The Cottage (18)

12:01am Thursday 13th March 2008

The writer-director of acclaimed British crime thriller London to Brighton does a handbrake turn into comedy horror with harrowing results.

The Flight of the Red Balloon

12:01am Thursday 13th March 2008

As the title suggests, this Parisien drama takes its lead from Albert Lamorisse’s Oscar-winning short of 1956.

Libero (15)

12:01am Thursday 13th March 2008

Acclaimed Italian-Scots actor Kim Rossi Stuart, last seen here in Romanzo Criminale, makes his directorial debut with this powerful family drama.

Mister Lonely (15)

12:01am Thursday 13th March 2008

Marilyn Monroe invites Michael Jackson to stay in her Highlands home with the Queen and Abraham Lincoln. Not the beginnings of a joke but the plot of Harmony Korine’s oddball comedy drama.

The Boss of It All (15)

12:01am Thursday 13th March 2008

Lars von Trier, the Danish director of Dogville and Dancer in the Dark, is not one of cinema’s natural-born giggle generators, so to have him helming a comedy is an event in itself.

Water Lilies (15)

12:01am Thursday 13th March 2008

Three 15-year-old girls stumble through the badlands of adolescence in Celine Sciamma’s beautifully realised debut. Floriane (Adele Haenel) and Anne (Louise Blachere) are members of synchronised swimming teams.

Hannah Montana/Miley Cyrus: Best of Both Worlds Tour

12:01am Thursday 13th March 2008

Your critic was at something of a disadvantage at the Sunday morning public preview of this 3D concert movie. It wasn’t just being five times the audience’s average age, or flagrantly breaching the dress code of pink and spangly.

User Rating: 10/10

Movie stars: the solution to all of the world’s troubles

12:01am Thursday 13th March 2008

Who you gonna call when you’ve got a planet that needs saving? Hollywood, of course. There was a time, in the not so distant past, when Hollywood was synonymous with selfish glamour – and damn proud of it.

Let’s cut off all of their heads

12:59am Thursday 6th March 2008

The Other Boleyn Girl (12A): Contrary to boasting in some quarters, sex was invented not in the Sixties but in the 16th century. Irrefutable proof of this arrives in Justin Chadwick’s movie, The Other Boleyn Girl.

The Edge of Heaven (15)

12:58am Thursday 6th March 2008

Odd to describe as life-enhancing a film that focuses so closely on death, but Fatih Akin’s drama is gloriously optimistic about the human capacity to heal.

Battle for Haditha (15)

12:54am Thursday 6th March 2008

On November 19, 2005, a US patrol was blown up in Haditha, Iraq, killing one marine. The initial reports from the US military said 15 Iraqis were also killed by the roadside bomb, and more in the shooting that followed.

Garage (18)

12:53am Thursday 6th March 2008

To watch this Irish comedy-drama is to invite into your life a gnawing feeling of foreboding and doubt. The cause of the latter can be nipped in the bud straight away.

Vantage Point (12A)

12:52am Thursday 6th March 2008

Dennis Quaid might have a few years on Jack Bauer, but he does his best to pass for the 24 superhero in this slick but empty-headed thriller. William Hurt plays a US president who ventures to old Europe to sign an anti-terror treaty, only to find himself the target of an assassination bid.

Diary of the Dead (18)

12:50am Thursday 6th March 2008

It’s a long march to the grave whenever George A Romero is around. Diary of the Dead, the director’s latest zombie chiller, drags its weary carcass into view behind Day of the Dead, Night of the Living Dead, Dawn of the Dead and Coach Trip of the Dead (okay, that last one was made up).

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