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4/5
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Trap
(2024)
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Justine Elias
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Shyamalan exercises hard-handed control over everything without the virtuoso touches of his betters. He’s an effortful auteur, and the pleasant Trap springs some shivery fun on its own audience.
Posted Aug 12, 2024
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3.5/5
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The Instigators
(2024)
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Adam Sweeting
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It’s not, perhaps, the most original plot (though you’ve seen worse), but Liman has strengthened his hand considerably by employing a strength-in-depth cast.
Posted Aug 12, 2024
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1/5
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Borderlands
(2024)
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James Saynor
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Come back Madame Web, all is forgiven.
Posted Aug 12, 2024
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2/5
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Only the River Flows
(2023)
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Demetrios Matheou
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A combination of police procedural with film noir, shot with flair and imagination... Yet there’s another aspect, a psychological undercurrent, which becomes stronger as the film progresses and, slowly and determinedly, throws the film off course.
Posted Aug 12, 2024
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3/5
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Sky Peals
(2023)
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Markie Robson-Scott
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Moin Hussain’s debut feature is a sci-fi-inspired parable of alienation, often agonisingly slow and lacking in dramatic tension but strong on atmosphere and there are even a few laughs.
Posted Aug 08, 2024
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4/5
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Stevie Van Zandt: Disciple
(2024)
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Adam Sweeting
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To borrow from the Grateful Dead, what a long strange trip it’s been. If Stevie Van Zandt hadn’t existed, it wouldn’t have been possible for anyone to invent him.
Posted Aug 05, 2024
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5/5
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I Saw the TV Glow
(2024)
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Graham Fuller
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Trans writer-director Schoenbrun’s film is an instant classic, a disquieting but non-judgmental post-modern psychothriller about the value and dangers of wholesale immersion in visual media and the complexities of trans self-identification.
Posted Jul 29, 2024
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4/5
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Twisters
(2024)
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Adam Sweeting
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So OK, it isn’t Shakespeare, but Lee Isaac Chung’s movie, with a screenplay by Mark L. Smith, sustains a hectic and frequently hysterical pace while delivering oodles of gobsmacking footage of terrifying storms threatening to engulf both cast and viewer.
Posted Jul 26, 2024
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4/5
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The Echo
(2023)
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Sarah Kent
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As a series of beautifully observed scenes of childhood,The Echo is unsurpassed and cameraman Ernesto Pardo’s shots of landscapes and weather are glorious. But as an objective look at life in a Mexican village, the film remains frustratingly incoherent.
Posted Jul 26, 2024
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4/5
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About Dry Grasses
(2023)
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Helen Hawkins
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The epic length of the film for what’s essentially a chamber piece isn't a problem because the twists and turns of Samet’s personality are compelling.
Posted Jul 26, 2024
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4/5
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In a Violent Nature
(2024)
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Harry Thorfinn-George
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Is it merely a nerdy exercise for genre aficionados? There is an element of that, sure. But I do believe that those who agree to meet this film on its own strange terms will be pleasantly surprised.
Posted Jul 22, 2024
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4/5
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Janet Planet
(2023)
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Helen Hawkins
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Baker’s move to film is impressive. She has sidestepped a key pitfall for stage directors of using too much dialogue and thinking all the mise-en-scène has to be arty and inventive.
Posted Jul 22, 2024
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5/5
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Crossing
(2024)
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Tom Birchenough
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A loose road-movie that speaks with considerable profundity of the overlapping worlds in which it is set.
Posted Jul 22, 2024
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4/5
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Chuck Chuck Baby
(2023)
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Graham Fuller
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Writer-director Pugh doesn’t conceal her rage at the inhumane ways some men treat women. Her movie is laced with delicate visual and aural flourishes rare in earthy, humour-tinged dramas about the travails of working-class women.
Posted Jul 19, 2024
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3/5
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Longlegs
(2024)
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Harry Thorfinn-George
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A fantastically tense, peeking-through-your-fingers experience, the kind that you either avoid like the plague or can’t get enough of. But don’t get it twisted -- this is a ridiculous and insubstantial film.
Posted Jul 15, 2024
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3/5
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Sleep
(2023)
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Adam Sweeting
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Yu steers his film deftly to a turbulent climax, though after all that’s gone before his conclusion feels a little too tidy, not quite the cathartic eruption that he seemed to be leading us towards.
