Search: Starring Adam Driver

I could not have wished for a more perfect first film to wean me back into the in-cinema press screening world I left behind in March 2020.

This emerges as a piece of bravura filmmaking that tackles huge themes with style and intelligence while providing a compelling narrative drive.

Jarmusch usually manages to invest his films with a quirky sense of humour, but here the lines fall decidedly flat.

The car racing scenes are the best in the history of cinema.

You can enter through the objects, like an Eames chair or three pairs of Ray Bans, bought online. Or through the religious conflict inherent in a bacon bagel.

An inconstancy of detail might be forgivable if it were not matched by inconstancy elsewhere.

A thriller, a deep hard stare into the nature of escape, a comedy of metaphors and an alluringly photographed glimpse into the abyss.

Everyone involved here has done better elsewhere.

The script depends on the pieces fitting together at the right time in the right places, ignoring daft coincidence and ludicrous possibilities

The balance of the super real with intricately timed artifice and how they collapse into each other is Baumbach's crown achievement.

A sublime family thriller

Gilliam’s script cannot quite stand the excesses of his own imagination.

The film is at its best when it is portraying conflicted emotions - as old love underlies fresh acrimony.

It is described simply as “A Fable”, but there is nothing simple about this over-ambitious allegorical sprawl.

After the initial disbelief that Jarmusch has written and directed a movie as simple and quiet as this, you settle into the rhythm of the piece and begin to appreciate the secret

The issue is that if you strip out the elevated craft and A-list performances, what is left is the sort of bread-and-butter plot arc Cagney & Lacey used to rely on back in the day.

The problem with The Report is that despite this ongoing relevance, its powerful subject matter, the capable cast and an impressive script, it never builds up the impetus it ought to have.

It looks as if Scorsese is battling his own demons, oblivious of the pain he inflicts upon an unsuspecting audience

This is perhaps less a swansong than a familiar sunset

The Force Awakens manages to stop one thinking about how disbelief is suspended and instead carry one along.

It's that old magic again.

Nostalgia, soured by memory

Visually the film has emotional qualities that contribute to the feeling of admiration for Robyn's quest

The script is as flat as Monday morning

This is Woody Allen territory, except not as funny

Baumbach shoots his disaster scenes, evacuations, and poisonous cloud rife with contradictions. The purple sky of doom is beautiful and strangely soothing.