Robert Downey Jr is a very busy man. He has a lot to uphold amongst his Hollywood comeback, first donning the Iron Man suit and now almost certainly entering a second franchise with one of fiction’s most beloved characters. It’s funny then that the character of Sherlock Holmes hasn’t been a favourite in cinema; the bumbling detective now has one of the most known falsely quoted lines in history. Sadly but rightly so, said line fails to actually be mentioned – but the 1800’s London setting gives Guy Ritchie the perfect opportunity to do what Guy Ritchie does best – show the gritty side of town with a bit of humour thrown in. More than a bit – this is his most family-friendly film to date. After all, it is a ‘blockbuster’.

Sam Taylor-Wood’s feature debut Nowhere Boy charts the turbulent teenage years of music legend John Lennon, but you wouldn’t know that from the title alone. You could say it’s a missed opportunity to cash in on a household name, but the title is actually a perfect fit; Nowhere Boy is a solid urban drama on its own accord, it doesn’t need to flaunt Lennon’s famed name to be enjoyed. The fact that the young Liverpool lad depicted on-screen goes onto create arguably the most famous band of all time feels almost coincidental.

eautifully vivid in cinematography and eerily noir in theme, pace and score, Los Abrazos Rotos a.k.a Broken Embraces, is an emotive dissection of heart wrenching circumstances. Love, trust and family cycle the stories of present day and fourteen years before, bridged by one writer/director’s sudden need to recount his own story before he can move on to writing another. Through opening himself up to a much younger man who is his producer’s son, a blind Harry Caine – previously known as film director Mateo Blanco – depicts the tense climate of making a film, falling in love with his lead and dealing with the tragic consequences dealt down by her Chilean financier husband, the rich and miserable Ernesto Martel (played brilliantly by Jose Luis Gomez). Ultimately, Writer/director Pedro Almodovar uses the catharsis of human interaction – our obsessions, jealousies and unintelligence when falling in love – to portray the intensity and importance of honest expression through film.

Just off the beaten track from Wolf Creek and Cape Fear is Rupert Glasson’s promising feature debut Coffin Rock; a must-see destination for deftly crafted thrills and chills. In fact, this surprisingly good thriller might even satisfy those without a lust for blood, as the film initially masquerades as an earnest drama about a rural couple’s fruitless attempt to conceive a child. But as soon as a psychopathic third party gets involved (ala Fatal Attraction with the gender roles reversed), Coffin Rock suddenly shifts into high-gear for a fierce, if somewhat contrived, horror finale.

Like the temptation of a big red button that reads ‘Do Not Push’, New Zealand director Peter Jackson simply cannot resist filming the so-called “unfilmable”. First it was J.R.R Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings trilogy, and now it’s Alice Sebold’s bestseller The Lovely Bones; a dense thematic story of a teenage girl, who after being brutally murdered, watches over her broken family and sadistic killer from heaven.

While Jackson might have aced Rings, he only just manages to pull off Bones. This is a film that shines only in short, erratic bursts. It can be an emotional film, a disturbing film, a romantic film, a funny film and a breathtaking film, but never a seamless blend of each.

While Jackson might have aced Rings, he only just manages to pull off Bones. This is a film that shines only in short, erratic bursts. It can be an emotional film, a disturbing film, a romantic film, a funny film and a breathtaking film, but never a seamless blend of each.

Defying the sceptic inside all of us, James Cameron’s long-awaited sci-fi epic Avatar does the impossible by actually living up to the lofty expectations set by the director’s own inflated ego and the record-breaking success of his previous endeavour Titanic. Coating classic romanticism with breathtaking 3D visuals, Avatar transports us to another world for 162 minutes of sensory bliss, a place difficult to leave once the credits roll. Every cent of the film’s $300+ million budget can be accounted for, and I’m betting every cent will be recouped in box-office takings before the new year.