Strong performances, warmth and light comedy abound, even if it is a bit stagey.

Shot with grace and precision but paced with all the urgency of a Sunday afternoon stroll, Joanna Hogg's Haneke-lite study of an English middle class family is a well-crafted affair elevated by terrific moments.

Hogg stages some scenes with a sure sense of composition and dramatic tension but too often the film feels self-conscious and ponderous.

Begin Again is a joyous movie about the good things in life: love, family, relationships, New York, creativity and music. And Knightley and Ruffalo make for one of the most unusual engaging couples of the year.

It could easily have been a workaday music doc, but amid all the gigs, pit stops and sound checks emerges a funny and wry story of brothers at work.

Eat well beforehand or you’ll be in tummy-rumbling, tongue-hanging-out agony as the merry band cook their way across America. Good fun and happy, filling fare.

A character-driven thriller with more twists than an off-the-map dirt road, awards-quality performances from the three leads, a rare sensitivity to the after-effects of horror and a sure directorial hand. Mickle and Damici officially segue from ‘promising’ to ‘delivering’.

For all it boasts in ingenious style, this genial American yarn lacks the delicious bile of Jenuet’s early days.

Hogg’s films are never conventional stories, but this is a rewarding and affecting watch.

A romance not nearly as seductive as its lead actress.

A commanding, troubling domestic horror that should launch a long career for Avranas.

As meticulous as one of Claudel's sculptures, Hors Satan director Dumont and his star do this true-life story justice with an empathetic telling.

A satisfaction conclusion to the trilogy.

Conventional to an almost eye-watering degree, this could have used a little more effort to subvert the genre - and a little more Terence Stamp.

Half "GoodFellas," half "Dreamgirls," Jersey Boys is an appealing take on a grit-to-glamour biopic. What it ultimately fails to do, though, is convince.

Despite a few missteps this is a spirited, touching romance and Shailene Woodley’s best performance yet. Divergent fans after a weepie need look no further.

If not a star-making turn, Mbatha-Raw's tough, tender performances should give her plenty of opportunities in sharper fare.

Rare is the film that understands the pleasures of letting an enraged Ice Cube take out his wrath on an all-you-can-eat buffet. And which other blockbuster in 2014 would interrupt its climactic car chase to lob in a gag about Benny Hill?

A grimly funny social allegory that doesn't pull a single punch.

Like Chronicle, it's a fresh spin on the high-school flick. Unlike Chronicle, its execution never quite matches its ideas.

The toxic reaction in Cannes should offer fair warning: Weinstein's glossbuster is a bust.

A deeply moving drama played out on the small stage of ordinary people’s lives. An unforgettable performance from Jordan invests Grant with real humanity, while Coogler’s unvarnished script and sure-handed direction propel the film to its inevitable, terrible conclusion.

If this tiresome yarn is the ‘true’ story of one of Disney’s most popular villains then, please, give us colourful lies and happy ignorance.

An unlikely but effective found-footage horror from Goldthwait.

A road trip movie filled with simple pleasures. Ashmore does a solid job as a mariachi musician without a single grenade-launcher in his guitar case

Polanski’s unavoidably stagy adaptation of David Ives’ celebrated Broadway play is an enjoyably witty two-hander, confined to its theatre setting, yet with much to say about gender roles in the world beyond.

Despite visceral moments, it often feels like an excuse to use footage that didn’t make the 2010 film.

An unsparing look at the winter of life, salted with humour and emotion.