Film of the week: The Personal History of David Copperfield

The Death of Stalin, his scabrously dotty romp through the halls of the Kremlin, was rife with zingers of a very British hue, and the clashing colours turned out to be a stroke of genius. This adaptation of the Dickens staple is similarly beguiling, again softening some of the more dour edges of the saga's latter chapters and instead emphasising the camp, the clownish and the perverse.

Dev Patel (Slumdog Millionaire, Lion) is the titular Victorian hero around which the fates of kindness and villainy orbit. After disappointing his rich aunt Betsey (Tilda Swinton) by being born the wrong gender, we see the young David showing much promise under doting mother Clara (Morfydd Clark, who also plays Dora) and housekeeper Peggotty (Daisy May Cooper).

When Clara takes up with the horrid Murdstone siblings (Darren Boyd and Gwendoline Christie), David is sent off to work in a bottle factory. There, he learns about the world while lodging with Mr Micawber (Peter Capaldi), eventually breaking free following news of his mother's death to reunite with Betsey and her equally eccentric partner Mr Dick (Hugh Laurie). Fateful encounters with James Steerforth (Aneurin Barnard), Uriah Heep (Ben Wishaw) and Agnes Wickfield (Rosalind Eleazar) follow in his undulating fortunes.

Dickens's sprawling yarn is reliably hilarious in the hands of Iannucci (and co-writer Simon Blackwell), and a charmingly madcap elixir for the time of year that is in it. It just cartwheels along effortlessly, with the richness of the source material taking on an unrestrained quality while being lavished with affection by Iannucci.

Patel is a gorgeous epicentre for it all, playing it slightly straighter than the rest of the wonderful ensemble cast (Paul Whitehouse, Bronagh Gallagher and Benedict Wong all muck-in gamely too).

A beautiful hoot. ★★★★★ Hilary A White

The Turning

Cert: 16; Now showing 

Henry James's The Turn of the Screw is the inspiration for director Floria Sigismondi's The Turning.

Oft adapted, the horror novella's main character, a governess, has been interpreted both as having seen supernatural things and as having mental health issues. The attempt to continue this mystery leads to one of the most abrupt endings ever but although the film has other problems, it has its charms too.

This project is one to which Steven Spielberg was so personally attached that he was at Killruddery House in Wicklow two years ago to oversee a second attempt at production, under new director Sigismondi.

Mackenzie Davis is good as the governess, Kate, who in the 1980s comes to care for two orphaned children, Flora (Brooklynn Prince) and Miles (Finn Wolfhard) in a remote house in Maine (Killruddery House) with their austere but devoted housekeeper Mrs Grose (Barbara Marten). There have been other nannies, there was a groundsman, Quint (Niall Greig Fulton). The question is what remains.

It feels like it ticks off the elements required for gothic horror but it falls short on the hardest one, suspense, which is in part due to the weird ending.

I'm not sure what I am meant to be scared of. It's all right, but it's not terrifying.

★★★ Aine O'Connor

The Grudge

Cert: 18; Now showing 

We're between purple patches in horror cinema, in case you hadn't noticed. They only seem to come about every couple of years, when the dark stars of movie terror align and drop a small cluster of inspired and fresh releases that have been crafted to mine our deepest and most fundamental fears. See the work of Ari Aster, or the likes of The Babadook, Get Out or A Quiet Place.

The rest of the time, we have dross such as this uncalled-for reboot of an early noughties US remake of the Japanese horror Ju-On: The Grudge. This, we're sorry to say, is the default standard of so much horror being made in Stateside these days; heavily formulaic, free of wit or agility, plying its trade by way of cheap frights which rely exclusively on shrill blasts of sound design.

Writer-director Nicolas Pesce knows the drill; a mysterious death, a curse that gets passed on and on via murderous rage, and the clicking ghoul-girl crawling out of the bathtub. Playing a homicide detective and single mother, Andrea Riseborough leads a fine cast that includes Demian Bichir, Lin Shaye, and Betty Gilpin, all of whom deserve better than this unforgivably boring trudge. Same goes for the dank and musty cinematography of Zachary Galler. ★★ Hilary A White

Paw Patrol: Ready, Race, Rescue!

Cert: G; Now showing

Little ones and the cinema - a conundrum if ever there was one. Between teetering attention spans and callow bladders, many parents just keep toddlers and tykes by the couch.

So there's a market for this mini Paw Patrol branded feature that clocks in at 48 minutes. In that time, dastardly bad guys cackle, heroes find courage and the super-duper team of plucky pups save the day.

We're at the racetrack, where the team are on hand to help if any of the drivers malfunction or have an accident. Trouble arrives in the form of new contestant Cheetah. She causes star racer The Whoosh (Isaac Heeks) out of the race with injury, giving young Paw Patroller Marshall (Lukas Engel) a chance to fill-in. Marshall has to overcome self-doubt, though, so there is an important wee message behind all the primary-coloured adventure too. ★★★ Hilary A White