Cinema releases

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2012

#The Turin Horse New release

Hungary’s master of entropy Béla Tarr closes his own filmmaking career with a slow, stark parable of a horse on strike and the world caving in. It’s heartfelt – but a bit gloomy, says Kieron Corless

#Free Men New release

Viewing Occupied Paris through a Muslim prism, Ismaël Ferroukhi’s muted drama is a more contemplative sort of Resistance film, says Catherine Wheatley

#She Monkeys New release

Lisa Aschan’s cryptic fairytale of young womanhood casts its subjects in an uncanny ambience of pale half-light and thick steam. Catherine Wheatley peers quizzically

#Damsels in Distress New release

The erstwhile laureate of satires of the American preppie heart, Whit Stillman breaks his 13-year silence with a decidedly tongue-in-cheek college comedy. Kate Stables wonders if its frivolity is for real

#Breathing New release

Karl Markovics’ debut study of an institutionalised teenager finding release in mortuary work takes several leaves from the Dardennes’ neorealist playbook. Catherine Wheatley sees muted naturalism turn to the sublime

#The Cabin in the Woods New release

Drew Goddard and producer Joss Whedon’s marvellous meta-monster horror may be smarter (and funnier) than it is scary, says Kim Newman

#Le Havre New release

In Aki Kaurismaäki’s deadpan fairytale of working-class solidarity, quirky flirts with cutesy and bathos with true poignancy. Hannah McGill sees the raw humanity shining through

#The Hunger Games New release

Returning to the audiovisual medium that inspired it, Suzanne Collins’s dystopian bestseller about televised mortal combat loses moral depth but gains some dramatic breadth, says Anton Bitel

#In Darkness New release

Agnieszka Holland’s third engagement with the terrors of WWII is a hard-hitting portrait of national and class divisions amongst fugitive Jews in the sewers of the Lwów ghetto. By Michael Brooke

#If Not Us, Who New release

A melancholic addition to the canon of films about Germany’s 1960s radicalism, Andres Veiel’s biopic of lovers Bernward Vesper and Gudrun Ensslin ponders the rivalry of word and deed, says Catherine Wheatley

#Blood Car New release

Anton Bitel hails a belatedly released satire of American car culture surely destined for cult status

#Hadewijch New release

Militantly uncompromising, Bruno Dumont’s portrait of a nun turning to Islam sees the master of enigmatic mysticism himself swap condescension for compassion, says Jonathan Romney

#The Muppets New release

As the Muppets Studio is under threat from an evil oil billionaire, Kermit rallies his troupers to produce a timely protest against corporate culture, discovers Sophie Mayer

#Carnage New release

Four bourgeois Brooklynites trapped in one room descend into conflict and misery. Roman Polanski’s elegant and unsettling adaptation of Yasmina Reza’s hit play takes full advantage of cinema’s apparatus, finds Kate Stables

#Coriolanus New release

Ralph Fiennes’s bold modern adaptation of Shakespeare’s caustic late combat drama makes a strong fist of merciless material, says David Jays

#A Useful Life New release

A genial homage to a failing cinematheque and its waning artform, Federico Veiroj’s comedy also proves an ode to reinvention, says Mar Diestro-Dópido

#The Iron Lady New release

Thatcher – The Biopic runs shy of politics. Philip Kemp scratches his head

2011

#The Artist New release

Moving on from his OSS 117 James Bond spoofs, French entertainer Michel Hazanavicius has found novelty magic in the style and lore of silent Hollywood. Tony Rayns finds resonances in unexpected places

#The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo
New release

David Fincher’s thumping, pumping take on Stieg Larsson’s thrilling bestseller about the sins of patriarchy redeems the Hollywood remake, says Anton Bitel

#We Have a Pope New release

Nanni Moretti’s tragi-comic story of a newly elected pope on the run is no toothless satire of organised religion, says Catherine Wheatley, but a bittersweet portrait of age, fate and fallibility

#The Deep Blue Sea New release

A love-triangle drama set in a tattered post-war England, Terence Davies’ adaptation of Terence Rattigan’s play may still not be Sophocles, but does play like a cinematic opera, says Jonathan Romney

#Wuthering Heights New release

Stripping away the literary, romantic and supernatural trappings of Emily Brontë’s famous novel, Andrea Arnold’s elemental new reading is powerful if lop-sided, says Kate Stables

#Weekend New release

A one-night stand matures into a deeply romantic and revelatory weekend in Andrew Haigh’s wonderful second feature. Samuel Wigley is utterly convinced

#The Adventures of Tintin The Secret of the Unicorn New release

Sumptuously motion-captured and computer-modelled, Steven Spielberg’s big-screen rendition of Hergé’s adventure comics isn’t entirely gripping, finds David Jays

