels a little like ‘a very special episode of The Walking Dead’ and might be a tad low-key for its field, but Schwarzenegger and Breslin are good and the payoff is affecting.

Outstanding account of a pivotal moment in small-screen history.

Don’t get too caught up in the all-too-familiar plot, just savour Jake Gyllenhaal’s powerhouse performance in a riches-to-rags-to-redemption sports movie that punches well above its weight.

Partly the story of a music scene, but mostly the story of a man who realises that living the dream isn’t always the best thing for your life. Vivid, immersive and blessed with a perfectly nostalgic soundtrack.

The science is haphazard, the techniques gimmicky, but the point is cogently made.

The former comedy co-stars (Knocked Up) are superbly cast in this fascinating, fact-based story.

Superb star turn from Maria Alexandra Lungi but this doesn’t grip as it might.

Some of his Salgado's depictions of human suffering are not for the faint-hearted but, like this fine film, demand to be seen. Unmissable.

As bleak, unflinching and utterly unmissable as its predecessor.

Inside Out is audacious as it is silly, as funny as it is imaginative.

A science-fiction, action-heist, superhero comedy soap opera, this straddles as many genres as the Avengers films have characters but manages to do most of them pretty well. Extremely likable, with a few moments of proper wonder.

Despite a second act lull, Connolly convinces in this cute and charming comedy.

Lea van Acken is outstanding but Dietrich Brüggemann’s severe gaze invites voyeurism, not empathy. A stony, stifling if fascinating film.

Less fun than last time and oddly unpleasant in its tone. MacFarlane takes potshots at everyone he can find, while shielding the two characters that deserve it most.

Like it or not, Six has contributed something fresh and demented to pop culture.

Visually, this is an exquisitely composed film, and it teems with curiosities and compassion. If on occasion the story seems to wander, it arrives at an enchanting destination.

Do the right thing — take a break from summer spectacle to check out this assured and eloquent indie.

This is the film Brian Wilson’s talent deserves: original, smart and affecting.

While beautiful, early scenes of shocking violence give way to philosophising and gauche symbolism.

If director Chuck Workman maps a familiar rise and fall of rule-breaking brilliance it is vindicated by the great raconteur and in-depth praise from an impressive roster.

A vibrant, haunting documentary, and a poignant tribute to a free spirit.

Director Alan Taylor handles the big action adeptly as he did in Thor The Dark World, but the script is an ever-decreasing cycle of tool-ups, chase sequences and daft monologues.

With Soderbergh now only on cinematography duties, this one takes all of the original’s surface — chiefly the hip gyrations — and none of the substance, interesting character arcs or charms.

The filmmaking is exemplary but most impressive of all is the tone that mixes comedy, melodrama and darkness.

Farty, burpy, fall-y over fun tied to a pretty inconsequential plot. Your kids will explode with joy.