The film manages to illuminate precisely what makes Dylan’s opaqueness so captivating.

An achingly intimate portrait of a marriage weathering a storm ... what shines is the combination of Owen McCafferty’s stingingly honest screenplay and the two lovely, emotionally textured central performances.

Though perhaps low on insights, this is an evocative portrait of a brief, intense window of hedonism, self discovery and Olympic levels of self-indulgence experienced by young people on the cusp of adulthood.

In true, blunt Aussie fashion, Last Stop Larrimah takes this wild-west story as it comes, and Tancred tells it well.

Semans pushes Margaret into potentially preposterous narrative terrain, but Hall’s total commitment to her character’s growing mania helps ground the proceedings, no matter how outlandish the plotting becomes.

Effectively a chamber piece spiked with musings on the difficulty of art, the piece is by nature a little stagey as well as talky.

Wildly uneven, sporadically brilliant, occasionally unbearable, Alex Ross Perry’s sprawling portrait of a self-destructive rock star is carried by a performance by Elisabeth Moss which is turned all the way up to eleven, and beyond.

The Nice Guys harks back to the 70s golden age of revisionist detective thrillers, but the result feels too knowingly déja vu, rather than bringing a truly fresh angle.

A paean to the importance of retaining one’s childlike enthusiasm, the animated The Little Prince is itself a charmingly innocent film, lacking some of the storytelling and design sophistication of its Pixar and Dreamworks competitors but nonetheless delivering a sweet, likeable tale.

A Ciambra may be a conventional tale of a young man trying to find himself, but the writer-director’s attention to detail enriches that setup.

The newness is subtle and gently perplexing, but very satisfying indeed.

Eagles Of The Republic reunites Saleh with Fares Fares, the lead in the earlier pictures, to mock film industry egos while delivering a chilling commentary about a tyrannical government which imposes its will both through media propaganda and deadly force.

Unfortunately, no matter the initial electricity DaCosta brings to the material, the crackle gradually starts to wane, the momentum diluted by extraneous subplots and slack pacing.

Affecting as well as perceptive in how it intimately depicts the awkward blossoming of youth, Heartstone wades into the crowded coming-of-age genre with just the right amount of confidence, compassion and clear-eyed style.

The script holds plenty of satire and laugh out loud moments, but Wilson and Huston keep it supple enough to bend protectively around the central love story, while allowing the morality tale element to still have bite.

[Quivoron] emerges as a formidably kinetic director, who could easily have a career making pedal-to-the-metal action movies - although her way with character and deep-dive exploration of working-class subculture suggest that she is way too individual to take a straight generic path.

For all its originality, the film fails to leave much of an impression.

While some of the decisions by first-time director Gaysorn Thavat reveal a lack of experience, [Essie Davis] is as compellingly watchable as a car crash.

It’s a modern melodrama that dances through a moral maze, sometimes uncomfortably so. Yet, coming from a filmmaker who has always been preoccupied with the roots and the dynamics of male violence, it poses an intriguing central question.

As a star, Patel has rarely been better. And as a director, he grants an intoxicatingly gruesome vision of the kind of gritty vehicles he could steer in the future.

The film’s destination might be apparent, but the trek through past regrets, race relations and the central subject itself never feels drawn out.

Whenever Herself settles into predictability, the strength of Dunne’s performance pulls that comfortable rug away. And if her screenplay and her acting helps audiences understand what it is to be homeless, to be vulnerable in this way, Herself will have been a A-grade build by an A-list team.

Paul Rudd and his equally likeable cast mates find the heart and humour in familiar comic-book theatrics, resulting in a film which is less concerned with generating awe than in delivering plenty of goofy grins.

Its relatively tranquil surface, its small amusements (many of them revolving around a tasty turn by John Turturro as a histrionically insecure American leading man), its moments of touching, almost Sirkian melodrama, above all its ability to tease resonant themes out of seemingly inconsequential scenes or lines of dialogue, make for a film that is greater than the sum of its parts.

