An unorthodox romance that will leave you sweaty-palmed and tearful, in equal measure. It doesn’t quite reach the heights it could, but there’s a hell of a view at the top.

Surprisingly exciting and laugh-out-loud funny, Thelma is a warm-hearted joyride. If anything, it’ll make you really want to pick up the phone and call your own grandma.

Despite some shaky moments, Chuck Chuck Baby is an endearing tale of self-acceptance, wearing its heart fully on its sleeve thanks to the affecting central romance and joyous transformation of its protagonist.

The 4.5 hour-plus runtime might put some off, but that massive canvas only allows for the deepest of deep dives into a monumental achievement in cinematic science-fiction. Another glorious day in the corps!

This is a bold, unusual and gorgeously realised take on the very familiar slasher template — even if it doesn’t quite live up to its innovative promise.

A tale of pelts that pelts along, with more lunacy and creativity than a brace of other films, this film dares to go full beaver. Don’t sleep on it.

A chilling concoction, featuring a remarkable transformation of Nicolas Cage and a reminder of Maika Monroe’s star quality. Submit to its demonic darkness for a singular, sensory cinematic horror experience.

With Edgar-Jones and Powell’s fizzing appeal at its epicentre, Twisters at once feels like a testament to a new generation of stars and a gripping old-school movie event. Fear it. Watch it.

Greg Berlanti’s revisionist comedy offers a fresh take on the Apollo 11 moon landing, but its convoluted conspiracy fails to capitalise on the charms of Johansson and Tatum’s workplace romance.

Kill lives up to its name, and then some: this is a breathless, ferociously gory action film, on a level rarely seen before in Indian cinema.

A compelling if formulaic star-crossed lovers’ narrative. Come for a wordless seduction, stay for the complexities of parenthood, drag queens and family loyalties that deserve more of your time.

It looks fantastic, Gru is still loveable, and smaller viewers will be engaged enough. But Despicable Me 4 stalls in its overstuffed plot and its lack of an interesting narrative.

It purports to celebrate the pursuit of science, but this film may have single-handedly set the space programme back a decade.

All involved have done a solid job in executing what most fans likely want from a very belated Beverly Hills Cop sequel. This is not an action movie with the slickness or invention to take on any current blockbuster franchise. It’s cheerfully old-fashioned and easy. It feels like you should be popping open a VHS case to watch it.

Not even Nicole Kidman playing off Kathy Bates — or Zac Efron singing Cher's Believe — are enough to save what should have been a surefire hit from Hallmark musings and tired clichés.

The female-first vibe is refreshing but Something In The Water is something old, nothing new, a lot that is borrowed and an eyeful of twinkly blue.

A solid A Quiet Place entry is elevated by Lupita Nyong’o and Joseph Quinn’s affecting performances — a surprisingly tender tale of the end of days.

Capping an unusual trilogy, MaXXXine is an intense woman-fights-back thriller. Mia Goth’s Maxine is what you’d get if the Robert De Niro and Jodie Foster of Taxi Driver were fused in the telepod from The Fly.

A thoughtful, affecting debut feature from Tremblay that puts a necessary spotlight on Indigenous peoples — featuring another exceptional performance from Lily Gladstone.

Another humane, odd and highly accomplished Yorgos Lanthimos film, one that sees him returning to the tone of his earlier work after The Favourite and Poor Things.

An unremarkable and quickly forgettable B-movie. Jessica Alba makes a decent stab for John Wick’s particular brand of movie vengeance, but she needs better material than this.

There’s a wobble about how committed this is to being a scary movie rather than an inside Hollywood drama, but — like Exorcist III — it springs one great lunge-out-of-an-unexpected-corner-of-the-frame jump scare.

Out front and backstage, this illuminating but not quite revelatory documentary shows a vulnerable, exhausted Blur and the band at their best. Interesting to casual fans, essential for devotees.

