The Star's critic MARIA DUARTE reviews Sebastian, Four Mothers, Restless, and The Most Precious of Cargoes

The Star's critic MARIA DUARTE recommends a drama that explores the formative years of Richard Burton’s life

The Star's critic MARIA DUARTE recommends a deliciously dark thriller that explores the complex loyalties within a marriage

The Star's critic MARIA DUARTE review Cottontail, Memoir of a Snail, Bridget Jones: Mad About the Boy, and Captain America: Brave New World

MARIA DUARTE recommends a tense thriller that uses Palestinian characters to explore the predicament of migrants in Europe

The Star's critic MARIA DUARTE reviews September 5, The Fire Inside, Bring Them Down, and Love Hurts

The Star's critic MARIA DUARTE is enthralled by a complex thriller, but advises caution in accepting its depiction of reality

The Star's critic MARIA DUARTE reviews Companion, Saturday Night, The Tasting, and The Colours Within

The Star's critic MARIA DUARTE is dazzled by an extraordinary performance in a classic Mike Leigh film

The Star's critic MARIA DUARTE recommends an edge-of-your-seat film exposing uncomfortable truths

Hallucinogenic homosexuality, a quantum thriller, airport shenanigans and feminist Tolkein: MARIA DUARTE reviews Queer, The Universal Theory, Carry On and Lord of the Rings: The War of The Rohirrim

Horror for young mothers and Western presidents, a one-legged wrestler and weaponised art; the Star's critic MARIA DUARTE reviews Nightbitch, Rumours, Unstoppable and Porcelain War

The Star's critic MARIA DUARTE is moved by a real-life story of rescue at sea that upturns easy assumptions about political motivations in times of war

Papal tiffs, Reality TV torture, volleyball feminism and a monster in the closet; The Star's critic MARIA DUARTE reviews Conclave, The Contestant, Power Alley and Your Monster

MARIA DUARTE recommends a documentary that reconstructs the part played by white activists in the struggle against apartheid

Emotional repression in Hong Kong, emotional repression in the UK, swords and sandals and a forgettable family reunion: reviews of The Last Dance, Silent Men, Gladiator II and Christmas Eve in Miller’s Point

The Star's critic MARIA DUARTE recommends an unlikely tale of friendship between an Israeli and a Palestinian in the midst of West Bank ethnic cleansing

Serial killer dating; courtroom charm; synaesthetic inspiration and jungle book robotics - The Star's critic MARIA DUARTE reviews Woman of the Hour, The Crime is Mine, A Sudden Glimpse to Deeper Things and The Wild Robot

MARIA DUARTE recommends a biopic of the US presidential candidate that explores his relationship with gay communist-basher Roy Cohn

Healthcare evangelism; Rajneesh child-abuse; an unwanted musical; and an un-Elephant man: The Star's critic MARIA DUARTE reviews Medicine Man: The Stan Brock Story, Children of the Cult, Joker: Folie A Deux, and A Different Man

Racial injustice, British colonialism and the climate crisis intersect to create the perfect storm in a new documentary, says MARIA DUARTE

Decline and fall of the US empire, rehab in Orkney, the younger self, and lone wolves

MARIA DUARTE recommends a gripping courtroom drama

Yorkshire chills, tangled in the dark web, pregnancy diaries and brackish juice: MARIA DUARTE reviews Starve Acre, Red Rooms, My First Film and Beetlejuice

The Star's critic MARIA DUARTE reviews Sing Sing, Mandoob (Night Courier), Close To You, and The Count of Monte Cristo

The Star's critic MARIA DUARTE recommends a moving 'Proustian' tale of a search for a lost past and a forsaken love

The Star's critic MARIA DUARTE salutes a frenetic and funny political comedy drama whose battleground is Belfast and where the weapons are words

US Gran-dram, Turkish Trans-dram, UK Band-dram, and predictable tornadoes: The Star's critic MARIA DUARTE reviews Thelma, Crossing, Blur: to the end, and Twisters

The Star's critic MARIA DUARTE recommends a quietly powerful drama that examines an Iranian mother and daughter who escape domestic abuse

MARIA DUARTE is chilled by a documentary that brings together the son of Rudolf Hoss with a Jewish Auschwitz survivor

Trans perspectives, opposites attract, washed-out noir and white-knuckle fridging: the Star's critic MARIA DUARTE reviews Orlando, My Political Biography, The Nature of Love, What Remains, and Kill

The Star's critic MARIA DUARTE recommends a refreshing perspective on sexual fluidity and the cultural pressures on Indian gay men

Posh environmentalism, Moroccan lumpenproletariat, US survivalism and cartoon adolescence

The Star's critic MARIA DUARTE recommends a US documentary that shines a light on the ill effects of corporate profiteering in the food industry

Channel swimming, forgetting the ex-bf, therapeutic cycling and scary spiders: The Star's critic MARIA DUARTE reviews Young Woman and the Sea, The Beast, Hard Miles, and Sting