Benjamin Lee

Janiak has found a way to add new life to old material, gifting us with the rare horror franchise that makes us want more rather than less, the prospect of an expanded universe seeming less like a curse and more of a blessing.

Even when it’s trying too hard, the very fact that it’s trying at all makes it hard to dislike. The rules might not make any sense but you’ll have fun playing along regardless.

The graphic novel-inspired world of Gunpowder Milkshake isn’t unique, but it’s admirably committed and Papushado edges his film away from the danger of pastiche thanks to an equally committed cast.

Cage is remarkably restrained (bar one unnecessary scream), delicately deconstructing what we’ve come to expect from him. His trademark tics are gone, his voice that much softer, his swagger replaced by an unsureness, an aggressive blare that’s faded into calm.

Netflix’s flashy RL Stine trilogy continues with a darker Friday the 13th-aping horror that brings more shocking gore and excellent performances.

It’s hard to know how seriously we’re supposed to take any of this when it’s so unclear what the makers’ intention is and so the film’s deeper cuts fail to truly wound because so much of it is mired in silliness.

There’s real, seat-edge fun to be had here, the sort of fun that’s too often missing from modern horror.

While The Ice Road might not be quite as cut-and-paste as some of the others (there’s less revenge-taking, skill-listing and name-taking than usual), it’s still familiar enough for it to feel like we’ve seen him do this exact thing before.

As the film crashes to a conclusion, early promise fading away, the film has the feeling of a valiant, but misguided, post-Get Out attempt to infuse social commentary within the framework of well-worn genre territory, aiming high but landing low.

It all goes off the rails in the worst way in the chaotic final act, as Schlesinger invents a farcical, and increasingly ludicrous, way to wrap things up, the truth of what happened proving far too pedestrian for the framework she’s created.

It’s string-pulling Pixar formula but done with just about enough effectiveness to work (do their films ever truly fail?). It doesn’t have that emotional kicker of an ending we might expect and hope for, it’s far too slight to evoke an ugly cry, but it’s breezily watchable, low stakes stuff, handsomely animated (on dry land, in water less so) and, like Disney’s spring adventure Raya and the Last Dragon, refreshingly free of romantic diversion, prioritising friendship and self-discovery over getting the boy, girl or sea monster.

It’s the worst kind of soulless committee-made product, lazy and risk-free, that need never and will never be thought of again. Infinite? Not even close.

It’s all torturously uninteresting, a plodding retread that never once explains or justifies why it made the leap from “what if?” to actual full-length movie.

It’s the sort of old-fashioned string-puller that when done well is hard to resist even if we know the strings are being pulled, like we’re aware of the bait but powerless to resist.

A handsomely made return to form for a series that had been showing signs of fatigue.

Curiosity might bring you here but boredom will drive you away.

It’s all so rushed and half-assed, like it was cobbled together on the fly rather than intricately plotted out, stupidly written and worst of all increasingly dull, a fitting end to a rotten pile of guts that’s less book of Saw and more novelisation. Game over.

Premiering as one of the more proudly mainstream offerings at this year’s Toronto film festival, David Oyelowo’s sweet-natured family adventure The Water Man gives us our first look at a commercial conductor in training, aiming to excite and thrill with adventure while making an unashamed appeal to our emotions shortly after, a Spielbergian combination that many have tried and failed to perfect.

It’s in many ways a minor, almost mundane, story with an ending that chooses the small over the big but it resonates just about enough, a quiet scream in the darkness, now able to be heard in living rooms across the world.

Ritchie mostly moves his mixed bag of pieces around the board with flair, showcasing his well-rehearsed knack for gnarly violence and chaos, giving us a sinewy B-movie that warrants a watch on a screen bigger than the one in our homes, another welcome shot of adrenaline for us and for the industry. I’m craving my next dose already.

A silly and dated new attempt to transport the classic fighting game to the big screen is a late-night drunk watch at best.

The focus on the job at hand works until it doesn’t as with just the slightest of characterisation, we’re invested in the problem rather than those solving it and the grip of the first two acts loosens as the finale beckons.

While some of the in-your-face attempts to combine YouTube videos with animation are jarring at best and annoying at worst, the cautionary stabs about unregulated big tech that come alongside are no bad thing, nestled within the framework of a brightly coloured kids movie. It’s also genuinely funny, a credit not only to the hit-a-minute script but also to a finely picked cast of comic actors

It’s all just too sanitised and safe, a journey that stumbles as it takes us from the unknown to the familiar, a film that plods when it should stride. How did a bracing idea about rebellion, sexual awakening and lawlessness turn out so boring?

If the devil did exist then surely he’d have the power to destroy films as dull as this.

The much-hyped battles deliver the giddy thrills we demand but in the moments when the pair aren’t at war there’s also a staggeringly well-built and extensive universe to explore and one that’s barely been teased in the trailers we’ve seen.

Very young kids might find some enjoyment in the brightly hued, fast-paced mania of it all, but those with any real affection for the pair of violently opposed animals will leave unimpressed.

It’s all very been here, seen that yet there’s something infinitely pleasing about a film doing very little but doing it very well, knowing just how high to aim without aiming any higher, aware of exactly what it can and can’t do. In a tight 91 minutes, without any bloat, Nobody gives us exactly what we want.