More of a slow burn than a thrill-ride, this study of bygone motorhead mentality at its most visceral and violent is gorgeously shot — but only nicks the surface.

A solid shark thriller whose admirable but clunky eco-warnings almost get in the way of a good time. Best when it allows itself to really go in-Seine.

It’s not the fault of either star, but the half-baked script makes this an unsatisfyingly thin exploration of the weighty themes it seeks to cover. More intellectual cut-and-thrust and fewer flashbacks would have helped.

More solid Prime Video Sports Doc than Subject-Transcending Asif Kapadia Investigation, Twelve Final Days is nonetheless an entertaining, occasionally illuminating and at times surprisingly moving look at the final bow of a genuine tennis legend.

It’s all a little too lightweight, and not above corniness and sentimentality, but it does earn its little emotional breakthroughs, modest as they are. And the sense of time and place is vivid.

Though things go off the rails in the third act, Arcadian’s intriguing premise and inspired monster design pack plenty of scares into this post-apocalyptic fable.

It's fine for an epic to sprawl, but you want a sense of purpose at the same time, and this one sometimes loses its way. Still, it’s handsomely shot and well performed, a throwback to the glory days of event-movie horse operas.

A devastating, urgent reminder that art can be dangerous and important and political and powerful — especially in ten-inch heels.

Through this decade so far, Pixar’s films have held great ideas that haven’t quite reached their full potential. This is probably its best film since Coco, and best sequel since Toy Story 3.

Sasquatch Sunset is a gloriously vulgar film about made-up monsters from children’s stories — but it is also a terribly melancholy adult story about the violence of progress. What a remarkable, unique, sad little cult oddity it is.

A Western that hits many of the expected beats but which does so in an unexpected manner, being centred on a tender, loving relationship rather than gunplay and grit.

Fanning brings her A-game and there’s enough mystery about the monsters in the woods to string audiences along until the satisfyingly weird finish. As mid-list horror goes, perfectly fine.

Scruffy and overstuffed, but contagiously good-natured. And frankly more films need to feature showdowns at abandoned alligator-themed amusement parks.

Ron Howard’s genial account of the legendary Muppeteer plays it safe, with a fairly traditional documentary-making approach — but it still manages to be adequately inspirational, celebrational and, yes, even Muppetational.

Eschewing the linear approach, this erratic documentary occasionally drifts a little too close to self-indulgence. But it’s also a frank, funny and disarmingly deep portrait of a true screen legend.

It’s long and sometimes gets swept astray by currents of family drama and period detail, but Ridley’s plucky determination and can-do energy carries the whole thing along. The result is an old-fashioned inspirational pleasure.

Though it takes too long to get into the swing of things, Sting delivers faint echoes of the B-movie classic it wants to be, offering a memorable foe in a giant, bloodthirsty spider.

By putting technology on trial as the chief parasite causing modern malaise, but fusing it with a melodrama about love, Bonello has created a wholly original work that pulses with prescience.

Lopez throws everything at this, but even major movie-star charisma can’t make up for the recycled story elements, tired exposition and endless psycho-babble. Maybe the machines can take over and do better.

This latest attempt to adapt the world’s laziest cat for the big screen just feels plain lazy: pure kids’-movie-by-numbers. The cinematic equivalent of a Monday.

Glen Powell achieves certified movie-star status and Adria Arjona shines in this slick, seductive romantic thriller. Don’t let it get buried in your Netflix watch list.

Luna Carmoon’s grimy study of loss might ultimately be too strange for its own good. Nevertheless, this debut boldly announces the arrival of one of Britain’s most promising new filmmakers.

Far from perfect in its execution, but once IF hits its stride, Reynolds and Fleming keep this emotional adventure entertaining enough.

The chassis may look familiar but there is a very different engine driving Furiosa from that of Fury Road: it’s a rich, sprawling epic that only strengthens and deepens the Max-mythology. It shall ride eternal!

Tarot is a personality-less horror that doesn’t overly concern itself with either character or plot. It’s here to deliver one thing and one thing only: cool kills.

