There’s nothing about this watchable but somewhat workmanlike dramatisation of the literary fraud behind author ‘JT LeRoy’ which is anywhere near as extreme as the story on which it is based. But Justin Kelly’s low key directing choices allow the two very fine central performances to take centre stage.

Indulgent and meandering, but also very funny and thought-provoking, this film is ultimately about how little we understand about others — as well as ourselves.

More frustrating than nerve-wracking, Old is hampered by its one-dimensional characterisations within an intriguing set-up.

Rather than attack his subject with bristling anger, Arcand approaches it with world-weary wit and the kind of warming optimism that might not appear out of place in a Frank Capra classic. The result is a little old-fashioned but also surprisingly endearing and feels like some of his best work in a while.

Distinguished by a cast in which the trans characters are played by trans actors, the film effectively uses the trials of an individual life to illuminate the prejudices faced by a wider community.

The gimmick for this schlocky action picture is that it’s almost entirely dialogue-free. The story unfolds through ambitious action sequences and montages; the film helps itself liberally to the cheese buffet that is 1970s MOR rock.

The movie is competently made, but also perfunctory, telling us things about the greed of rich business executives and the shallowness of cable TV that we already know.

Yesterday is a film we’re all familiar with, for better or worse.

For all its showy excesses, sophomoric humour and strained gravitas, Ambulance is often riveting, the film speeding along as recklessly as that ambulance. This popcorn thriller certainly is not brainy, but its escapism has a muscular precision.

Starting sedately but promisingly, it sails (literally, in one respect) into a perfect storm of heavy-handed symbolism and sentimentality.

While The Boogeyman — based on the 1973 Stephen King short story about a closet-dwelling stealer of souls — is as narratively generic as its on-the-nose (and oft-used) title may suggest, British director Rob Savage brings an innate humanness and playful spirit that lifts this otherwise-rote monster movie.

Wendy casts a powerful spell — the movie has the potency of a dusty folktale brought to vivid life — but it can be frustrating that Zeitlin doesn’t have much interesting to say beyond his stylistic flourishes and evocative atmosphere.

While we understand Sam’s back story and present situation, we too rarely get a sense of who he is when not struggling against misunderstanding and harsh weather.

Hot Milk lacks some of the lush, heady symbolism of the book, and opts for a less teasingly ambiguous approach to the storytelling. Mackey, however, impresses, as a woman driven to distraction by the neediness and manipulation of those around her.

It’s easy to buy Hardy’s dual performance, and it doesn’t get in the way of the film – although some actor-ly exuberance in the delivery of Ronnie can sound an off-note, with Hardy using some facial prosthetics around the jaw line which aren’t particularly subtle.

In the end, there’s perhaps just too much sheen to this heartfelt portrait for it to really bite. But it remains a touching tribute to a woman who, von Trotta suggests, pitted a radical desire to question everything against the comfortable certainties of the men who surrounded her.

A marketable slice of hit-and-miss mischief that doesn’t suggest a career rebirth so much as a larky side project that will yield more in the way of nervous laughter than quickened pulses.

Adam Driver brings a brooding energy to the role of a tortured genius architect seeking to craft a modern utopia in a city threatened by mindless spectacle and rampant greed, but Megalopolis is stymied by arbitrary plotting and numbing excess. One can feel Coppola’s anger and sorrow over the decline of his beloved America, but narrative coherence is far less apparent.

A superhero movie with the scope of an epic but the spirit of a mischievous boy, Aquaman is a goofy, uneven adventure that proudly sticks to its loopy vision even if it doesn’t quite work.

The picture is irreverent yet oddly touching, never especially great but often disreputable fun.

Too much of Kursk revolves around scenes of sodden sailors sitting around wondering why someone doesn’t just hurry up and rescue them. A sentiment likely to be shared by some audiences, as well.

DC takes the multiverse for a spin in The Flash, an entertaining adventure that outruns its familiar narrative trappings thanks to a playful sense of humour and the arrival of an iconic character in a supporting role.

More often than not, the stirring tunes and the genuineness of the proceedings help paper over Spirited’s rough spots. A couple of twists are well-handled, and Ferrell’s performance as a dutiful ghost who suddenly questions his (after)life choices reveals a vulnerability which is disarming.

You are well aware of the shameless manipulation and can second-guess exactly where it is going and yet resistance is futile. It tugs at the heartstrings with such determination and sincerity that there may not be a dry eye in the cinema.

Walk With Me is a slip of a film, at turns worthy and profound, yet also soporific and uneventful, an occupational hazard of spending three years embedded in a Zen community, no doubt.

There’s more texture than might be expected from characters based on plastic dolls.

Freud aside, this is a fairly straightforward boy-to-man narrative, but that it plays out during such a turbulent time in Austrian history brings additional texture.

Altogether solemn in tone, the film is undeniably handsome, with DoP Benoît Delhomme steeping the Japanese landscape in melancholy atmospherics, but Minimata tends to over-aestheticise its material, not least in the too-elegant recreations of Smith’s black and white imagery.