#We Need to Talk About Kevin
New release

Lynne Ramsay’s long-awaited return to filmmaking expresses a mother’s nightmare of raising a hell-child through a splatter of flashbacks and teasing use of the colour red. Tim Robey is impressed

#Sleeping Beauty New release

A young woman sells her sleeping body for sex in Australian novelist Julia Leigh’s first film. Sophie Mayer pines for the expressivity of the film’s mentor Jane Campion

#Tyrannosaur New release

Boasting vivid performances from Peter Mullan and Olivia Colman, Paddy Considine’s sober, composed treatment of masculine violence and self-destruction marks an auspicious debut feature, says Trevor Johnston

#The Debt New release

A sturdy psychological suspense thriller about a botched Mossad kidnap mission, The Debt focusses intriguingly on the dilemmas of a female lead agent until an implausible last act, says Kate Stables

#Drive New release

Ryan Gosling’s hot rod / getaway driver harks back to the old cool of Ryan O’Neal and Steve McQueen in Danish crime auteur Nicolas Winding Refn’s classically pulpy Los Angeles debut. Wally Hammond enjoys the ride

#Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy New release

In the hands of Let the Right One In director Tomas Alfredson, this feature adaptation preserves, even enhances, the atmosphere of mistrust and cynical insecurity in John le Carré’s spy-catcher novel, says Philip Kemp

#Kes Re-issue

Ken Loach’s adaptation of Barry Hines’s novel about a Barnsley boy and his kestrel is more than mere telly-vérité, wrote Jack Ibberson in our Autumn 1969 issue

#Self Made New release

Gillian Wearing’s fly-on-the-wall performance documentary – featuring a cast of volunteer ‘non-actors’ – blurs film ‘boundaries’ and probes screen ‘revelations’. Mark Fisher is lost in questions and suspicions

#Days of Heaven Re-issue

Terrence Malick’s portrait of a fleeting utopia in the lie between four souls working the pre-WWI Texan wheatfields distills a poetic vision of paradise lost, wrote Tom Milne in the May 1979 Monthly Film Bulletin

#Conan the Barbarian New release

Nick Pinkerton finds director Marcus Nispel and star Jason Momoa’s re-adaptation of the Robert E. Howard barbarian yarn is sans tissue, sans weight, sans identity and sans Arnie

#In a Better World New release

In Susanne Bier’s twin-track drama of virtue and violence in the schoolyard and in an African war zone, morality shifts and heaves beneath the surface sermons, argues Lisa Mullen

#Super 8 New release

Henry K. Miller on expert retromaniac J.J. Abrams’ homage to 1970s backyard filmmaking, “a Spielberg pastiche of uncanny precision and sublime pointlessness.”

#French Cancan Re-issue

Jean Renoir’s triumphant return to la comedie Parisien makes poetry of showmanship, as Catherine de la Roche wrote in our Autumn 1955 issue

#Poetry New release

A 66-year-old mother defies patriarchy and Alzheimer’s through poetry and empathy for a dead rape victim in Lee Chang-dong’s remarkable drama. Trevor Johnston sees something close to greatness

#Beginners New release

Sweet but terminally meandering, Mike Mills’ coming-to-terms-with-life story leans heavily on an ebullient sideshow from Christopher Plummer, says Kate Stables

#The Tree of Life New release

Intimate childhood memoir? Absurd sacred bluster? Michael Atkinson parses Terrence Malick’s ambitious Rorschach blot

#Transformers  Dark of the Moon
New release

Michael Bay’s third shot at his giant shapeshifting robot franchise continues to drag its knuckles. Kim Newman looks in vain for the awesome fun

#The Beaver New release

Mel Gibson’s fallen alpha male channels himself via a beaver glove-puppet in this poker-faced family discord drama from director Jodie Foster. Nicolas Rapold wonders if it’s a deadpan parody

#Kaboom New release

Gorgeous bed-hopping teens head off the apocalypse in between lessons on giving head. Just another day at the office for Gregg Araki, says Ryan Gilbey

#X-Men First Class New release

Set in the comic-books’ native Kennedy era, Matthew Vaughn’s latest entry in the knotty X-Men series is clean, cool and seemingly imperishable, says Kim Newman

#Le quattro volte New release

Goats and their herdsmen, fir trees, dust and the Pythagorean philosophy of reincarnation are considered in the round in Michelangelo Frammartino’s remarkable portrait of rural Calabria. Nick Bradshaw is beguiled

#Third Star New release

A Welsh bromance cum valedictory road movie, this burnished feature debut from director Hatti Dalton and writer Vaughan Sivell never truly sheds its disease-drama trappings, says Kate Stables

#Attack the Block New release

Joe Cornish’s uproarious aliens-versus-hoodies feature debut has street smarts to match its movie smarts, says Michael Brooke

