Jacques Audiard’s latest is a meandering melodrama that finds the emergence of companionship and perhaps love in people broken emotionally and physically. Starring Marion Cotillard alongside relative unknown Matthias Schoenaerts, Rust and Bone is a bruiser of a film that ultimately fails to pack an emotional punch.

Winner of the Palme d’Or for 2012, Amour is a film that truly lives up to its name. Casting aside the fiery passion that most of the rest of cinema is obsessed with, it takes an uncompromising look at a love so deep and enduring that it becomes a prison. Never contrived or manipulative, Amour will wrench something deep inside you and not let go. Bring tissues and bring a lot. You’re going to need every last ply.

It’s not scary, it’s not funny, it’s not even very bloody. Aside from a few interesting set designs, the only revelation here is how bad it is. Silent Hill: Revelation is in the running for worst film of the year, and at the moment the odds are in its favour. Run from it.

Hovering somewhere between a teenage sex-romp comedy and Clarissa Explains it All lies Fun Size, an awkward, inoffensive and ultimately meandering tale attempting to target the abandoned 12-14 y/o market. This film lingers and loiters like a greasy teenager at the mall, and is about as appealing to anyone who is not themselves a greasy teenager.

Coinciding with this Friday’s release of the extended US cut of The Shining, Room 237 delves into the puzzles, patterns and riddles found in Stanley Kubrick’s horror masterpiece. By turns insightful, hilarious and (literally) out of this world, Rodney Ascher’s documentary is a cinephile’s dream. Or nightmare, depending on how deep you’re willing to dig.

Five time Oscar nominee Paul Thomas Anderson is back with 2012’s most anticipated film (that doesn’t feature a comic book hero or James Bond). But is his controversial take on Scientology up to scratch? The Anderson stamp gleams back at you from every polished frame, but beneath all the style there’s something missing from The Master‘s heart.

Probably the best Bond of the new era, Skyfall is an assured and at times jaw-droppingly beautiful action film. Veering slightly more towards the ludicrous excesses of the Bond of old, Skyfall simultaneously maintains the grittier, more modern style, making it an anniversary throwback and a distinctly modern Bond film all at once. Obsessed with the spectre of death and being replaced, Skyfall doesn’t actually have a great deal to say on those topics, but it does have a memorable baddie (finally!) – and if the climax is disappointing, it’s only in comparison to the mastery of the rest of it.

A distinctly Western drama/rom-com, Karan Johar’s Student of the Year is a bright and breezy affair, lacking in story and innovation, but brimming with colour, humour and brilliant performances from it’s young cast. Overlong, and at times predictable, Student of the Year is nevertheless a fun way to spend a few hours, whether you’ve ever seen a Bollywood film before or not.

No matter how much the phrase “art house” appears on the back of the DVD, or the flimsy references to “philosophie” in the director’s biography, this film’s intent is clearly to titillate. This it does not.

One of the most buzzed-about films of the year is finally here, and its reputation as magical, realistic, liberal, conservative, sentimental and hard-skinned is well-earned. Hard to pigeonhole and even harder to dislike, Beasts of the Southern Wild is an engaging swamp romp that has given the world a star in six year-old Quvenzhané Wallis.