Galluppi’s mindfulness in crafting The Last Stop in Yuma County truly shows what outstanding stories can come from taking a leap in the dark.

Behind the flashing neon lights, Mars Express’ messy and complicated core is a delight to unpack and crucially, is without the comfort of easy answers. While it’s not exactly reinventing the wheel, its entangled approach to familiar concepts positions it uniquely, and is well worth the price of admission.

Hood Witch is redolent of self-importance, so deeply invested in its own world that it barely pauses to consider the viewer’s ability not to care about its mediocre characters and plot delivery.

A patchwork quilt of genres, Alice Rohrwacher’s La Chimera is a grimy and charismatic fairytale, and Josh O’Connor is its beating heart. 

Lyd, which recently played at Melbourne's Palestinian Film Festival, is a cinematic exploration of the city formerly known as Lyd, a place with a rich and tumultuous history that has been shaped by its many inhabitants and the broader geopolitical forces at play.

While The New Empire may not be exactly treading new ground, it does succeed at something that few modern blockbusters do - being fun. GxK delivers on a monster mashup of epic proportions, with a few little surprises up its sleeve and just enough creativity to inspire hope for the franchise ahead.

Fans of bizarre, esoteric and extreme films, who live around Melbourne and Sydney can rejoice, because it's that time of year - Fantastic Film Festival Australia is back once again.

As it is, Kung Fu Panda 4 is a worthy sequel and enjoyable film, even if it doesn’t quite live up to its potential.

This is a fun movie. Longtime fans will probably love Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire the most, but at the end of the day, it won’t grab the imagination of any new audiences.

Philip Gnadt and Mickey Yamine’s 2016 film Gaza Surf Club tells the story of several Palestinians and their relationship with the sea. Each of them finds a form of liberation while surfing. We see their struggle to form a thriving surf club whilst living under Israeli occupation.

Io Capitano offers audiences an empathetic and raw portrayal of the harrowing challenges asylum seekers face, simply in order to have a better life that so many of us take for granted.

Glass subverted my expectations repeatedly through her pairing of lesbians and gym bros, the supernatural creeping into the frame, and an unexpected experimental conclusion to the movie. Love Lies Bleeding is a bloody good thriller!

Watch out Cullens, there's a new vampire family in town! Fans of Twilight (2008), Dark Shadows (2012), Submarine (2010), and Moonrise Kingdom (2012), get your fangs out and sink your teeth into this quirky vampire coming-of-age film.

Imaginary is a confounding experience, with absolutely none of the first draft wrinkles of the script ironed out.

This is one of the most important films in this year’s festival. I would implore anyone wanting to learn more about Palestinian history to watch it. 

Factually, this film is about the stain that the 1948 Nakba left on its people. Symbolically, it’s about children who are trapped in a cycle of trauma that they will never outlive. It’s terrifying to think of the thousands of children who this story now belongs to, but it is important not to look away.

Driven by a powerhouse performance, Vanya is devilishly funny, playful, and inextricably human.

With its sweeping visual scope and grand approach to world building and action, Dune: Part Two is an absolutely monumental piece of sci-fi cinema. This is the kind of cinematic event that doesn't come around often, and I'd highly recommend checking it out in the biggest, loudest cinema possible.

Based on his 2017 short film of the same name, Alberto Corredor’s Baghead is a horror film about a young woman who inherits her father's pub, only to find out there's a supernatural entity in the basement with the ability to take on the form of dead loved ones.

Just two bros sitting around a campfire. Five feet apart. Because they can’t face reality.