What’s it about?
A series of highly implausible coincidences sees a widower (Adam Sandler) and his three daughters forced to share South African holiday accommodation with a divorcee (Drew Barrymore) who he went on a terrible blind date with and her two sons. Predictable hijinks and the titular “blending” of the families ensue.

What did we think?
It’s not often one thinks to use the term “poor man’s Brady Bunch” but that pretty much sums up this painfully unfunny vehicle. For some reason it seemed a good idea to pair Sandler – doing his wisecracking, sad-sack buffoon shtick yet again – with Barrymore for a third, worst outing. Racial stereotypes and way too many gender-based “jokes” abound. Best to avoid.

The Cherry Ripe I consumed during the screening was quite nice, though, so silver linings and all.
 

What’s it about?
A non-combat officer finds himself caught in a time loop during a war with an alien race. He combines with a special forces officer but will it be enough to save the world?

What did we think?
Anthony Sherratt says: Yes, it’s Groundhog Day mashed with Independence Day. And it works. With more laughs than I would have expected, the latest Tom Cruise sci-fi offering has a great balance of action, good characterisation and interesting plot. Emily Blunt is amazing and it has to be said Cruise plays the unlikeable Major/Private Cage really well. The story is well-told so the repetition doesn’t (quite) grate and you’re not actually not quite sure how it’s going to end which is a nice change.

Even anti-Tom Cruise fans should enjoy it as they at least get to watch him die a hundred or so times.

What it’s about?
Hazel Grace is 17, smart and obsessive. She’s also taking an experimental drug that gives her the ability to resist the build up of tumors in her lungs and to breathe. She falls for dreamy cancer survivor Augustus Waters, but wrestles with the guilt of the damage she will cause when she leaves.
What did we think?
Dan says: It may lack the explosions of a ‘summer blockbuster’ but Hazel and Augustus are so beautifully portrayed it doesn’t matter. A film about cancer will always have that sword of Damocles hanging over the characters’ heads. It is impressive that knowing this going in, you still can’t help yourself falling for them both, knowing full well that every moment there’s a medical discovery to be revealed, your heart will screw itself up into a knot.

If you are, or even have been, a 17-year-old girl you should definitely see this gripping love story (remove half a star from the review if you’ve never been a 17-year-old girl, but it’s still pretty good).

What’s it about?
Grace Kelly becomes a princess, frets about losing her Hollywood career. Meanwhile really interesting world crises are happening.

What did we think?
This poor film looks as confused as Nicole Kidman does acting in it.  On the one hand, its a genuinely interesting story about a political stand-off in Monaco over taxes, the impending threat of war with France, and the kind of eye-watering Mad Men-esque style we’ve come to admire from the early 1960’s.

On the other hand, the film is a midday melodrama about why Grace Kelly wants to do another Hollywood movie, can’t do another movie, learns French and saves the day with an overreaching speech at a ball.

For the VERY curious only – I’m off to acquaint myself with Alfred Hitchcock’s To Catch A Thief, the REAL Grace Kelly and a convertible car load of proper Riviera style.

What’s it about?
Disney steal the concept of Wicked by telling the story of Sleeping Beauty from the perspective of the villain Maleficent.

What did we think?
Definitely not for kids and with a story not strong enough for most adults it’s unclear who the target audience for Maleficent really is. Die-hard Disney and Angelina Jolie fans will certainly flock to it but the many faults balance out the majesty of the effects and performances. The failure to commit to making Maleficent actually evil really robs the movie of any gravitas as does the bizarre decision to make the three ‘good fairies’ bumbling idiots. An adversarial relationship there alone would have strengthened a film sadly lacking real backbone.

Jolie – a performer I don’t really like or usually enjoy – is incredible but we’re so sympathetic to her throughout the movie that the original premise is almost pointless. When you shrug at someone putting a curse on an innocent baby then perhaps it’s evidence debutant director Robert Stromberg has missed the mark. The failure to commit is further seen in what is changed from the original story.  Giving the ‘wicked witch’ more detail and background is okay but doing so at the expense of the characters on the other side of the spectrum – who are all two-dimensional morons here – just makes this a star-driven film rather than a good story.

It’s not actually a bad movie (I did enjoy it) but those who haven’t seen the original Sleeping Beauty would love it much more.

What’s it about?
There are a million ways to die in the West, and a cowardly Seth MacFarlane has to navigate them all.

What did we think?
Elizabeth says: Family Guy, Back to the Future 3, Blazing Saddles and Barney Stinson walk into a bar… and stumble out two hours later, drunk and slightly less funny than they went in.

What’s it about?
Two middle-aged British comedians tour Italy sampling the local food & women in this sequel to the cult BBC film / TV series The Trip.

What’s it REALLY about?
Edited-down “best bits” of a six-part BBC docu-comedy where The Observer commissioned comedian Rob Brydon to write restaurant reviews in Britain’s Lake District (series one) and Italy (this film/series two). Brydon invites fellow comedian Steve Coogan along, and we are served the best bits of their improvisations and  impersonations based on an EXTREMELY loose plot.

What did we think?
We are force-fed a game of one-upmanship (that starts off tedious and becomes painful) sandwiched between an excuse to follow in Byron-Shelley’s footsteps across Italy, and the veiled excuse of truncated food-porn.

I won’t lie: I laughed a couple of times at their James Bond / Godfather / Michael Caine impersonations. However if this premise sounds interesting, watch the TV show – at least it’s served up in palatable courses. As a movie it’s tedious. And thanks to the lack of a decent steadicam during the yacht sequence, it’s also seasickness inducing.

What’s it about?
Best buddies Davy and Ally return home to Edinburgh searching for love after their tour in Afghanistan ends in tragedy.

What did we think?
Stephen says: In a word: “twee”. In a sentence: It’s a musical version of EastEnders. In an odious comparison: Take Mamma Mia, replace ᗅᗺᗷᗅ with The Proclaimers, dumb down the story, and you have Sunshine On Leith.

Jokes aside, The Proclaimers music is infectious, so even if you only know the opening and closing songs, you’ll still be tapping along throughout. The main problem is the script: the current climate of creating musicals from popular bands’ back catalogues is stripped back to its ugliest form: “hey, they have a song about a Jean – let’s name on of the characters Jean… and one about sending a postcard back from America… and lots of songs about love”. Voila! Extremely flimsy and lacklustre plot written! Thankfully it’s performed and shot well. It’s just bland. Bland but fun. I’m sure mum will enjoy it.

What it’s about?
In the dystopian future, outlawed superhuman mutants are hunted down and killed, so gnarled and knuckle-clawed Wolverine is sent back to the 1970s to warn the younger versions of his fellow X-Men, thwart destiny and satiate the kidult Supanova crowd who still covet action figures in their 30s. Like me.

What did we think?
Careful, one of the mutants says of time travel, the mind can be stretched only so far before it snaps. Consider yourself warned. The exposition-and-character-heavy Days of Future Past could lose non-cosplayers fast. But hang in there. Paraplegic telepath Charles “Professor X” Xavier and metal-manipulating Erik “Magneto” Lehnsherr, again portrayed with impeccable dramatic heft by James McAvoy and Michael Fassbender of 2011’s first-class X-Men refresh, make franchise rivals Thor and the Hulk look like the rather silly cartoons they are.

Returning director Bryan Singer adds flesh to his pioneering but outmoded early-2000s X-Men template, melding atomic-grade effects setpieces with Inception’s out-of-body mind-thumps (and Ellen Page), while introducing a tremendous take on the JFK magic-bullet theory. Oh, and there’s Tyrion.

So, Marvel’s latest mutation is both super AND cerebral? Your move, Avengers.