#Deep End Re-issue

Jerzy Skolimowski’s study of obsession blends poetry and farce with surrealist abandon, as wrote Nigel Andrews in his original Monthly Film Bulletin review

#Thor New release

Norse-mythical Asgard crosses hammers with modern-day spook trail New Mexico in this latest addition to the Marvel Comics movie franchise. Kim Newman even detects a touch of Shakespeare

#Taxi zum Klo Re-issue

Frank Ripploh’s groundbreaking (self-)portrait of a gay teacher and errant lover is both impish and assured, wrote Bill Marshall in his 1982 Monthly Film Bulletin review

#The Last Picture Show Re-issue

Movie references or no, Peter Bogdanovich’s bittersweet portrait of small-town disenchantment offers a universal depiction of the workings of nostalgia, as Tom Milne wrote in his 1972 Monthly Film Bulletin review

Meek’s Cutoff New release

Tracking three frayed families forging the Oregon Trail in 1845, Kelly Reichardt’s starkly beautiful fable casts a female view on a West “dominated by space and silence”. By Kate Stables

#Before the Revolution Re-issue

Bernardo Bertolucci’s second feature eyes the brief flickering of a young bourgeois’ revolutionary ardour in the director’s Parma hometown. Philip Strick admires his command, in this 1969 Monthly Film Bulletin review

#The Silent House New release

Newcomer Gustavo Hernández’s ingenious low-budget, single-shot horror film is a remarkable exercise in atmosphere and suspense, says Mar Diestro-Dópido

#Essential Killing New release

Jerzy Skolimowski’s visceral study of an escaped jihadi’s struggle for survival in the Polish wilds makes a deft mix of involvement and estrangement, says Tony Rayns

#Country Strong New release

Gwyneth Paltrow battles drink and demons as a foundering honky-tonk singer in Shana Feste’s mostly glib country-music square dance. Nick Pinkerton picks out the positives

Les Diaboliques Re-issue

French suspense master Henri-Georges Clouzot’s schoolhouse murder mystery wallows in shallow shocks, wrote Derek Prouse in our original 1955 review

Man of Aran Re-issue

Robert Flaherty’s idyllic epic of Irish island fishermen is a triumph of ‘living cinema’, wrote Paul Rotha in our original 1934 review

#His & Hers New release

Ken Wardrup’s elegantly composed portrait of 70 Irish women of all ages – in age order – puts Samuel Wigley in mind of Alan Bennett and Ozu Yasujiro

#The African Queen Re-issue

John Huston’s odd-couple action romance sets steam for fantasy land, argued Clarissa Bowen in our original 1952 review

#Animal Kingdom New release

An exploration of Australia’s criminal underbelly, David Michôd’s debut is on the whole an ambitious and effective thriller, argues Wally Hammond

#Inside Job New release

Charles Ferguson’s slick, smug explication of the root causes of the current global recession offers a useful primer for the incredibly ill-informed, says Vadim Rizov

True GritTrue Grit New release

The Coens’ new adaptation of Charles Portis’s frontier novel might be less true to the letter than Henry Hathaway’s 1969 John Wayne vehicle but, finds Ben Walters, it captures the original’s feel for the grotesque

La Peau DouceLa Peau douce (Silken Skin) Re-issue

‘Conventional’ on the surface, François Truffaut’s adultery drama hides deep seams of irony, melancholy and a newfound control, as Tom Milne argued in the December 1964 issue of the Monthly Film Bulletin

Brighton RockBrighton Rock New release

Rowan Joffe’s new adaptation of Graham Greene’s underworld thriller – classically filmed by the Boulting brothers in 1947 – distinguishes itself by updating the milieu to 1964. Philip Kemp wishes it hadn’t copied the former film’s ending

Men on the BridgeMen on the Bridge New release

Asli Özge’s tapestry of gridlocked lives in contemporary Istanbul offers further evidence of the flowering of late neorealism in Turkish cinema, says Kieron Corless

Breakfast at Tiffany’sBreakfast at Tiffany’s Re-issue

Under Audrey Hepburn’s spell, Blake Edwards’ adaptation of Truman Capote’s novel is incorrigibly away with the fairies, as James Breen elucidated in our Winter 1961/62 issue

GaslandGasland New release

Improbably riveting, Josh Fox’s investigative doc about unregulated US hydraulic fracture mining is all the more powerful for its quiet meticulousness, says Sam Davies

The King's SpeechThe King’s Speech New release

Mystique and mischief: Tom Hooper’s film about the stammering future King George neatly has its royalty both ways, says Philip Kemp

2010

The Big SleepThe Big Sleep Re-issue

Howard Hawks’ 1946 adaptation of Raymond Chandler’s famously Byzantine novel is a tantalising brew of apparent suspense, vivacious women and entertaining bits of business, noted John Pym in a 1978 Monthly Film Bulletin review

