Not for the faint of heart, certainly not for anyone looking for a pleasant diversion or a happy night out at the multiplex, Mungiu’s Beyond the Hills is nonetheless a fantastical stunner and, without question, a work of art I’m unlikely to soon forget.

Makinov shows he knows what he’s doing, ratcheting up tension at times in ways that had me sitting on the edge of my seat ready to gnaw the nails off of my fingers.

While nothing unexpected happens, while there weren’t any surprises, the comfort I felt in seeing this family break new ground while coming closer together as a unit still put a smile on my face, and as such The Croods ended up being a sojourn into the fantastically prehistoric I kind of adored.

My feelings towards Olympus Has Fallenaren’t exactly euphoric, and my reaction to the overall motion picture itself isn’t anywhere near positive. At the same time, for a schlock Die Hard variation (i.e. knockoff) Fuqua’s film isn’t anything close to a disaster, it’s too competently acted and directed for that to be the case. At the same, it’s also not anything even slightly special, making watching it more of thing to do when there’s nothing else to do than a necessity worthy of rushing out to the multiplex to experience.

The Sapphires is just too much darn fun for me to get all that worked up about its shortcomings. By the time I left the screening room I was whistling a fairly happy a tune. As unabashed audience crowd pleasers go and a few sour notes notwithstanding, this is definitely one song I kind of can’t wait to sing again.

In many ways, Korine’s enterprise is like an electronic music video set to the latest dance tracks only helmed by some weird amalgam of Terrence Malick, Steven Soderbergh and Quentin Tarantino. Scenes repeat themselves, dialogue is uttered in voiceover in hushed, almost whispered tones while the visuals appearing on the screen don’t always match the actions being described by one of the characters. It’s a fevered dreamscape of sex, lies, violence, videotape and cell phones, all of it lit in neon hues so unearthly they could only exist in a rabidly virile candy land as depicted here.

Anderson is a good director, and he does get solid performances from both Berry and Breslin. None of which is to say The Call is any good. It’s not, the script’s continued ability to shoot itself in the foot making that impossible. The movie remains a mess, this thriller an obnoxious bit of nonsense that should be hung up on and forgotten about at the first opportunity.

While not covering new territory, Ginger & Rosa is still a glorious achievement of breadth and beauty anchored by a performance from Fanning that’s superb.

I’ve got something of a soft spot in my heart for The Incredible Burt Wonderstone, and while the magic it conjures might be fleeting it’s still there, the smile it left me with as I left the theatre both unanticipated and also one I was in no hurry of seeing mystically disappear anytime soon.