RABBIT HOLE (12)

IT'S every parent's worst nightmare – the death of a young child. Rabbit Hole follows Howie and Becca, a well-to-do American couple whose life is ripped apart when their four-year-old boy Danny is killed after running into the road outside their house. While Howie takes comfort from their weekly group therapy sessions and watching videos of their son, Becca rejects the 'it must be God's will' brigade at group and sets about erasing the signs of their son which just remind her of her heartache at every turn. She seeks out the driver who killed her son, commencing a strange and secret friendship as she tries to cope with all-encompassing grief.

Nicole Kidman's performance is compelling. It's hardly date night fodder but this is as raw and human a story as you will find.

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Paul (15)

BEST friends Graeme Willy and Clive Gollings embark on a road trip across America, stopping at various locations associated with alien contact.

En route, they encounter Paul, a potty-mouthed extra-terrestrial stranded on Earth, who is being hunted by mysterious special agent Zoil and the pals agree to help Paul return home.

Paul is a fantastical road movie which impishly probes feel good sci-fi adventure, ET.

Pegg and Frost’s natural chemistry and sharp comic timing compels us but, next to Shaun Of The Dead and Hot Fuzz, Paul does feel flat and Pegg and Frost hastily paper over the cracks with nods and winks to Raiders Of The Lost Ark and Aliens.

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True Grit (15)

MATTIE ROSS is just 14 when a coward by the name of Tom Chaney kills her father. The teenager seeks out marshal Rooster Cogburn and hires him to help her track down Chaney. A tenacious Texas Ranger called LeBoeuf (Matt Damon), who has been on Chaney’s trail for some time, joins the hunting party. “I know Chaney,” he tells Mattie, “it is at least a two-man job taking him alive.” Adapted from the novel by Charles Portis, Joel and Ethan Coen’s masterful reworking of True Grit is a bloody tale of retribution layered with the brothers’ trademark black humour. It’s clear from his first appearance, shifting nervously in a courtroom witness stand, that Jeff Bridges is not paying homage to John Wayne’s signature role. He mumbles words as if he is permanently chewing on a ball of tobacco, spitting out polished one-liners like bullets. Hailee Steinfeld is a revelation, utterly believable in the role and holding her own against seasoned co-stars.

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