Best films: UK cinema releases Dir: Sean Ellis; Starring: Jake Macapagal, Althea Vega, John Arcilla The third feature from the young British director Sean Ellis starts as a swirling drama of survival set in the Filipino capital, then morphs into a crisp, Christopher Nolan-ish crime thriller. A penniless rice farmer, played by Jake Macapagal, brings his family to the city in search of work and food: he finds work as a security van driver, and also a one-off chance to set up his wife and children for life. Courageous storytelling on a humble budget. Read the Telegraph's review here. THE CALL (15 cert, 94 min) Dir: Brad Anderson; Starring: Halle Berry, Abigail Breslin, Morris Chestnut, Michael Eklund A half-decent thriller with Halle Berry? Contain your surprise. The first half's the good half - she plays a 911 operator whose latest caller (Abigail Breslin) is locked in the trunk of someone's car. Brad Anderson (The Machinist) handles these sequences with verve - it's just a pity about the lurid, dated serial-killer shenanigans later on. This workmanlike documentary offers glimpses into the private and public life of the world's greatest cosmologist, with narration supplied by Stephen Hawking himself. It effectively details the stubborn determination that has fuelled his stellar academic career while his motor neurone disease has steadily progressed; and it does not shirk from showing the personal cost to those around him. Financed by TV companies, it's no-one's idea of great cinema - but as a brief history it's fascinating. DIANA (12A cert, 113 min) Dir: Oliver Hirschbiegel; Starring: Naomi Watts, Naveen Andrews An utterly pointless, shoddily-scripted biopic that does no honour to the memory of the Princess of Wales. It's centred on her lesser-known romance with Pakistani heart surgeon Hasnat Khan but twice exceeds its brief, repeating scenes of Diana's final minutes in that infamous Paris hotel before her fatal car ride. Naomi Watts and Naveen Andrews do their level best in the lead roles, but the film is likely to be best remembered for its squirmingly embarrassing dialogue and unintentionally comic moments. Buy cinema tickets from Telegraph Tickets The best other films still out in UK cinemas... Dir: Paolo Sorrentino; Starring: Toni Servillo, Carlo Verdone, Sabrina Ferilli, Carlo Buccirosso, Iaia Forte, Pamela Villoresi, Galatea Ranzi The new film from Paolo Sorrentino sets out to explain Rome today, as city, mindset and belief system. That's a fantastically ambitious project, which follows in the footsteps of Rome, Open City and La Dolce Vita. Who knows if this can really stand alongside these greats but it certainly soars above Sorrentino's earlier work and is a shimmering coup de cinema to make your head burst, your mind swim and your soul roar. RUSH (15 cert, 122 min) Dir: Ron Howard; Starring: Chris Hemsworth, Daniel Brűhl, Olivia Wilde, Alexandra Maria Lara, Christian McKay You don't need to be a motor-racing fan to be intrigued by this story of two temperamentally opposed rivals - James Hunt (Chris Hemsworth) and Niki Lauda (Daniel Brűhl) - battling it out, almost to the death, for the memorable 1976 Formula One world championship. Hunt, all blond hair, playboy glamour, often with a young woman on each arm; and Lauda, a methodical, brooding perfectionist who shunned the high life. Chris Hemsworth and Daniel Brűhl fit their respective roles splendidly. The racing scenes are brilliantly and intimately shot; the cameras get in close enough so you never forget there are vulnerable, flesh-and-blood men driving those machines. 15 cert, 92 min Dir: Lake Bell; Starring: Lake Bell, Fred Melamed, Demetri Martin, Geena Davis Lake Bell, who wrote, directed and stars in this charming comedy, announces herself here as a formidable talent to watch. She plays Carol, an under-achieving 30-year-old voice coach with ambitions to break into her overbearing father's field: movie trailer voice-overs. There's a lot going on in this deceptively easy-going film: a romance, a feuding family and plenty of sharp comments about Los Angeles and the entertainment biz. Funny and smart, with well-observed characters, it's a delight. ELYSIUM (15 cert, 109 min) Dir: Neill Blomkamp; Starring: Matt Damon, Jodie Foster, Sharlto Copley Here, at last, is a special effects film with fire in its belly and something to say. Neill Blomkamp's follow-up to District 9 is another blistering science-fiction allegory: this time, his subject is the ever-widening gulf between the haves and have-nots. Max (Matt Damon) is a wronged factory worker desperate to break into an idyllic gated community that hangs in the sky above Earth's polluted crust. This is thrilling and thought-provoking in equal measure, if not quite as immaculately achieved as Blomkamp's 2009 debut. Dir: Jem Cohen; Starring: Bobby Sommer, Mary Margaret O'Hara Underground hero Jem Cohen directs a contemplative gem about the Platonic friendship that develops between a Viennese museum guard (Bobby Sommer) and a visiting Canadian (one-time singer-songwriter Mary Margaret O'Hara) whose cousin is on her death bed. It's a film about the contentments of a quiet life and the solace of old age. Dir: Fernando Trueba; Starring: Jean Rochefort, Aida Folch, Claudia Cardinale The great veteran French actor Jean Rochefort stars in this French-language drama as Marc Cros, a celebrated painter and sculptor in a sleepy French town near the Spanish border in 1943. Dir: Richard Curtis; Starring: Domhnall Gleeson, Rachel McAdams, Bill Nighy, Margot Robbie Richard Curtis's film centres on a young man called Tim Lake (Domhnall Gleeson), who discovers on his 31st birthday that the men of his family can travel through time - not to change the course of history but to ensure that bumbled romantic catastrophies become bumbled romantice triumphs. When the film starts to break its own time-travel rules to shoehorn yet another honey-toned walk on the beach, your patience starts to unravel, but you don't go to Curtis for polished storytelling and intellectual rigour - you go to him for films to nestle in. Dir: James Wan; Starring Patrick Wilson, Rose Byrne, Barbara Hershey This rangy sequel to James Wan's haunted house hit from 2010 picks up the story where the first film left it, with no concessions made for newcomers. The Lambert family have successfully banished their original demons to a mystical realm called the Further, but some new ones have slipped in while the door was open. The threads that link the spooky set-pieces are feebler than before, but it's mostly scary, and it mostly works. 42 (12A cert, 128 min) Dir: Brian Helgeland; Starring: Chadwick Boseman, Harrison Ford, Nicole Beharie, Christopher Meloni Named after the number Jackie Robinson (the first black American to play major league baseball) wore, 42 recounts that first season after Robinson was signed by the Dodgers from the 'negro leagues" (that's what they used to call them). Dir: Roland Emmerich; Starring: Channing Tatum, Jamie Foxx, Maggie Gyllenhaal, Jason Clarke Roland Emmerich, a past master of disaster, has returned with the second film this year in which terrorists lay siege to the White House. Channing Tatum stars as a hero cop and single father who must protect Jamie Foxx's President while simultaneously rescuing his own daughter. Emmerich has already destroyed the Presidential abode in Independence Day, and in that film it took around five seconds; here it goes on for more than two hours, and you wish the aliens were around to speed things up. RIDDICK (15 cert, 119 min) A back-to-basics return for Vin Diesel's Riddick character, a rock-hard space convict with shining eyes and survival skills you wouldn't believe, sounds like fun. But this threequel lacks the taut imaginative flair of Pitch Black, the movie that introduced him, and reveals a sadistic personality to match its unappetising visual design.