It’s the same low-budget horror flick you’ve seen many times before, but it’s nice to see some local variants on a familiar theme.

The lack of development in the supporting cast is a problem. Nothing, or almost nothing, of any consequence happens to these people. The title is a bit misleading: there is no real communal plot development.

Joseph L Mankiewicz's four-hour Cleopatra is a stately but sometimes mindboggling spectacle. The central moment is the queen's jawdropping entry into Rome, for which Mankiewicz creates a sensational Busby Berkeley fantasy, like the world's biggest Olympic opening ceremony.

The tropes are a bit familiar.

It’s deeply silly but uproariously entertaining. At the end, I almost felt guilty for enjoying it all quite so much - almost.

It’s a victory lap, which will probably be enough for fans content to share Q’s presence and nothing more. But this movie isa cataloguing of a man who lives in three dimensions. In sticking to recitation of well-known historical fact and flattery it has taken the easy way out.

This is exasperatingly nonsensical and humourless: it is full of grand gestures, gigantically self-important acting, big scenes (though often bafflingly truncated), big emotions and smirkingly knowing dialogue. Yet I admit there is technique and gusto to the way it is put together.

It’s a testament to Scotney’s performance that Millie retains a perverse kind of integrity even as she dupes herself more than the people around her. A shrewd and promising debut.

It’s all more or less sufferable, and it may well keep young children quiet at Christmas … but we surely needed a higher joke content.

Though hats are respectfully doffed, this is a four-woman show, deftly managed to allow all the leads – McCarthy, Kristen Wiig, Kate McKinnon and Leslie Jones – a chance to showcase their own distinct brands of comedy.

The multiverse madness is treated with genial high-energy panache, though I have to say that this infinite profusion of realities does not actually feel all that different in practice from the shapeshifting, retconning world of all the other Avengers films. And infinite realities tend to reduce the dramatic impact of any one single reality, and reduces what there is at stake in a given situation. Nonetheless, it’s handled with lightness and fun.

After a somewhat breathless opening section – yes, we get it, Pierre Cardin was a genius – this genuflecting documentary settles down into a watchable portrait of the late fashion designer that astutely showcases Cardin’s ease in front of the camera.

It’s Curtis who embodies the story’s wacky spirit.

For a slow – and often ponderously uneventful – film, the ending also feels strangely rushed, decisions and reveals not explored enough for them to really land in the way that’s clearly intended (there’s a potentially more satisfying psychological thriller using the same ingredients). There’s really impressive craft here though.

There’s a very entertaining daftness and theatre nerdery to See How They Run (the title sounds uncomfortably like Run For Your Wife) as director Tom George takes the same approach to The Mousetrap that Ken Russell took to The Boyfriend: playing up the artificiality of it all. The comedy is shallow in the right way, and Rockwell’s bleary world-weariness contrasts nicely with Ronan’s saucer-eyed idealism.

It’s a great story that lends itself to some striking scenes. Yet the film in total – if I may paraphrase Webb’s critics – has a number of holes.

The film is watchable and often funny, but still seems encumbered with a kind of Sundance-indie self-consciousness, and I wondered if, in the end, it was doing anything more than the far more unassuming and gag-packed Harold & Kumar movies.

The story of the ingenue who enters the fold and awakens deep feelings is nothing new, but Doremus makes it all utterly captivating. He mines just the right amount of drama and spontaneous comedy from each moment and the foreshadowing is perfectly weighted.

The film itself never amounts to much more than a silly, self-satisfied crime caper, but the headline stars look as though they are enjoying themselves and their sense of fun, by and large, is infectious.

This is one sequel you can’t fault for effort, and the dud jokes are far outnumbered by the ones that are just about cute, smart or screwy enough to nudge out a laugh.

The film creates space for Hinds and Manville to give substantial, intimate, complex performances of the kind that most movies (of whatever sort) do not allow their leads, and Manville in particular is very moving.

The film has an impeccable technical finish, but it is insipid, contrived, solemn, and ever so slightly preposterous.

There’s a rare unpredictability that initially proves alluring, at least until that confusion starts to feel less intentional.

[Jay Roach] wants the film to be fun, while the story is serious. It’s a good idea and an admirable intention. But it does suffer the odd wobble.

This is very much a sympathetic fly-on-the-wall with Team Chelsea, but, considering the high drama of Manning’s life, the resultant film is muted and disjointed, and given to impressionistic images – such as landscapes out of car windows – when really the time could have been spent telling us more.

[An] engrossing, unnerving but unexpectedly sympathetic drama of family dysfunction.

Michael Gandolfini is goosebump-inducing as the young Tony Soprano, amid race riots and antagonism towards rival African American gangs.

Ronan is just so good in this movie – so intelligent, so passionate, but she upstages Robbie, and Robbie’s parts of the film, often lumbered with leaden historical exposition dialogue, especially from Pearce, don’t have the same snap.

