The result, if you can get past some of its absurdities, is a slight, enjoyable, lightweight jaunt. Just don’t expect anything more.

It’s not one of this summer’s strongest entries, but it’s fun to spend 90 minutes in this dog-eat-dick world.

A mockumentary as sparky, big-hearted and entertaining as its cast of bright-eyed kids and the wannabe thesps who coach them in the ways of ‘turning cardboard into gold’. The affection for musical theatre is so sincere, it’ll win over even the most Sondheim-averse.

Gran Turismo may ultimately be a glossy marketing exercise, but there are moments that’ll leave you with the right kind of whiplash.

Like Aftersun on a gallon of SunnyD, this warm and freewheeling comedy-drama about a girl connecting with the dad she’s never met proves that working-class stories don’t have to be all misery and angst. Sometimes, that kitchen sink can be filled with bubbles.

For a film that is primarily focused on one person at a time, speaking directly to camera, it is never remotely dull. The lean 73-minute runtime gives Smith all the time she needs to conjure a poignant and personal ode to these four women, and the experiences of Black trans women more broadly. We rarely get to see that on screen this powerfully and unapologetically.

More than just another franchise reset, Mutant Mayhem wrestles with its own cultural relevance (or otherwise) in interesting ways.

The story has a good dose of hokum, but the execution has an oppressive and sometimes feral quality that doesn’t just make the hairs on your neck stand up, it puts your whole body in fight-or-flight mode. An extremely impressive first film.

Warm, self-assured and free-flowing, Pretty Red Dress is the long overdue expansion of Black masculinity that the big screen has been crying out for. It’s about daring to be different, but mostly just yearning to be understood.

Far from a clone of its Blaxploitation predecessors, Taylor’s exhilarating debut taps into the conspiracy theorist within us all.

Life in The Damned Don’t Cry is brutally unfair, and Boulifa offers no easy answers. But thanks to the compassionate filmmaker and his two impressive leads, it’s a compelling watch.

The cumulative effect is so stunning and antithetical to anything Hollywood is doing at the moment – the equally audacious Barbie aside – that it feels like a completely different art form. And, frankly, hallelujah for that.

this is a wonderfully fun watch that somehow manages to simultaneously celebrate and satirise the Barbie brand, its feminism and girliness pairing like gorpcore sandals with a floaty pink skirt. It’s Barbie’s world, and it’s a thrill to live in it, at least for an hour or two.

Tom Cruise’s latest IMF outing is so relentlessly exhilarating, you’ll need a lie down afterwards.

The sheer ambition is still there, but the storytelling rigour – Lasseter’s great forte – is again missing in Elemental, the studio’s latest big-screen offering.

La Syndicaliste is a weird footnote to Huppert’s long career, one that feels hampered by its ‘true story’ status to the point where it can’t really say much about anything. It’s quietly intriguing. But let’s hope her next outing gives her something that’s really worth dressing up for.

The portmanteau structure suits Dupieux’s demented sensibility, providing a wildly varied yet consistently entertaining dose of bafflement and bemusement.

It’s a sensitive, careful film with real emotional intelligence, but no less gripping for swerving dramatic fireworks in favour of quieter, more observational moments.

In its quieter moments, No Hard Feelings gestures towards real emotion. More often than not, though, it gets sidetracked by chaotic set pieces, with naked fistfights (the actress, surprisingly, goes full frontal here), mace sprayings and even an ingenious homage to The Shining, working Lawrence’s knack for slapstick to the funny bone. It’s fleeting fun, when a bit more honesty and candor might have made it her answer to Young Adult.

It all adds up to a fascinating, amusing and enjoyably illusion-shattering study of the creative process, suggesting that modern art owes as much to opportunity and happenstance as it does to talent.

Occasionally, the dizzying filmmaking style, a mix of practical stunt work and invisible VFX, feels like a video-game cutscene. More often, it just sucks the air from your lungs. The ending gestures pretty firmly at another sequel to come. It’ll have a tough job upping the ante on this.

Close Your Eyes builds up slowly, deliberately, allowing ample breathing room to supporting characters who were, once at least, elemental in Miguel or Julio’s lives so we can paint a picture of who they are as artists and as people.

There’s a kinetic strength to star-in-the-making Aswan Reid’s screen presence as we first glimpse his unnamed ‘new boy’ attempting to throttle the life out of a policeman much bigger than himself.

New director Steve Caple Jr (Creed II) isn’t as slick a director as Michael Bay – it’s sometimes hard to orient yourself in his larger battles – but he’s efficient and can land some solid gags. It feels generally similar in tone to Bumblebee, by far the most fun Transformers movie.

There are hints of greatness in Chevalier, but it’s worthier of polite applause than a standing ovation.

It’s such a torrent of universes, ideas and styles that it should collapse under the weight of its own creative payload. But it all works – brilliantly.

Beautiful acted by Japanese veteran Yakusho, it’s a character study with real depth. Maybe not top tier Wenders, but still one to linger over.

Rohrwacher weaves this thread in and out of the more grounded storylines with the most exquisite even-handedness, evoking Greek mythology while creating her own legend.