Enigmatic, absorbing and so much more alive than any pottery behind glass in a museum, this is an exquisitely crafted, grown-up Indiana Jones steeped in its own distinctive magic.

It's less action-heavy than the last trilogy and inevitably more ape-centric, but this is a promisingly chewy start for the latest series of simian thrillers. These apes are still strong.

If Pop-Tarts are barely a breakfast, Unfrosted is barely a movie — but it’s sprinkled with solid gags, stuffed with super-silly guest appearances, and lovingly glazed in sweet ’60s trappings.

Deceptively courageous and perceptive on parasocial celebrity culture — and on the fallacy that women have expiration dates — The Idea Of You has good, clean fun with two characters it’s impossible not to love.

With some incredible stunts and Gosling and Blunt on top form, this gloriously entertaining comedy is a love-letter to the unsung heroes of cinema.

Seize Them! turns the Dark Ages into the daft ages, delivering a mostly entertaining, female-centred comedy enlivened by winning performances.

Despite a valiant effort from Justice Smith, the satire in The American Society of Magical Negroes feels aimless, scattered across a story that struggles to pick a meaningful direction.

The performances are solid and the story is touching — and perhaps that will carry this to its chosen audience. But it's a little flat for true drama.

Despite some fun action excess and an impressively committed performance from Bill Skarsgård, Boy Kills World is a muddled, tiring mess, favouring violent shocks over cohesive storytelling.

Hugely affecting and perfectly played, Nowhere Special is a peach of a picture.

Kidnapped is an expertly paced, gorgeously shot and evocative true story of faith, family, and the power of people coming together to right deeply ingrained wrongs.

Tense and occasionally disturbing, but somehow you’re left with the nagging suspicion that what should have been a meaty psychological drama has been turned into a slightly insipid thriller instead.

A solid, old-fashioned Irish Western about what it means to hang up your rifle. It isn’t especially deep, but it’s good to see Liam Neeson find some character depth among the usual shooting and grumbling.

With a cast this talented there will always be decent moments, but they never cohere. Credit for its casting and design, but it’s not the movie messiah, just a very disappointing mess.

Marginally better than Part One, but still a weird, messy and humourless sci-fi that gives you little reason to cheer the potential continuation of this Snyderverse.

Tossing a malicious vampire kid among squabbling, not-exactly-un-dangerous humans is a recipe for a wickedly enjoyable thrill ride. One of the messiest vampire movies ever made, and winningly so.

A beautiful, subdued Daisy Ridley performance anchors a story that is underplayed to the point of almost non-existence. Still, if you’re tired of blockbuster bombast, this could be the antidote.

Operating at the peak of his powers, Luca Guadagnino has the time of his life with this practically sadistic exploration of unrelenting obsession. It is horny, it is hungry, it is phenomenally exciting filmmaking.

A deceptively simple tale with a lot to say, Drift lingers long, thanks largely to a mesmerising performance from Cynthia Erivo.

A solid performance let down by a script that cherry-picks the facts and ultimately tells us less than we already know. Watch Asif Kapadia’s Amy instead.

For veteran viewers who’ve seen it all before, it’s not exactly the Second Coming. But novice nunsploitation audiences might find this habit-forming: a stylish enough entry-level initiation.

Scoop is not quite the prince that was promised. But there are some gripping moments, and some extraordinary performances — especially from Sewell and Piper.

Director Ryusuke Hamaguchi subverts expectations beautifully, but this brain-teaser makes no bones about the violence that often comes with ‘progress’.

This doesn’t reinvent the wheel, and keeps you waiting too long for the final showdown — but when the creatures collide, it still delivers satisfying thrills.

As a political statement, Civil War is provocative and occasionally exasperating; as a purely cinematic experience, it is urgent, heart-in-mouth, extraordinary stuff.