Its old-school charm shades into tired plotting more than once, and the moral lesson concealed in the film’s central story about a gang of tykes’ search for buried treasure can feel a little preachy.

Debut feature director Sebastien Vanicek proves to be adept at wringing every drop of tension out of this slim narrative, elevating this B-movie creature feature to A-grade horror.

With the consistently playful, often delightful and frequently funny God fantasy The Brand New Testament, the Belgian auteur delivers his most substantially enjoyable film since 1991’s Toto The Hero.

Promised Land deftly flits from biography to impact study to cinematic essay on the boom and bust of happiness-peddling myths, drawing a clear line from the music king to the current US leader.

Together Together makes for comfortable viewing elevated by Harrison’s sparky presence.

This is a compulsively watchable drama which taps into some genuinely intriguing themes. A twisted and tangled final act makes heavy weather of some of its reveals, but Binoche is terrific throughout.

BenDavid Grabinski’s time-twisty, sci-fi gangster comedy Mike & Nick & Nick & Alice is brimming with hair-brained schemes and hilarious gags; the kind of unruly one night adventure that isn’t about logic, it’s about stoking delirium.

Lit from within by the sunny disposition of its main character, Mrs Harris Goes To Paris is a lovely, modest ode to kindness, anchored by Lesley Manville’s considered performance as a housekeeper who is tired of feeling invisible.

The measured pacing and an overly generous running time might work against the picture, but for the most part, it’s a rich, rewarding and fully fleshed-out drama.

Padraic McKinley’s feature directorial debut is a hugely confident survivalist tale that’s as bluntly effective as the primitive weapons employed in this bare-knuckle saga.

It’s a handsomely mounted period piece, which acknowledges the strength required by previous generations of Indonesian women to rise above the patriarchal demands of a restrictive society. But the storytelling, by writer and director Kamila Andini, is exceptionally slow and can be rather laboured in the points that it makes.

A nail-biting, evocative and utterly persuasive crime drama that is very much a part of the country’s burgeoning film output.

The period details are impeccable, the look and feel are seductive, but the muddled script lacks the killer instinct of its central figures.

Co-writers Julian Barratt and Simon Farnaby fly the flag for a rare original idea with the goofy, genial, fitfully inspired Mindhorn.

While the first half of Rotting In The Sun may be overly self-indulgent, once Silva gets himself out of his system, he gives his skills and Saavedra an opportunity to shine.

Ariane Louis-Seize’s debut feature plays like a coming-of-age genre mash-up, and features a tortured blood-sucker protagonist reminiscent of Only Lovers Left Alive, A Girl Walks Home Alone At Night or even The Hunger, although it is narratively and stylistically striking enough to make its own impact.

The result is a polished horror yarn that leads to a satisfying conclusion, and leaves the impression there is more than enough material here for a potential prequel or an extension of Solveig’s story.

As arresting as this speculative portrait can be at times, the film is ultimately both galvanised and limited by how unknowable its protagonist turns out to be.

As free-wheeling as a Preston Sturges farce, the handsome-looking Mug feels scattershot at times but it does convey the sense of a Poland racing towards hell in a hand cart.

Loveridge doesn’t seem to trust Maya’s natural significance and strains for the doc about her to achieve UN levels of relevance. Taking her for what she is would have been more than enough.

While this stirring dramatization of Davidson’s life hits conventional narrative beats, sensitive handling and a remarkable central performance from Robert Aramayo do heartwarming justice to a remarkable life.

Thompson delivers a memorable performance as the abrasive “cold witch,” as someone describes her, perhaps even outdoing Meryl Streep’s Miranda Priestly in The Devil Wars Prada as a delightfully wicked woman of power.

Unlike Yankovic’s best songs, Weird’s inspired goofiness eventually runs out of gas, growing more and more outrageous without coming up with comparably choice gags.

A film drunk on its own trashy, lurid aesthetic, Knife + Heart (Un Couteau Dans Le Coeur) has style to burn but not as much sense.

