Emerald Fennell was never going to convince those who reverently cling to Emily Brontë’s novel of its provocative potential, yet in her ravishingly grotesque vision of passion and obsession, Wuthering Heights lays bare two convulsive hearts responsible for their own primal, fevered torture.
The middle part of Satyajit Ray’s coming-of-age trilogy lingers precariously between innocence and responsibility as Apu approaches adolescence, and through Aparajito’s passage between pastoral and city life, grapples with the irrevocable losses that make each small step towards maturity possible.
The kinetic choreography which fuses dance and combat in KPop Demon Hunters certainly impresses, yet music transcends spectacle in this vibrant, neon-soaked world of idols turned warriors, liberating performers and fans alike from those inner voices that gnaw at self-worth.
Kleber Mendonça Filho sets a vast stage for the tense political drama of The Secret Agent, tracing one dissident’s attempts to outmanoeuvre Brazil’s military dictatorship in the 1970s, and studying historic expressions of grief and resistance distorted by its cruel, bureaucratic censorship.
Bi Gan’s metamodern autopsy of cinema may be elusive in its dreamlike passage through time, yet in becoming one of the medium’s most transcendent accomplishments in recent years, Resurrection enacts the intersection of art and reality as a transient, bittersweet exchange.
Table tennis superstar Marty Mauser is unlikeable a sports movie antihero as they come, and through Josh Safdie’s abrasive illustration of a self-serving quest for glory, Marty Supreme propels his morally dubious ventures forward on waves of frantic, pulsating momentum.
Richard Linklater sensitively bares the lonely, eccentric soul of Broadway lyricist Lorenz Hart in Blue Moon, locating him on the opening night of his old creative partner’s newest hit, and tracing the heartbreak, jealousy, and self-sabotage that send him spiralling towards oblivion.
Everything that the devoted family man of Train Dreams holds dear is a transient heartbeat in the grand scheme of history, and Clint Bentley’s impressionistic lens joins him in tenderly contemplating its slow surrender to time, marrying curatorial precision with a luminous, transcendent spirit.
Memory is the only projector that Hollywood celebrity Jay Kelly willingly surrenders to in his twilight years, and as he watches those frames of his regretful past unspool, Noah Baumbach composes a bittersweet reflection on the fragility of selfhood beneath the glare of stardom.
Six-year-old Apu may revel in the bright innocence of his rural childhood, yet the sacred cycles of Satyajit Ray’s natural world persist, holding memories of joy and sorrow within Pather Panchali’s timeless, primordial pulse.
