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.

My Amityville Horror has its merits, it’s just too bad the filmmakers couldn’t have delved a little deeper or pushed a bit harder in order to give Daniel’s story the weight, power and poignancy it potentially deserves.

Dead Man Down is a solid little thriller, one that takes its time to develop the principals, giving them reasons to connect and trust one another, and even if everything concludes in a rather familiar fashion that’s not too terrible a problem, the director hitting the requisite beats with a scruffy relish that fits the genre nicely.

Emperor isn’t a great film, and I’m not even sure I could go so far as to call it a good one. But it does have great moments, and while Jones isn’t front and center his memorable take on one of America’s most enigmatic, polarizing and famous military leaders is still sensational.

With Cassel’s masterful performance the glue holding everything together, The Monk rises above the fray to become something memorable, its spiritual search a mystery worth the time it takes to solve.