Charline Bourgeois-Tacquet’s intriguing, modest drama keeps its focus tight on Gabrielle but, thanks to a keenly observed screenplay and Drucker’s finely balanced performance, presents a wider view on the female mid-life experience.

As the story travels from bittersweet to comic and back again, The Last One for the Road never feels like it explores new territory in terms of its characters and situations. But the specific setting both in time and place make it a very vivid portrait of a place ravaged, like its characters, by time, but hopeful that one last drink might enable things to be seen in a more positive light.

Meditative and meandering, this handsomely shot but unfocused picture might present something of a challenge to all but the most dedicated students of Chinese cultural history.

It is ultimately a heartfelt, inspiring story about ordinary people who choose to stand up and make a change – and a reminder that, for so many women, the fight goes on.

While the character’s resulting journey of self-discovery may follow familiar lines, it is bracing nevertheless.

Structurally inventive, if not downright format-twisting, it takes a Jacob’s Ladder to 1990s China, where a beleaguered police detective tries so hard to unravel a killing that he spins himself into seeming madness.

This is filmmaking which echoes Cohen’s music style – it’s contemplative, searching and stripped back, but it can also be somewhat navel gazing, ponderous and very slow.

This twisted fable suggests a filmmaker who gleefully goes to extremes, but the story’s shocks and stomach-churning gags prove more memorable than the underlying observations about the way in which women are pitted against one another in a patriarchal society.

The result is a cheerfully lurid mess that goes goofily off the rails after a slow build, and will offer few surprises for adepts of Lovecraft or of screen schlock.

There are plenty of elements to admire in Amant Double but the endless twists and revelations grow tiresome.

A timely film, capable of sparking vigorous debate.

It is the resilience of individuals that seems to reflect a melancholy Cuba acutely aware of its past but curious about its future. There are times when Epicentro seems to lack focus but no matter where it roams, it always returns to its central concerns of colonisation, mythmaking and the way the true spirit of Cuba resides in its people.

Australian director Cate Shortland (Somersault, Lore) takes a horror movie premise and imbues it with the knotty emotional complexity of a dysfunctional relationship psychodrama.

A weaponised comedy which concludes with real poignancy. ... The film shares with [Veep] a similarly tart and unvarnished view of the savage, sweary machinations of power and the expendable status of the powerless.

The result is a deeply touching tapestry that celebrates the diversity and cultural richness of LA, while at the same time exploring the hopes and fears of a generation heading into an uncertain adulthood.

On its surface, Materialists tackles familiar romantic-comedy debates — contentment versus passion, money versus happiness — but Song approaches these themes with a frankness that makes them feel fresh.

The result has a definite voice – even when its protagonists struggle to find their own.

In No Sleep Till, it feels as if time is standing still.

Although The Phoenician Scheme is transporting — an effect amplified by Alexandre Desplat’s lilting orchestral score, supplemented by selections from Stravinsky and Beethoven — the narrative proves to be fussy rather than delightful.

Richly detailed, sensitively played and cleverly mounted.

Sluggish pacing slightly undermines the film’s main assets — the strong performances from Kelli Garner as Mary and a suitably ravaged-looking Nick Stahl as Eli.

Boosted by some lovely performances from its young actors, writer-director Christopher Zalla’s sometimes-creaky feel-good film is most affecting when it explores how some children can have their future taken away only too soon.

Jude makes us think and makes us feel and succeeds in making Blecher a presence in the film.

The heady fusion of teenage romance, gothic fantasy and Mafia thriller becomes an immersive, atmospheric drama.

Mackenzie’s film works best when it believes in its audience. And it feels tantalisingly close to greatness when it allows the relationship between Ash and Sarah to simmer. The pacing is so unhurried, and the script has such deliberate mechanics that the film remains enthralling, despite an overbearing score.

Hvistendahl gives her ensemble time and space to deliver the conflicted emotions they are feeling, a mixture of shock and longing playing out on their faces and in their movements.

