When the talking stops the film takes off, with a pair of bone-rattling chases set in Athens and Las Vegas that cause maximum damage to people, property and the audience’s eardrums. A bracing reminder of how fiercely efficient Greengrass can be, these scenes just about justify the existence of Jason Bourne. But, please, no more.

A film that never feels remotely real, content to wallow in dead-rock-star mythology and tedious druggie indulgences.

It’s a nail-biting story, but this doc isn’t as gripping as it should be.

Skarsgård himself is fairly bland as Greystoke, delivering a po-faced Byronic spin on the character, all velvet coats and dreamy romantic stares at his belle while sitting barefooted in the boughs of trees. But at least the animals are memorable – best of all is a pack of scene-stopping silverback gorillas digitally created for the movie. This Tarzan isn’t quite the jungle VIP – but it’s got a little swing.

Overall, Bleed For This is difficult to dislike: the story may be hokey but it’s real, and so is the sentiment behind it.

Pioneer delivers insidious, shadowy tension, while it’s genuinely surprising to find yourself so engrossed – story glitches notwithstanding – in key issues like compression sickness and divers’ gas supply.

Missing – and missed – are Matthew McConaughey as snake-hipped strip club owner Dallas and director Soderbergh, who gave the original its lived-in feel.

It’s anarchic, sometimes amusing, intermittently tedious, with ideas about digital alienation and the corruption of technology that too often feel blunt and tired.

It’s all so overly macho that it plays like a camp pleasure-cruise.

As storytelling, it’s pristine: it moves like a reptile playing the long game. But its cruelty is tough to bear.

It’s as handsomely shot as any film about an ace shutterbug ought to be, and Binoche infuses familiar internal crises with palpable pain and urgency.

This slapdash but endearing doc about the rise, fall and resurrection of '80s pop outfit Spandau Ballet is an inside job, packed with strong archive footage yet lacking anything you'd call truly incisive.

In this madcap comic farce, the homage to '30s screwball is explicit in the title, unflagging pace, and plot: a liberal lawyer (Hawn), married to an uptight DA (Grodin), gets messed up by a rogue ex-husband (Chase), their ex-convict servants, and her six dogs. A little of Adam's Rib or The Philadelphia Story creeps in as you drift into wondering how Cary Grant or Katharine Hepburn would have mastered the roles of slightly cracked, snobbish professionals.

An intimate and likeable picture. As a part-animated live-action movie, it harks back to less frenetic kids' fare from the '60s like Bedknobs and Broomsticks, rather than, say, the 'toon-laden Roger Rabbit.

If there’s nothing profoundly original or insightful here, there’s no denying the atmosphere of squalid authenticity, particularly in the scenes shot on the streets.

Like Restrepo, this troubling and thoughtful documentary asks tough questions.

Half of a Yellow Sun bravely takes on too broad a canvas with too narrow a budget, but it’s a relevant saga that’s worth telling.

Hats off to Viggo Mortensen. He pulls off playing identical twins in this Argentinian thriller, which never quite lives up to his talents.

Fitfully entertaining, with some grabby trial scenes, the film struggles to find a proper, engaging focus.

Alan Ormsby's script, about a new kid in a Chicago high school who hires the biggest guy in school to fend off a lunch money protection racket, is (unusually) directed not for nostalgia value but from a perspective of adolescent insecurity, and helped along by fresh performances from a cast of inexperienced young actors.

This risible hokum cashes in on TV's The X Files and invasion mania, but what it lacks in sophistication (everything), it partly makes up for in sheer gall.

This is an unapologetically fluffy film that never digs deep into its characters’ lives. Its pleasures are patchy. Keaton offers an endearing performance, even if her chemistry with Gleeson (not on top form) is weirdly lacking.

Fleischer handles a heavy script and most of the acting like no one should handle a melon; but he really soars into competence at moments of tension, car chases, and general cinematic escapism.

If it's all a little too crowded with characters, Branagh’s pacy direction keeps the story zip along to a conclusion that’s tense even if you remember whodunnit.

Its repetitive qualities are beyond reproach. Every bit as amiable and disposable as its predecessor, it recycles everything from slapstick gags to its own voice cast.

Anchorman 2: The Legend Continues is not the disaster some feared it might be, but neither is it the endlessly quotable, deliciously idiotic follow-on so many of us were optimistically anticipating.

It’s formulaic, but also largely entertaining, quite touching, occasionally amusing and competently animated.

An unbalanced but never less than entertaining film, enthralling and deflating in roughly equal measure, and studded with moments of true, old-school glory.

Brad Pitt pulls along this gutsy, old-fashioned World War II epic by the sheer brute force of his charisma.

Some prior interest in Berger would help, but even newcomers should find this an infectious portrait of independent thought and living.

Stick with it and writer/director Alice Rohrwacher’s first feature reveals another side: taking a small town as a microcosm of Berlusconi’s something-rotten-at-the-core Italy.

Rogue Nation is an uneven film.

Some clunky coincidences and unlikely events confuse the film's mission, and it lacks the clarity and parable-like meaning of the brothers' best films.