It sometimes seems as if each Jude film is almost to be viewed once only; if you press play again, or go to the cinema to see it a second time, there will be only a blank screen, as if Jude and his ragged company have folded their tents and vanished.

Director Robert Zemeckis is usually known for his zestiness and zippiness; but this is arduous. Screenwriter Steven Knight scripted smart movies such as Locke, Dirty Pretty Things and Eastern Promises, and there are some nice touches, but it resembles an unconvincing and sluggish pastiche of a war movie.

In a world of compromised adaptations, Dredd is something of a triumph.

Without a doubt, it is an impressive debut from director Thomas Hardiman, even if his script doesn’t quite pull off a first-class whodunnit.

It’s a film with a decent bit of charm, and it’s hard to argue with the greed-is-bad message.

Perhaps there is less zap in Scream nowadays and archly invoking the newer generation of indie horror - Jordan Peele is mentioned, with absolute respect - only serves in the long run to remind you how elderly Scream is. But it’s still capable of delivering some piercing high-pitched decibels.

The result feels a bit like being fed a plate of arthouse vegetables, a collection of not always easy-to-watch films, randomly connected and with a total running time of 58 minutes that, to be honest, is a bit of a slog.

The film just bounces along, zipping through its running time.

There is something deeply crass about this facetious nonsense, and everyone involved in this film might want to reflect that Nazi medical experimentation during the second world war did in fact happen, under circumstances other than these. It was a very real thing, not just a death-metal horror movie gag.

All in all, this is a carefully modulated plea for tolerance and mutual understanding.

Goat lacks heart and soul, and a sense of genuine emotions.

There’s just one problem. It’s mostly the same jokes over and over: cute kids cursing and not understanding sex stuff.

There’s bits and pieces of entertaining stuff here, a few sharp lines and a gonzo final shootout, but the overall tone of cliche is a bit wearing, correctly signalled in the title, which appears to misremember the phrase “saints and scholars”.

It’s a heavy meal to digest, but this is a strong, vehement film with a real sense of time and place.

Fraser does an honest job in the role of Charlie, and Hong Chau brings a welcome fierceness and sinew to the drama, but this sucrose film is very underpowered.

A watchable and accessible revival, though not groundbreaking, and not quite matching the story's passionate fear and rapture.

Zombie-ism in the movies is traditionally inspected for metaphorical qualities. Here it could simply be that we males are emotionally dead … until love revives us.

It’s a direct, nasty, entirely unpretentious B-movie and while this remains faint, faint, faint praise given the state of the genre, it’s one of the year’s sturdiest horror films. I wouldn’t exactly urge you to run rather then crawl to see it, but a brisk walk should do.

A more unforgiving approach might have been more interesting.

There is such tenderness and gentleness in this film.

However agonising it is to admit it, this film isn't half bad, a sparky black-comic actioner with a cute "con trick" scene showcasing Gibson's Clint Eastwood impression.

There’s more to this movie than sweeping music and celebrating in slow motion. It all stems from Costner’s remarkable, taciturn performance as Coach White.

This is one to forget: a muddled, tonally misjudged, badly acted, uncertainly directed and frankly dubious drama, something that falls into the so-bad-it’s-bad bracket.

There is little narrative, beyond the Wembley gig approaching; and, more crucially, little conflict, outer or inner.

Too hip for its own good, the film ends up going nowhere. Only of interest, perhaps, to hardcore St Vincent and Brownstein fans.

Inconsistency is A Perfect Day’s biggest problem. The script is scalpel sharp in some places, flabby as the well-blocker in others.

For all the expensive honey drizzled over this script, Forster’s film is just unpersuasively weird for an hour, before it tails off in the softest of focuses.

This is an epically long and epically brash film from director and co-writer Patty Jenkins, but Gadot has a queenly self-possession and she imposes her authority on it.

This film looks absolutely gorgeous, but apart from its production design it is basically a disaster.

For all its twisty unexpectedness, it didn’t deliver a really satisfying denouement. The performances are interesting.

There are moments of creaky comedy and some bluntly emotional dialogue that one can more easily picture in front of a specifically catered-to live audience.

Director Brad Bird deserves praise for packing such big ideas into such an accessible, rip-roaring, retro-futurist adventure.

Point Break is a freaky mix of Dog Day Afternoon and Big Wednesday; bank robbing meets surfing.

One can never quite tell with Dumont if he’s deadly serious about all this or laughing up his sleeve. That’s sort of what makes his work fascinating, although in this instance, viewer patience is severely tested.

It looks weirdly like a romcom pastiche, not cynical, but not properly inhabited; it doesn't taste of romance or comedy any more than Andy Warhol's Campbell Soup cans taste of soup.

It’s a garrulous, yet almost static movie, and weirdly for a film about narrative there is no single overwhelmingly important storyline.