Boudu Saved from DrowningBoudu Saved from Drowning Re-issue

Renoir’s airy 1932 fable about a Parisian tramp’s subversion of a middle-class household remains as fresh as when Tom Milne wrote this review for the BFI’s Monthly Film Bulletin in 1965

#On Tour New release

Actor-auteur Mathieu Amalric’s portrait of a New Burlesque troupe touring provincial France rings up all sorts of resonances, finds Chris Darke

#The American New release

Anton Corbijn’s fastidious, retro-ish Euro-espionage thriller is written, acted and directed as if it were still 1974. Only George Clooney could have got it made, says Michael Atkinson

#Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows    Part 1 New release

Practical magic and the power of love struggle against great swathes of plot exposition in this near-finale of Warners’ epic J.K. Rowling wizard cycle, says Sophie Mayer

#Let Me In New release

A US remake of the hit Swedish vampire hit Let the Right One In, Matt Reeves’ film may be less daring, but it works better as a horror film, finds Kim Newman

#Mary and Max New release

Oscar-winner Adam Elliot’s latest mordant claymation comedy considers correspondence and its lack through a sad story of a 1970s pen-friendship. Mark Fisher harks back to an age before the internet

Over Your Cities Grass Will Grow
New release

A film about art, or about film as art? Either way, Lisa Mullen is ravished by Sophie Fiennes’ hypnotic record of the work of Anselm Kiefer

#Police, Adjective New release

Corneliu Porumboiu’s dry-humoured follow-up to 12:08 East of Bucharest may be the most undramatic cop movie ever filmed, writes Philip Kemp. But beneath its games with language lies a vision of the gaping moral quagmire of police work

#Eccentricities of a Blonde-haired Girl
New release

Manoel de Oliveira’s latest eccentric gem mixes moral tale with courtly romance in a present-day setting. Jonathan Romney is strangely charmed

#The Secret in Their Eyes New release

Ricardo Darín is a model of minimalist acting in this investigative probe of a 1970s Argentina on the brink of dictatorship, says Maria Delgado

#Ivul New release

Andrew Gallivant Kötting takes to the trees in his first film from Swiss exile. Nick Bradshaw admires a tone poem of landscape, bodies and madness

#Toy Story 3 New release

Pixar’s latest mixes valedictory and renewal. Jonathan Romney agrees that it’s better to reuse than to throw away old material, old toys, old ideas

#Greenberg New release

Ben Stiller's New York narcissist rides out a nervous breakdown in the California sun in Noah Baumbach's knotty character study. Nicolas Rapold admires its toxic spectacle

#4.3.2.1. New release

Noel Clarke's four-girl British heist caper may be mix-and-match derivative, but Catherine Wheatley admires its cheeky, cheerful charm

#The Happiest Girl in the World

A small-town teenager finds winning a fruit-juice competition the road to calamity in this acerbic portrait of consumer culture. Michael Brooke admires another dispatch from the Romanian new wave

#Lebanon New release

Samuel Maoz’s Venice Golden Lion-winner depicts the 1982 Israeli-Lebanon war entirely from the Stygian interior of an Israeli tank. Roger Clarke feels the brutalisation of the tank’s four young occupants

#La Danse The Paris Opera Ballet
New release

Frederick Wiseman’s documentary dissects both an institution and an artform with extraordinary skill and beauty, says Kate Stables

#Cherrybomb New release

Three rebellious Northern Irish teens form an increasingly dark love triangle in this spirited first-time feature. The acting's the thing, says Lisa Mullen

Alice in WonderlandAlice in Wonderland New release

Tim Burton’s vision of a grown-up Alice is imaginative but narratively over-corseted, says Lisa Mullen

#The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo
New release

This adaptation of the first part of Stieg Larsson's Millennium trilogy is an ultraviolent and devastating whodunit with an unsettling political undertow, says Lisa Mullen

#Lourdes New release

Sylvie Testud plays a wheelchair-bound miracle hunter in Jessica Hausner’s wry comedy of manners. Michael Brooke finds the results beguilingly odd

#Capitalism: A Love Story New release

Pitching itself to a ‘sub-prime’ audience, Michael Moore’s pseudo-investigative attack on post-1980 capitalism has all the analytic rigour of a crap shoot, says Tony Rayns

#Father of My Children New release

Life goes on in Mia Hansen-Løve’s snappy yet slow-burning portrait of a film family's schism, says Ryan Gilbey

#Our Beloved Month of August
New release

A family musical docu-drama set amongst Portuguese village-fête show bands, Miguel Gomes' film is a hybrid work of bewitching perversity, says Jonathan Romney

#Invictus New release

Clint Eastwood's Nelson Mandela sports drama throws race-relations sanctimony like so many pies, says Michael Atkinson

#Harry Brown New release

#Me and Orson Welles New release

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Last Updated: 01 Jun 2012