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I Love You Phillip Morris

3:17pm Wednesday 17th March 2010

Jim Carrey delivers his best dramatic performance since Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind in the improbable and utterly incredible true story I Love You Phillip Morris. Based on a novel by investigative reporter Steve McVicker, the film charts the romance of two prison inmates and their subsequent journey of self-discovery on both sides of the bars.

Shutter island

1:22pm Wednesday 10th March 2010

The lunatics are taking over the asylum, or that’s what Martin Scorsese’s impeccably crafted psychological thriller Shutter Island would have us believe. But then perception and reality are completely blurred in this 1950s-set mystery, adapted by screenwriter Laeta Kalogridis from the best-seller by Dennis Lehane (Mystic River, Gone Baby Gone).

Alice in Wonderland

4:41pm Wednesday 3rd March 2010

Combining a unique aesthetic, conjured from his twisted imagination, with dark humour and heartfelt emotion, Tim Burton has remained a visionary in a sea of profit-driven conformity.

• Timeless tale of a golden afternoon

From Paris With Love and Leap Year

6:40am Thursday 25th February 2010

Paris: the city of romantic overtures, fine cuisine, sartorial elegance, and crunching cars chases along the Avenue des Champs-Elysees. Director Pierre Morel returns to the scene of previous cinematic crimes for From Paris With Love, an explosive tour of the capital in the company of two mismatched US agents on a quest to dismantle a terrorist cell.

The Lovely Bones and The Last Station

3:42pm Wednesday 17th February 2010

There is life after death in Peter Jackson’s visually stunning interpretation of The Lovely Bones, the best-seller by Alice Sebold, which proves to be one adaptation too far for the Oscar-winning director of The Lord of the Rings trilogy and King Kong.

A Single man

3:14pm Wednesday 10th February 2010

If the Oscars were truly awarded on merit rather than the baubles of a popularity contest then Colin Firth would be collecting a golden statuette as Best Actor in a Leading Role on March 7. However, the British star’s mesmerising portrayal of a gay professor torn apart by grief in A Single Man will inevitably be overshadowed by Jeff Bridges’ showy portrayal of an alcoholic country and western singer in Crazy Heart. Nuance and subtlety are apparently underrated, and the aching emotion conveyed in a single silent gaze will be completely overlooked by audiences and voters, who need to be instructed how to feel every step of the way.

Invictus

3:19pm Wednesday 3rd February 2010

On February 11, 1990, when Nelson Mandela walked free from Robben Island after more than a quarter of a century of incarceration in his eight feet by eight feet cell, he discovered a country divided by apartheid. His release lit the touchpaper on civil unrest as he worked together with President de Klerk to end apartheid and begin the difficult healing process.

Edge of Darkness

3:51pm Wednesday 27th January 2010

Award-winning, meaty British television dramas are providing plentiful food for thought across the pond in Hollywood. Last year, Russell Crowe, Ben Affleck and Rachel McAdams headlined an accomplished distillation of the Bafta award-winning 2003 mini-series, State of Play. Now, we have more political intrigue and corporate skulduggery in Martin Campbell’s slick reduction of the 1985 BBC mini-series, Edge of Darkness.

Brothers

3:42pm Wednesday 20th January 2010

All’s fair in love and war. In Jim Sheridan’s English language remake of Susanne Bier’s celebrated Danish drama Brodre, love is war as two siblings – polar opposites – are divided by their deep bond to the same woman.

Up In The Air

10:11am Thursday 14th January 2010

DAMON SMITH says George Clooney is set for yet another Oscar nomination

• Have your say

Sherlock Holmes

2:01pm Tuesday 22nd December 2009

Guy Ritchie’s reinvention of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s legendary sleuth should have been a dream new beginning for the director. Starting his career in 1998 with the almighty bang of Lock, Stock & Two Smoking Barrels, the Hertfordshire-born film-maker has spent most of the past decade in the shadow of then-wife Madonna.

Avatar

3:27pm Wednesday 16th December 2009

It’s been 12 years since James Cameron became king of the world with the Oscar-winning Titanic. The tragic love story between Kate Winslet’s socialite and Leonardo DiCaprio’s scallywag aboard the doomed ocean liner shattered box office records and countless hearts to the warbling of Celine Dion.

Where the Wild Things Are

9:11am Wednesday 9th December 2009

Based on Maurice Sendak’s beloved children's story, Where The Wild Things Are is not a sentimental coming-of-age story viewed through rose-tinted spectacles.

The Box and Cracks

5:40pm Wednesday 2nd December 2009

In our high-tech age, it’s sometimes easy to forget the consequences of our choices when everything is available at the click of a mouse or the touch of a keyboard.

Paranormal Activity and Nativity!

3:38pm Wednesday 25th November 2009

How do you turn 15,000 dollars into $100m? If you’re Israeli-born film-maker Oren Peli, you write and direct a low-budget supernatural horror movie, shoot it at your own house in your spare time and watch as that modest vision becomes a 21st-century Blair Witch Project.

A Serious Man and The Informant

10:23am Wednesday 18th November 2009

If fortune truly favours the brave, it's no surprise that the hen-pecked, mild-mannered mensch at the centre of Joel and Ethan Coen’s new black comedy A Serious Man is pummelled senseless by bad luck. Set in a Jewish community in mid-1960s Minneapolis reminiscent of the film-maker brothers’ childhood, the film is a deceptively simple portrait of a family in crisis, distinguished by a sharp script and terrific ensemble cast.

2012

3:08pm Wednesday 11th November 2009

Cancel the London Summer Olympic Games! Our time on the third rock from the sun will come to a dramatic end on December 21, 2012, when planets align as decreed by the Mayan calendar. Thus no one is going to care a jot about whether our stadia are finished on time, or which member of the cycling team breaks an individual pursuit world record.

The Men Who Stare at Goats

1:32pm Wednesday 4th November 2009

Truth is certainly stranger than fiction in Grant Heslov’s new black comedy, The Men Who Stare at Goats, inspired by Jon Ronson’s non-fiction best-seller of the same name.

• Have your say

An Education

5:24pm Wednesday 28th October 2009

A star is born. Twenty-four-year-old British actress Carey Mulligan positions herself as a serious Oscar contender with a mesmerising portrayal of a conflicted schoolgirl in Swinging Sixties London. Based on a memoir by journalist Lynn Barber, An Education is a rites of passage story blessed with a touching and humorous script by Nick Hornby (High Fidelity, About A Boy).