Posted Jul 11, 2024
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4/5
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Fly Me to the Moon
(2024)
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Adam Sweeting
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It’s an eccentric mixture, but it works thanks to some smart casting and a slick screenplay by Rose Gilroy, while the meticulous Sixties period detail of clothes, cars, music and hairstyles lends it an evocative time-travelling aura.
Posted Jul 11, 2024
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4/5
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Heart of an Oak
(2022)
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Sarah Kent
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On one level, Heart of an Oak is the most spectacular nature film you are ever likely to see... [But] the upshot is a sanitised view of the natural world.
Posted Jul 05, 2024
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2/5
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The Nature of Love
(2023)
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Saskia Baron
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Unsure if it's a sexy romcom, an essay on class divisions or an exploration of female sexuality, The Nature of Love seems unlikely to draw this summer’s absent cinemagoers back into the darkness.
Posted Jul 05, 2024
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5/5
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I Am: Celine Dion
(2024)
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Adam Sweeting
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Even if she can’t sing the way she used to, Dion has given us a brave and shatteringly powerful documentary.
Posted Jul 01, 2024
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3/5
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Kinds of Kindness
(2024)
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Demetrios Matheou
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The three stories are designed to belong in a unified world, and it’s one that is persistently nasty and cruel; and, at nearly three hours, that can become wearing. Nevertheless, it’s presented with great relish and style.
Posted Jul 01, 2024
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4/5
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Rose
(2022)
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Saskia Baron
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Rose is not a flashy film and won’t appeal to cynics or those with no experience of neurodivergence, but its heart is in the right place and it's well worth watching.
Posted Jun 28, 2024
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1/5
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The Exorcism
(2024)
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Adam Sweeting
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Crowe gets enough scenes here to suggest that this could have been a persuasive performance, had it been fully realised and framed within a coherent whole.
Posted Jun 21, 2024
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5/5
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Green Border
(2023)
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James Saynor
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Holland’s movie is a lesson plan for the 21st century and she has the résumé to draw a clear line between the 1940s and the 2020s. The forest closes in.
Posted Jun 21, 2024
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3/5
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The Bikeriders
(2023)
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Adam Sweeting
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There’s still plenty to like here, but there could have been plenty more.
Posted Jun 20, 2024
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3/5
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Arcadian
(2024)
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Nick Hasted
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Arcadian’s intriguing premise loosens once Cage leaves the screen, and slack plot and action beats swamp its essence.
Posted Jun 17, 2024
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3/5
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Freud's Last Session
(2023)
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Markie Robson-Scott
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Hopkins and Goode give excellent performances, but there’s a faintly pointless and schematic air to the proceedings.
Posted Jun 17, 2024
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3/5
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Sorcery
(2023)
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Justine Elias
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[Sorcery] sticks to a deliberate, even slack pace. Its real power, though, is Veliz Caileo’s quietly forceful performance. When the film’s shapeshifting mystery get murky, this young performer remains compelling.
Posted Jun 17, 2024
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2/5
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The Moor
(2023)
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Harry Thorfinn-George
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The problem with The Moor is that it lacks coherent vision, both in plot and style.
Posted Jun 17, 2024
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4/5
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Àma Gloria
(2023)
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Helen Hawkins
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In Marie Amachoukeli’s Àma Gloria there’s a remarkable performance by a child actor, Louise Mauroy-Panzani. So key is her contribution that It’s fair to say the director couldn’t have delivered the film she had planned without her.
Posted Jun 14, 2024
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2/5
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Sasquatch Sunset
(2024)
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Saskia Baron
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What Susquatch Sunset also doesn't do well is gauge its audience -- the onscreen violence and sexual acts would distress or puzzle a child and there’s not really enough narrative development for an adult.
Posted Jun 14, 2024
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4/5
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Wilding
(2023)
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Sarah Kent
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Directed by David Allen, Wilding tells the remarkable story of Knepp’s transformation from a barren tract of marginal land to a fertile oasis. Not surprisingly, the film is visually stunning.
Posted Jun 13, 2024
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3/5
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Riddle Of Fire
(2023)
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Justine Elias
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The movie’s handmade look (including authentically burned-out 16mm cinematography by Jake Mitchell), and the charming, unschooled performances of the young performers, prove to be irresistible.