Blind Willow, Sleeping Woman is an impressive achievement, a piece of storytelling which balances moments of flighty whimsy against deeper existential questions, marking Foldes as a talent to watch in the world of adult-skewed animation.

Newcomer Jelly Lin brings a delightfully quirky demeanour to her literal fish out of water.

Offering an eye-opening insider perspective that comes as a reminder of what conviction politics looks like when it is maintained even under extreme pressure, as well as being a celebration of feminism, Prime Minister holds appeal for audiences well beyond New Zealand’s shores.

Israeli teacher-turned-filmmaker Matan Yair mines his own experiences for Scaffolding, bringing depth and poignancy to what could have otherwise been a familiar tale.

Writer-director Potsy Ponciroli has crafted a taut Western that borrows heavily from familiar themes and storylines, but it has been constructed with such confidence and precision that one can’t help but be seduced by the picture’s stripped-down spell.

Solidly grounded, teeming with thought-provoking ideas, wonderfully atmospheric, and often visually striking, this magical realist eco-fable about a dead mother who returns to transform the lives of her dysfunctional family pays the price for its own high ambition and is simply unable to sustain the intensity until the end. But until then, it’s a hypnotic and entrancing ride.

Emily Watson leads the cast delivering, yet again, a stinging reminder of her talent.

Moll is a director who is adept when it comes to loading the screen with tension; actors swerve in from the side of the frame, silhouetted against the plateau, all playing characters who are clearly not walking a straight line mentally.

Debut director Prano Bailey-Bond crafts a stylish, effective horror that is both an homage to genre cinema of that period and a psychological dive into the combined traumas of grief and guilt.

In the end, Sex is a compelling exploration of ordinary men trying to figure out who they are permitted to be, how they are evolving and what their lives are all about.

If Saroo’s story seems out-of-this world, the team behind this film have risen to meet the challenge it sets. There may be a sense of inevitability about Saroo’s ultimate destination, but what counts here is the journey.

Miseducation has a funny, breezy surface — even though tragedy predictably intervenes at one point — but Cameron’s wry sense of humour doesn’t diminish how warping these conversion centres are, slowly instilling in people the sense that they’re faulty.

Rocketman is so energetic that it’s possible to be swept away by its enthusiasm for putting Reg on a pedestal. Too often, though, the film just flattens you, demanding fealty to Sir Elton.

Faucon, obviously very fond of all his characters, carefully avoids the patterns that many genre films fall into.

The journey is definitely worth making, as both people and places lead Kit slowly towards some sort of rapprochement with his identity.

Backed by a wealth of archive interviews and a judicious use of clips, Gregory Monro’s elegant documentary should prove irresistible to those familiar with Kubrick’s films and keen to deepen their understanding of his process and filmmaking philosophy.

Inevitably, this will mean it draws comparisons to The Babadook, the current high-bar for grief manifestation horror, but Daddy’s Head, which premiered at Fantastic Fest, is sharply drawn, well-shot, and genuinely unsettling in its own right.

Consistently, persuasively unnerving, It turns the coming-of-age drama into a nightmare.

This is a moody comedy about unconscious marital discord, but it’s also about that ineffable discontent that envelops most of us. Digging For Fire is funny because it rings true — and because it stings a little.

The trouble with a high-stakes “small” British project like this is that everyone involved tends to want to play it safe.

Between the extensive VFX creature work – led by Mike Stillwell and Andrew Simmonds - the performances, the tone, and the life-or-death subject matter, experienced shorts director Pusic has given her debut her all, and observers will take note.

With its restrained tone and measured performances, The Sun Rises creates a fragile world populated by characters who don’t know how to move forward — either separately or, perhaps, together.

This initially subdued, superbly acted story of an unlikely connection takes a savage and unsettling tonal swerve in the final act. The latest from Paul Andrew Williams will not be for everyone, but it is a chokingly tense commentary on the precarious nature of community.

While the film is contemplative, intimate and visually arresting, its deliberately slow pace lessens its dramatic impact.