Ultimately it's left to Mad Max wizard Miller to steal the show with an extraordinary remake of Richard Matheson's story about an airline passenger who spies a demon noshing the starboard engine.

As a self-conscious exercise in kitsch graverobbing, ‘Viva’ succeeds through a combination of cultural nous and sheer aesthetic audacity.

Perhaps inevitably, the film as a whole doesn't stack up to its central performances.

Sir Ian McKellen is a pleasure to watch as an elderly Sherlock Holmes, though the drama isn't as compelling as it might have been.

There are sequences in Doctor Strange that could burn the top layer off your eyeballs, crammed as they are with some of the most unashamedly drug-inspired imagery since the ‘The Simpsons’ episode where Homer takes peyote. But problems arise when Doctor Strange tries to tackle the everyday stuff, like telling a half-decent story.

It’s a winning yarn, but Osmond has to crack the whip to get it over the finishing line.

It takes a while to find its focus – and takes itself just a little too seriously – but as low-budget Ozploitation goes, it’s snappy and effective.

A solid watch for gore fans.

Perez has a field day as Muriel, injecting a welcome note of good old-fashioned greed into what is otherwise a relentlessly edifying story.

There’s something sloppy and sluggish about ‘Irrational Man’, even by Allen’s patchy standards.

It’s hardly high art, but for a cheapjack homegrown action flick this is surprisingly solid.

It’s an important story, of course, but only mildly engaging as cinema.

The ever-present air of madcap, goofball insanity carries it through. A seriously guilty pleasure.

An old-fashioned sequel which plumbs depths and hits heights, in which the lovable Rocky Balboa gets another crack at the world heavyweight championship.

It’s all a bit heavy-handed at times, but this is a sweet story honestly told.

There’s typical grace and good humour in Kore-eda’s handling of this all-but-impossible situation. But the film’s critical lack of dramatic nuance undercuts its emotional resonance.

Jim Jarmusch's 16mm feature debut, made not long after the writer/director graduated from film school, is an oblique study of a young man (Parker) adrift on the streets of New York. As he roams, he has chance encounters with a car thief, a saxophone player and a grizzled war veteran, among others. Learning their stories, he begins to seem more and more isolated.

Luckily, Jackson’s singular talent for massive-scale mayhem hasn’t deserted him, and the hour-long smackdown that crowns the film gives him ample opportunities to indulge it.

By far the film’s best move is casting some lovable veteran actors. Ellen Burstyn is adorable as Adaline’s daughter and Harrison Ford steals the show as an old-timer with an instinct for saying the wrong thing.

Both actors are tremendous. Sy adds powerful dramatic shading to his usual irresistible charm, while Gainsbourg hints at a sunnier disposition beneath her volatile nervousness.

Origin of Evil takes a while to get going, and the demonic possession plot pretty much runs on rails. And yet there’s plenty to admire here: strong performances (‘ET’ legend Henry Thomas is a welcome sight as a kindly priest), top-notch jump-scares and some unexpectedly lovely, almost ‘Far From Heaven’-ish autumnal photography.

Makhmalbaf says he was inspired by the Arab Spring, and his film is pitched somewhere between allegory and satire.

It’s just a shame the film is slightly ragged, with a tendency to preach when there’s more than enough drama to get the point across. Still, it’s an important story, told with commitment.

For about half the film, Carpenter's narrative economy and explosive visual style (incorporating some marvellous model work of the new Manhattan skyline) promise wonders. The trouble is that his characters neither develop nor interact dynamically, so the plot gradually winds down into predictable though highly enjoyable histrionics.

Rousing as a tale of saintly gays against the system, Any Day Now is less stirring as cinema.

Denial cries out for a little more subtlety.

Jolie has assembled an A-list team – Roger Deakins behind the camera, the Coen brothers in charge of the script - but while her film is perfectly competent, it hardly dazzles.

Whedon has revealed that his first cut ran for well over three hours, and it shows: Ultron feels excessively nipped and tucked, barrelling from one explosive set-piece to the next, leaving ideas half-formed and character motivations murky.

iBoy’ is a sparky film, embedded in London’s cheek-by-jowl world of wealth and poverty. It’s also a dark teen drama, peppered with brutal beatings, gang rape, drugs and dead bodies.

The message to take home: put a pot of lavender on your windowsill. Save bees!

At just under two hours, the sheer relentlessness can become exhausting. But if you’re a fan of unfettered action, this will be a rare treat.

This being a kids film, there is a ‘message’ – about the destruction of nature. But the eco theme genuinely works with the film’s wonder at nature.

Ghost Protocol plays it strictly by the book: the characters are bland, the plot is over-familiar and the action sequences are resolutely old school. But animator Bird relishes the chance to play with real people.

Some of the performances (Hurt, Davis) give it an illusion of depth, but it's mostly expert in avoiding moral resonance and ambiguity: everything is satisfyingly clear-cut, just as every shot and every cut are geared to instant emotional impact. Political, moral and aesthetic problems arise when you try to superimpose the film on the 'truth' it purports to represent. As a head-banging thriller, though, it makes some of Hollywood's hoariest stereotypes seem good as new, and it panders to its audience's worst instincts magnificently.

