The Incredible Jessica James may be a slight romantic comedy, but there’s abundant pleasure in watching comedienne Jessica Williams in this star-making performance.

Deeply empathetic and increasingly universal, Ghaywan’s sophomore effort isn’t particularly subtle, but that does little to dilute the film’s impact or detract from its message.

Suzume is hardly a film for all tastes, but is certain to thrill anime buffs across all ages and continents.

A very basic formula, executed in bare-bones fashion, works a treat because this set of interviews with Brian De Palma on his life and films is so revealing, and entertaining, that little is needed here other than the man, his opinions and some telling illustrations.

Its immersive intensity makes it essential viewing for Serra followers, and for anyone interested in documentary’s ability to record, and make us think about, the extremes of the real world.

Its impact sealed by across-the-board strong performances from its all-male cast, Tangerines is a film about loss and belonging, about rootedness and departure.

The impressive feature debut from Maltese-American writer and director Alex Camilleri manages to be both self-contained, in its depiction of an embattled community, but also unexpectedly far-reaching in its themes. The film is an exploration of masculinity in crisis, of the attrition of traditions by the forces of progress and of the agonies and uncertainties of new parenthood.

Between the highs-and-lows of razzle-dazzle couture there a substantial film here, and a frank portrait of a damaged, evasive man trying to come to terms with what he has done.

Szumowska’s command of craft and a torrent of unsettling imagery will enhance her reputation as a visionary director.

Cesar Diaz’s debut feature is both compact and ambitious, distilling its larger themes into the core story of one young man and his secretive mother.

The Smashing Machine may not always transcend genre conventions, but is a consistently idiosyncratic and candid look at a working-class athlete with a complicated romantic relationship and a crippling opioid addiction. Despite his hulking physique, Dwayne Johnson plays Kerr with real vulnerability as his championship aspirations slip away.

Dynamic storytelling and powerful performances bring out the pathos in an unusual tale of conflicting loyalties set on the criminal edges of a travelling community.

It’s the empathy Syversen and her lead actress evoke for a free spirit battered into submission that is this tough little film’s greatest achievement.

A satire of Hollywood ego, a loving tribute to Cage’s hair-trigger intensity and a consistently funny bromance, Massive Talent doesn’t overstay its welcome or ever get too pleased with its premise, finding humour and sweetness in the notion that sometimes even Nicolas Cage can’t live up to being Nicolas Cage.

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.

Provocative Italian feature Bad Tales is one of those films that aren’t afraid to confront you with the grimmest aspects of the human condition, but yet leave you feeling strangely exalted by the sheer cinematic invention involved.

[A] subdued but affecting drama which showcases both a stark and striking backdrop and a pair of lovely, intimate performances from character actors Dale Dickey and Wes Studi.

This is pungent filmmaking which creates a world steeped in superstition, ritual and folk-magic.

Fences is a deeply affecting treatise on marriage, poverty and the struggles of sons to confront the long shadow of the man who brought them into this world.

It is a fascinating, horrifying story and Klayman eschews any tricks or gimmicks — bar some lively collage animation — to allow this explosive narrative to evolve through the eye-opening experiences of those who lived it.

Built on a potent mixture of quiet bravery and hard-won access, David France’s new documentary, Welcome to Chechnya, puts audiences in the middle of the literally life-or-death struggle of an already endangered minority.

In its style as well as its psychological focus, Hounds of Love marks Young as a filmmaker to watch, though he’s not the feature’s only standout. His trio of leads has rarely been better.

Giving her characters shading and the story space to breathe, Talati has created a quietly captivating, sharply observed film.

The ending is as low-key as the rest of the film, but the subtle shifts in power and understanding feel like a significant coming of age.

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.

Gitankali Rao’s debut feature is a stunningly realised work of animated film-making.

To reveal much at all about the film’s abrupt change of register around two-thirds of the way in would be unfair. Suffice to say that if The Mountain has been a very austere, mid-life-male variation on Into The Wild up to now, it soon feels like we are watching a Gaspar Noé movie, with a little dose of Miyazaki thrown into the mix.

More than a quarter of a century later, Beauty and the Beast enchants again as a swirling blend of live-action story, stage, screen and sheer, rococo-spun fantasy.