Posted Jun 10, 2024
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3/5
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Cabrini
(2024)
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Markie Robson-Scott
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You long for a bit of Gangs of New York-style grit. There’s no denying, however, that Mother Cabrini’s story is inspiring.
Posted Jun 04, 2024
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4/5
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A House in Jerusalem
(2023)
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Nick Hasted
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Palestinian Alayan and regular, sibling co-writer Rami Alayan offer a sympathetic but searching perspective on a place where the past is both national rationale and necessarily buried.
Posted Jun 03, 2024
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3/5
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The Beast
(2023)
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James Saynor
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Caged here in endless self-examination that always misses the point, Seydoux is establishing herself as a prodigious talent, both spontaneous and withholding.
Posted May 31, 2024
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3/5
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Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga
(2024)
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Demetrios Matheou
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Fury Road remains the more complete, accomplished, surprising film, the one whose energy really doesn’t let you go; as fun as this one is, there’s a sense of déjà vu and, ultimately, diminishing returns.
Posted May 24, 2024
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3/5
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The Beach Boys
(2024)
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Adam Sweeting
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The film reminds us that the band’s story is one of the great legends of pop history, but this does’t feel like the last word on the subject.
Posted May 24, 2024
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3/5
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Bermondsey Tales: Fall of the Roman Empire
(2024)
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Adam Sweeting
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Bermondsey is undermined by some basic structural flaws. It's never clear how much of a comedy this is supposed to be, and its larky approach to torture and beatings doesn’t feel quite right.
Posted May 17, 2024
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4/5
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Our Mothers
(2019)
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Adam Sweeting
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Director Cesar Diaz’s debut feature film was made on a modest budget and confines its running time to a crisp 78 minutes, but its impact is like being hit over the head with a sandbag.
Posted May 13, 2024
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4/5
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Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes
(2024)
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Nick Hasted
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The ideas at play since Pierre Boule’s original, 1963 novel Monkey Planet are eternally rich.
Posted May 13, 2024
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4/5
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La Chimera
(2023)
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Demetrios Matheou
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O’Connor’s Arthur has the petulant, reluctant charisma of many a Fellini hero. Indeed, the actor is a revelation. He has the clothes horse allure of a leading man, and the nuance and surprise of a seasoned character actor.
Posted May 10, 2024
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4/5
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Made in England: The Films of Powell and Pressburger
(2024)
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Saskia Baron
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Altogether Made in England is a rare treat for cinephiles.
Posted May 10, 2024
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5/5
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Love Lies Bleeding
(2024)
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Justine Elias
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Love Lies Bleeding’s portrait of doomed, dangerous romance knows where it’s going: straight into the pantheon of New Queer Cinema.
Posted May 06, 2024
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4/5
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Nezouh
(2022)
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James Saynor
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Trying to do “magical realism” in movies -- that is, both sides of that formula in the same film -- is usually a tall order, but Kaadan has a half-jocular sense of abandon and goes for it anyway amid the dust and explosions.
Posted May 03, 2024
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4/5
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I.S.S.
(2023)
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Justine Elias
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Director Gabriela Cowperthwaite (Blackfish) and screenwriter Nick Shafir nimbly sketch out the station’s cramped layout and the possibly false bonhomie among the crew, turning I.S.S. into a taut sci-fi take on Alfred Hitchcock’s Lifeboat.
Posted Apr 26, 2024
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4/5
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That They May Face the Rising Sun
(2023)
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Markie Robson-Scott
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The dialogue and Joe’s ruminations, often straight from McGahern’s novel, are wonderful. The silences are as important.
Posted Apr 25, 2024
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5/5
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Stephen
(2023)
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Sarah Kent
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Stephen is the first feature film by multi-media artist Melanie Manchot and it’s the best debut film I’ve seen since Steve McQueen’s Hunger. It’s gripping from the first frame to the last.
Posted Apr 23, 2024
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3/5
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Fantastic Machine
(2023)
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Sarah Kent
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Having done a brilliant job of amassing a wealth of thought-provoking material, they avoid drawing any conclusions from it... They simply ask where we go from here; which feels like a complete cop out.
Posted Apr 19, 2024
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3/5
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If Only I Could Hibernate
(2023)
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Markie Robson-Scott
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Director Zoljargal Purevdash’s remarkable debut, the first ever Mongolian film in the Cannes official selection, features impressive non-professional actors.
Posted Apr 19, 2024
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