There are times when it feels underpowered or unfocused... but this is an intelligent, sensitive debut.

Janiak has succeeded in making what she calls ‘an elevated genre story’, yet much of its frightening psychological ambiguity is erased by a disappointingly conventional ending.

The fish-out-of water moments are great fun, watching arthouse gods Depardieu and Huppert in tacky tourist hell.

If Zwick’s film improves on Christopher McQuarrie's inaugural, incoherent 2012 entry in the series, it's not through any special initiative on the film's part. But it's efficient, unfussy, and doesn't try to think any faster than it can run.

The absolute seriousness with which the band regard themselves – particularly drummer-songwriter Yoshiki, who’s so famous that Stan Lee turned him into a superhero – is never questioned by Kijak, resulting in a fitfully enjoyable but rather pompous fan film.

The result is a fascinating – at times illuminating – tightrope act, but rarely an enjoyable one: for all its luminous outsider’s-eye photography and painstaking, perfectly pitched performances, both the film and its shivering heroine prove difficult to warm to.

Crisply photographed, thoughtfully plotted and sharply soundtracked, The Transfiguration is a solid slice of US indie horror.

There’s more at play than a feelgood factor, as William and Kate are forced to examine their own reasons for making the trip. However well-intentioned, giving, they realise, is also taking.

What’s the opposite of warts-n-all? ‘No warts’ doesn’t even begin to describe Morgan Spurlock’s fly-on-the-wall film about One Direction. No warts, no acne – there’s not even a pimple on the butt of this on-tour portrait of the reality-bred boy popsters.

From the moment a pair of workmen crack open a seventeenth-century plague pit and unleash the undead, Matthias Hoene’s lairy, gory zombie comedy delivers.

It's really just an old-fashioned piece of wish fulfilment, rather duplicitously dressed up in foul language and sexual references in a cynical attempt to look modern. That said, there are still some nice touches of absurdist satirical wit hanging out along the sidelines, given extra bite by Dede Allen's superbly pacy editing.

Love, Marilyn blows out of the water the impression of Monroe as the helpless dumb blonde.

Really, this is David/Walter’s show. For reasons too spoilery to give away, Fassbender is electric, giving a spectacularly skin-crawling performance.

There’s something rather bland about Veronica Mars – even the murderers have neat hair and nice clothes – and the largely forgettable cast don’t help. But the one-liners are sharp, the plot unpredictable and the whole thing ticks along with a minimum of fuss.

The Wall isn’t a terrifically exciting thriller, but it’s thoughtful and fitfully suspenseful – a lean, character-driven and quietly rewarding film.

It is solid and watchable, and Radcliffe is genuinely ace, giving a smart, understated and intelligent performance.

Heldenbergh and Baetens pull you in with committed performances ­– their raw pain and grief is totally believable. But all that honest, intense emotion is thrown away as the film outstays its welcome by 40 minutes or so, piling one tragedy on to another.

The creature effects are charming.... But the pig-chasing antics and cartoonish corporate nastiness that dominate much of the film become seriously grating.

In its atmospheric soundscape, cinematography, taut characterisation and storytelling, this is a very involving genre thriller.

Seyfried is fine but has little character depth to work with: Sarsgaard impresses with a more complex character, as does a barely recognisable Sharon Stone as Linda’s bitter mother. If only the whole film were as well-rounded.

Into the Woods starts better than it finishes but it’s a great-looking film, with a nicely old-school, easy-on-the-CG feel.

The film is let down by thin characterisation, struggling to generate much empathy with its square-jawed, tough-yet-troubled special-forces warrior heroes.

It’s all extravagantly daft, moves at a fair clip and is over before you expect it to be.

The characterisation is feisty and memorable, the song-and-dance sequences intricate and colourful, and it’ll charm the socks off little people.

Kids should be game for the ride, and the colourful characters offer humour and poignancy: Paul Giamatti’s cautious snail Chet shares a sweet friendship with reckless Turbo. Comparisons with Pixar’s ‘Cars’ are easy to make, but that’s no bad thing.

At its heart, is Danner’s lovely performance, vulnerable and smart behind the sarcastic façade, and sealed by a devastating karaoke performance of Cry Me a River that hints at the musical talent her character left behind in her youth.

It’s hard to say exactly what’s at fault here: the performances are flawless – Carell fully justifies his unlikely casting, while Ruffalo is as dependable as ever – and the script is astute, intimate and at times shocking. But there’s just no real life in the film.

There are some gorgeous Disney touches, rabble-rousing songs on the pirate ship and the usual ‘best friends for ever’ message.

Ayoade tips his hat to so many other filmmakers and writers that he leaves little room to consider anything other than what a good job he’s doing of distilling all his references into an effective Pinterest board of paranoia and alienation.

A beautifully acted but disappointingly stiff period drama.

What Welcome to Leith does very well is dig deep and expose Cobb – and by extension the entire American neo-Nazi movement – as weak, confused and desperate, using a dying ideology as a way to feel less alone in the world.