Aurora’s Sunrise is notable not so much for its use of animation, which is effective but not especially creative or technically groundbreaking, but for the dramatic sweep of Aurora’s incredible tale.

Barraud offers a satisfyingly slippery tale in which we think we know where it might be headed but are constantly met by a little twist or discovery that puts everything into a different perspective.

Whether Medusa Deluxe quite convinces us that it needed to be a one-shot exercise, it’s carried off niftily — the electric performances, from a super-alert, bristling cast, giving a feel of live event to the action, framed in Academy ratio.

Despite an appealing cast and some nicely executed moments (not to mention some direct references to the original attraction) Dear White People director Justin Simien’s third feature is mostly a dispiriting experience.

Very British and proudly Black, Edwards’ film juggles tones and formats we’ve never seen put together before and it’s a pleasure to see a first-timer flex her muscles in a part-musical, wholly dramatic story of a recently-released prisoner who takes a shine to his partner’s micro red frock.

Director Yuval Adler taps into the lean story’s Collateral-like intrigue but, outside of Cage’s hair-trigger antics, there is not much surprise here — especially when the filmmaker unveils a twist most will see coming down the road.

It may be fuelled by the schmaltzy lyrics of a boy band, but this is ultimately a clear-eyed celebration of female friendship.

It packs a quiet emotional punch.

Streetwise is too familiar in terms of plot beats to completely stand out from the crowd but its unerring sense of place will nonetheless make Na a director to watch.

It’s an offbeat combination of erudite esoterica and sensory pleasures (many of them music-related) that patient viewers may find beguiling.

Nolan demonstrates his usual prowess for impeccable visuals and stunning craftsmanship within a deeply despairing portrait of an arrogant genius who, too late, realised the impact of his monstrous creation.

While Gerwig and co-writer Noah Baumbach may couch this self-discovery narrative in powder pinks and unrelenting pep, their message is authentic and acerbic: an urgent feminist call to arms wrapped up in a hugely entertaining popcorn movie.

For all the gambits that end up feeling like gimmicks, My Name Is Alfred Hitchcock never stops churning with ideas and ambition. The film pays Hitch the highest compliment by trying to follow his example and never do the expected thing.

There’s a lightness to the film and a loveliness to Feña’s open-hearted struggle.

It’s a technically accomplished work. The score is nervy pulsing and electronic, adding to the propulsion and tension of the storytelling.

An ensemble cast led by Maggie Smith, Kathy Bates and Laura Linney brings persuasive conviction to period heartwarmer The Miracle Club.

With its looming, angular and alienating architecture, and thoroughly considered technological and ethical future landscape, this is a phenomenal and inventive piece of world-building from Prague-based director Robert Hloz.

It’s an uncomfortable watch, but a extremely effective one.

Balanced on the tightrope between comedy and pathos, the precision-tooled Mamacruz is essentially a sensitively observed character study, with Spanish veteran Kiti Manver delivering a compelling, nuanced central performance as a religiously-repressed woman in late middle age who comes late – in all senses – to the transformative power of her own sensuality.

While the film’s conclusion is perhaps a little heavy-handed, the delivery of the message – of women’s reproductive rights and agency over their lives and bodies – is an emphatic slam dunk.

Ramona is both wonderful and appalling, and Vazquez’s edgy performance drags us entirely into her relentless, thoughtless world, with her flaming red hair, her smoker’s cough, her gravelly tones and her unfailing ability to bring joy and despair to those around her.

What emerges is the story of an extremely close and profoundly charming boyhood friendship – but one where the junior partner couldn’t, or wouldn’t, put the genie of his extraordinary talent back in the bottle once his pal had coaxed it out of him.

Brimming with confidence and swaggering showmanship, Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One further cements this series as a consistently dazzling action franchise.

[An] unusually direct, moving and deceptively simple exploration of love – and of film – as defences against forgetting.

Savill keeps the tone upbeat, homing in on her character study. From goofy grins to anxiety-ridden wide eyes, Scotney’s range and talent is clear: her comic timing and commitment to Millie’s mania are exemplary. But in centring her above all else, there are a few too many narrative stones left unturned.

Kristen Lovell has skin in the game of the story she tells, making The Stroll, an oral/archive history of the trans sex workers of New York’s Meatpacking District, a raw and tender memoir.

In between the nudity and four-letter words, the film looks seriously at grief, arrested development and economic inequality, and there’s a sweet rapport between the two leads. A series of irritating plot twists and a predictable trajectory ultimately undercut Lawrence’s bravely brash portrait of a woman going nowhere fast.

Klondike is both despairing – sometimes in a blackly comic vein – and empathetic in the way it sees the incident from the ground up rather than from the sky down.