The noble intention to make us dwell on our culture, and perhaps shame its more voyeuristic members, quickly devolves into a cavalcade of tedium.

The kooky premise of Jumbo – a young woman falling madly in love with a fairground ride – might invite bafflement but Zoé Wittock’s idiosyncratic comedy-drama is an entertaining blend of sensory overload and sincere empathy.

It’s all very spectacular – but nothing much happens in the second half, and back on Earth, the movie’s message about loss and the power of letting go feels over-sweetened, more Disney than Disney.

It’s a low-budget effort with high ambitions, something that’s hard not to admire, and while it often feels like the teaser for a bigger and better movie, it’s perhaps a sign that Hardiman is setting sail for Hollywood next.

There is something stolid and at times monotonous about the way this is presented to the audience – as ever with Nemes, the force of gravity is increased, making everything 20% heavier and denser. And Barábas’s performance is frankly actorly rather than real in his incessant frown of righteous resentment. It’s a minor movie from this always interesting film-maker.

When the traps begin, they’re as gnarly as ever, if not gnarlier, and with very little suspense about the outcome given how they tend to end, we’re reminded of what a Saw film is: a juvenile endurance test.

Foy's talent lies in suggesting horror, not delivering it.

There’s a streak of old-fashioned B-movie spooky playfulness here, and when actual, motivated characters are on screen it’s delightful.

There’s bits of misplaced humor, a firm sense of place and promising performances, but frustratingly little magic to be found here.

It’s a solid, well-crafted piece of professional carpentry, like a heavy piece of Victorian furniture; built to last; built to be used. The longer you look at it, the more impressive it grows.

The technical diligence and conceptual novelty on display during the boost uphold a high standard of excellence, its most inspired sequence played like a nerve-shredding game of red-light-green-light. Believably portraying expertise requires some measure of the same behind the camera, and the attentive, inventive Gudegast can keep pace with his subjects.

It doesn’t make sense as a comedy, it doesn’t quite work as a drama, and it doesn’t follow the typical roadmap of a biopic, but Rules Don’t Apply is strangely compelling nonetheless.

Like Kaja (Agnes Kittelsen), the wide-eyed Madame Bovary at its heart, Happy, Happy starts out cartoonish and ends up oddly endearing.

This feature is a very funny, if derivative panto-ish romp about the early life of Shakespeare.

It’s flawed by a slightly unconvincing and anticlimactic gun-related ending, but well acted, forthright and confident in the universe it creates.

The stunts are still awe-inspiring, and there's plenty of laughs. They really were thinking big.

The final endgame is a little unsatisfying, but this is a very interesting debut for McCarthy.

Neither of the two worlds of the film’s English title is illuminated clearly enough

This isn’t meant unkindly, but Vice Is Broke will be essential viewing for anybody who ever worked there, with its details about who had what job title and when.

It is a superbly shot, viscerally acted ensemble drama.

The period trappings – which must have cost a bomb – are lush and smartly deployed without being heavy-handed, and the two young leads are very watchable.

In a fun, glossy take down of age-old genre tropes, Rebel Wilson wakes up in an alternate universe, dominated by romantic comedy cliches.

Ivo van Aart’s movie gives full rein to that desire and is snappily directed – but in the end there is something self-satisfied and sententious about his feminist revenge flick.

Fans of the band will undoubtedly love the package, which puts the group front and centre. Those who are more agnostic about the music but nostalgic for the period will enjoy the peripheral material.

As a demonstration of the banality of evil, The Iceman is certainly effective and Shannon's performance gives the film its power.

It is a film with charm and the chemistry between Jones and Redmayne has something rather platonic and even sibling-like, but that isn’t to say there isn’t a spark of sorts.

None of this is represented in any compelling dramatic style, and the actors – all very talented and assured – have perhaps not had clear enough direction. It is a mood piece. Whose mood leads nowhere.

All Day and a Night is a weightier alternative to the average Netflix original and while imperfectly realised and scrappily plotted at times, it’s another promising sign that, away from the easy-to-digest content, there’s room on the platform for much much more.

Night Always Comes tries to be both seat-edge action thriller and searing social issue drama and while Caron is able to squeeze suspense out of the early, frenetic moments, there’s not enough emotional weight to the more human final act.

While there’s something engaging in how the film takes us to a place so, literally, far from where we started, how we get there is not as entertaining or propulsive as it should be with anonymously staged action, easy-to-spot twists and a crucial lack of suspense.

This film just wades into a murky lake of self-consciousness and sinks inexorably to the bottom.

This one, sadly, is flawed by that perennial problem of how to end a story with a great premise.

The set-up is a bit schmaltzy and the only guesswork is how bitter the bittersweet ending will be, but Haro coaxes strong performances from the cast.

Things eventually escalate, the pressure valve of pent-up emotions building and releasing. But it’s a long and demanding ride to get there, full of solemn looks and thousand-yard stares.