Sarah Ward

A gripping crime thriller that also makes a sharp political statement, Just 6.5 paints a bleak picture of Iranian law enforcement’s attempts to deal with the country’s flourishing narcotics trade.

Digger’s loyalties always reside with Nikitas, his quest to keep his home and his devotion to the woodlands; yet Grigorakis shows an environment- and economic-fuelled tragedy, too.

This is an unsettling rebuke of government control and ideological manipulation — as well as a sharp cry against compliance with the prevailing status quo.

[Speer’s] damning answers to Birkin’s questions might have threatened to become repetitive if they didn’t paint a horrifying yet bleakly fascinating picture of a man doing something that remains thoroughly relevant today: spinning fake news.

It’s a visually rich and moodily atmospheric film with a keen sense for the unsettling, even if it boils together a mélange of somewhat familiar ingredients.

While the Chilean-Spanish writer/director weighs down every second of Blanco En Blanco with tension and solemnity, its big moments continually hit their marks – including the devastation and absurdity of its prolonged final sequence.

Its ambitions might exceed its execution — there’s no shortage of stories to tell among these Corrientes teens, as the film makes plain — but One in a Thousand remains a potent, defiant feature.

Bringing a children’s favourite to life with vividly realistic visuals and appealing production design simply proves superficial when it lacks the heart and charm that has endeared its source material to readers for more than a century.

The atmospheric revenge-thriller marks the feature filmmaking debut of actor/writer/director Leah Purcell, who plays the titular matriarch with steely resolve, rousingly adapts her own play and book, and delivers an impassioned film with an unflinching Indigenous and feminist perspective.

It’s the central performance by feature first-timer Mahayni that best demonstrates the picture’s overall charms.

One of the most astute aspects of Morales and Duplass’ script is how it captures the twists and turns of a new friendship that is buoyed by excitement and yet remains tentative, and how it navigates the constant shifts that come with both fresh and established relationships.

Observational yet authoritative in its approach, Li’s film first paints an inspiring picture, then a dispiriting one.

Indeed, the fact that the movie’s youthful lead will have to say goodbye to his childhood might be inevitable, but it never feels as standard as it sounds. Assisting immensely are some naturalistic performances, particularly from Yasan.

While little here eschews genre conventions, Bana’s weathered performance and striking work by DoP Stefan Duscio ensure that this is a gripping-enough watch, even as it ticks a torrent of familiar boxes.

The notion that lives and loves are forged and defined in everyday moments isn’t unique; however it feels both accurate and earned here.

Demonstrating a light touch — underscored by a whimsy-leaning score and overtly comic moments, but never delving into flimsiness or farce — Yan handles her chosen topic, and the tapestry of tales it’s woven through, with care.

An intimate film tackling an expansive subject — the treatment of refugees around the globe, and the way the world processes the traumas that lead to such urgent, widespread immigration — this is a poignant and morally complex drama.

Once the recipient of the country’s top portraiture prize for his likeness of David Wenham, the provocative painter Adam Cullen is now the recipient of a blistering, no-holds-barred cinematic portrait that, like his artwork, relentlessly flouts convention, inspires questions and courts a strong, complicated reaction.

Finding its genial, quirky groove early, John Sheedy’s family film flirts with tweeness but ultimately bubbles with the same spark as its can-do protagonist.

Diving deep into dark material yet always remaining afloat, it’s a potent feature debut from Australian filmmaker Rodd Rathjen.

As fascinating as the film’s production process proves, it’s the results of their creative labours that entrance and enchant.

For a film so tied to a thoroughbred showcase, this broad crowd-pleaser blatantly relies on well-worn parts.

In its most poignant, resonant moments, the film feels both devastatingly personal and affectingly revelatory: a simultaneously forceful and tender piece of existential contemplation that’s intricately tied to Wilczynski’s life but still universal in its themes. But when it meanders, which is perhaps more often than it should, it requires serious commitment from its audience.

The Gentlemen is a disposable crime caper on autopilot. Propped up by an all-star ensemble, particularly the sturdy Charlie Hunnam and scene-stealer Colin Farrell, Guy Ritchie reclaims the genre that brought him to fame but does little more than shuffle battered parts into an intermittently entertaining configuration.

Never making an obvious move, like its subject, the end result veers close to avant-garde. That’s a term that Cunningham himself famously and continually shunned; however Kovgan clearly doesn’t share the same concern.

Angel of Mine isn’t without its bumps, but its equally challenging and cathartic payoff is worth the journey.

If any colour represents the long-term impact of war, it’s the blend of beige and grey that fills The Load’s quietly powerful frames.

In pairing the aftermath of a natural disaster with the minefield that is female adolescence, it proves its own surreal, savage and superbly performed creation.