Priscilla review - Bluebeard suede shoes

★★★ PRISCILLA Sofia Coppola on whatever happened to the teenage dream

Sofia Coppola on whatever happened to the teenage dream

Sofia Coppola knows a thing or two about teenage girldom. Like many of her other characters – in The Virgin Suicides, Lost in Translation, Somewhere and Marie Antoinette – the subject of her latest film, Priscilla Presley, is an ingenue living in a gilded cage and surrounded by lavish boredom. It hardly matters whether the setting is actually the Park Hyatt Tokyo, Chateau Marmont, the Palace of Versailles – or Graceland, in this case.

Every Body review - heartfelt American documentary

★★★ EVERY BODY Activists argue for greater awareness and tolerance of intersex conditions

Charismatic activists argue for greater awareness and tolerance of intersex conditions

This fascinating American documentary tackles the societal and medical treatment of the 1.7% of people born with intersex traits that leave them with sex characteristics (chromosome patterns, genitals, gonads) that aren’t obviously male or female. These people are the ‘I’ in the LGBTQI+ acronym.

Please Don't Destroy: Treasure of Foggy Mountain review - Dude, where's our map?

Laughter is the loot in this amiably silly American comedy

Despite an ominous title, there’s always fair weather in the debut comic adventure film featuring Please Don’t Destroy, a NYC sketch comedy trio that’s hit it big with viral videos and on the long-running NBC series Saturday Night Live. (So long running, in fact, that two of the three are second-generation performers.)

Monica review - sombre American drama

★★★ MONICA Slow moving story about a trans woman reconciling with her family

Slow moving story about a trans woman reconciling with her family

There’s a rich seam of folk stories about changelings, infants snatched from home and replaced with a substitute child, to the horror and bewilderment of their parents. The myth taps into parental anxieties that rear up when their offspring doesn’t resemble them. Harsh rejection of this seemingly alien being, who has usurped the place of a beloved child and threatens family harmony, is traumatic. 

Eileen review - a dank fairytale film noir

A naive prison worker crushes on a chic colleague in William Oldroyd's disturbing thriller

As the title character in Eileen, set in a miserable Massachusetts backwater in the days before Christmas 1964, Thomasin McKenzie plays a depressed hybrid of Cinderella and Sleeping Beauty who’s awakened by a patently fake Princess Charming-cum-Hitchcock blonde.

Greta Van Fleet, OVO Hydro, Glasgow review - all rock and very little roll

The retro rock band were too often sluggish during their arena show

If nothing else, you couldn’t accuse Greta Van Fleet of short-changing fans when it came to costumes or pyro. It felt like every few minutes the Michigan throwback rockers frontman Josh Kiszka was disappearing offstage, only to reappear in a variety of jumpsuits or robes, while roasting flames regularly shot up from behind the four piece.

May December review - a queasy take on sexual exploitation

★★ MAY DECEMBER Todd Haynes reunites with Julianne Moore in a stylish but cold melodrama

Todd Haynes reunites with Julianne Moore in a stylish but cold melodrama

There’s much to admire  here – May December features impressive performances from Julianne Moore and Natalie Portman, and director Todd Haynes shows his mastery of classic Sirkian style. But disappointingly, this comes across as a movie that aims to critique media exploitation of a scandal while indulging in its own manipulation.  

Is There Anybody Out There? review - autobiographical documentary on disability

★★★★ IS THERE ANYBODY OUT THERE? Autobiographical documentary on disability

Ella Glendining makes an impressive debut with her portrait of life with physical difference

Ella Glendining has made an impressive documentary debut with the autobiographical essay, Is There Anybody Out There? Born without hip joints and very short thigh bones, we first encounter her as a perky, confident little girl walking in the woods near her home, in video footage filmed by her parents. They were aware from the first pregnancy scan that she was different and have done an exemplary job of ensuring that she had as happy a childhood as possible.

Album: Rockstar - Dolly Parton

★★★ DOLLY PARTON - ROCKSTAR An indulgence, but who would begrudge her?

An indulgence, but who would begrudge her?

When Dolly Parton was nominated for induction into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, she requested that her name be withdrawn.