Visceral and heady, this is a blood-soaked, all-American fable that’s as if Thelma And Louise literally went on steroids. Rose Glass is a force to be reckoned with.

Stylish, high-energy, smart and eye-wateringly violent. There are quibbles, for sure, but where it counts, Monkey Man goes bananas in the best possible way.

Sophisticated, adult thrillers are few and far between, and Mothers’ Instinct fills the void admirably. With vivid, striking imagery and top-notch production design, the film paints an exciting, moreish portrait of psychological intrigue.

A smart, original approach makes this much more than just another Exorcist wannabe. You’ll sense that there are horrors coming, but you still won’t quite feel ready.

Immaculate has the look of something as lightly spooky as the Nun films, but is prepared to go a lot further — abetted by a committed lead performance — than your average haunted convent picture.

There was potential here, but Frozen Empire is an overpopulated mish-mash, with too many heroes to wrangle. What’s left is a bit of a gooey mess. We’ve been slimed.

Who needs humans? This is visual storytelling at its finest, a traditional animation of gentle, unshowy genius. Sometimes the very best love stories go deeper than words can say.

A bit of an odd one, an action-comedy throwback that doesn’t quite know what it wants to be. Still, it bodes well for Pierce Brosnan’s new phase as a grey-haired action star.

As with a number of arthouse films, the ending leaves something to be desired. But, courtesy of its meticulously mundane digital imagery, this is a film of precise details that sketches an outline of existence and then leaves it to the audience to draw their own conclusions.

As a fairy-tale romantic rendering of Ireland, Irish Wish is almost offensively bad; as another rung on the ladder for Lindsay Lohan romcom supremacy, it is almost, somehow, beyond reproach.

A gentle, odd little Australian fable. Warwick Thornton’s film has a lot of thoughts to process, and while they don’t always cohere, the performances from Blanchett and Reid keep it interesting.

Monster is Hirokazu Kore-eda channelling Christopher Nolan: twisty storytelling in the service of wise empathy. There is no judgement in Kore-eda’s worldview, just human behaviour in all its glorious complexity.

Not a total catastrophe, but perilously close to being one. Is it too obvious to say Imaginary is simply lacking in imagination?

Expertly handled by director Doug Liman, wittily scripted, and boasting a wonderfully original take on the action hero archetype, this new Road House is a total riot.

Despite John Cena’s best efforts, Ricky Stanicky is a comedy that delivers nothing but tedium, wasting a clever idea by repeating the same jokes over and over.

Too childish and shallow for adults, yet too brutal and gory for kids, this is one Damsel that really does need saving, after all.

A step back from the last film in terms of ambition, this nevertheless continues the series’ chirpy, amiable mood. Nothing to be po-faced about here.

DuVernay’s sweeping odyssey is an ambitious (if sometimes messy) spectacle. At its best, it holds a poignant power that provides plenty of food for thought — enough to linger long after the credits roll.

Atmospheric and chilling, Out Of Darkness doesn’t reinvent the wheel, but adds some thoughtful twists to a well-worn genre. It’s an intriguing sign of things to come from a new filmmaking voice.

Come for the wise alien spider, stay for Adam Sandler at his sombre best in this strange, heartfelt sci-fi drama. Here’s hoping he continues to push himself to new highs.

As furiously funny as it is helplessly horny, this lesbian road movie simultaneously feels exactly like a Coen brothers film — and entirely its own thing, too.

Another epic helping of sci-fi wildness from Denis Villeneuve that’ll take true believers to paradise — even if it’s a bit too much Spice to digest in one sitting.

Repetitive insults do most of the heavy lifting for this comedy, but any time spent with actors as skilled as Colman and Buckley is time enjoyably spent.

In a film that could have bowed to easy clichés, Chastain and Sarsgaard are a class act — their touching, tactile chemistry is the film’s triumph.

Zen and the art of toilet cleaning? You’d better believe it. This is as gentle as it gets — a humble little film, maybe, but an enriching one. It’s a soul-cleanse.