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As an elderly white man I could hardly regard myself as the ideal audience for 'Saint Omer'. Still, it was disappointing to find the film challenging but only in a dreary way.

It is a courtroom drama. So far, so good. And it has a fiendish psychological twist: the defendant, a young Senegalese immigrant, confesses to having killed her baby but pleads 'Not guilty'. The court and the cinema-going public must decide whether she is a clever chancer gaming the system or a troubled soul harried by the supernatural.

It sounds so promising. But the pace is slow, often stationary, and several of the performances suggest dramatic reconstructions by actors.

Perhaps the writer and director, Alice Diop, sensed as much. But her attempts to elevate proceedings seem clumsy. The main character, Rama, who attends the trial with a view to writing a book about the case, serves only a symbolic purpose: she cites Medea, identifies with the defendant and purports to turn the particular into the general.

The town of Saint-Omer has a hyphen; the film does not. Sure enough, St Omer (originally called Audomar) is a patron saint of the blind.

This is an outstanding film. Do not on any account let its length discourage you. Ignore any review that concentrates on hours or pace or that detects a contrast between the two halves. 'The Brutalist' is a rare piece of cinematic art and its dimensions are irrelevant.

It's a very fine film by conventional standards, but it sets out to do something more ambitious. The structure, imagery, soundtrack and even fine details like subtitles and titles all contribute as the film takes shape.

'The Brutalist' resolutely refuses to explain itself. Parts of the story are hinted at but left unexplored, and some scenes and sequences are included for no immediately obvious reason. It won't be hurried. The score delivers an occasional pummelling. Meanwhile a carefully constructed whole is being assembled. This is a wonderfully intelligent film, and 'Anora' must be truly remarkable to have beaten it to the Best Movie Oscar.

It's unkind to judge a film by the standards of another era. Even so, Conclave is a reminder of the remarkable talents of Gore Vidal. How much better a film it would have been had Vidal been available to write the screenplay.

The story is effectively about the management of an election, a field in which Vidal excelled. Variously unattractive candidates must be eased aside to allow the desired winner to emerge. Around the shifting identity of that winner the film's drama revolves.

Vidal would have handled the process with more subtlety and insight than Conclave achieves. The film is very beautiful to look at, understandably stately in pace and blessed with some very fine performances. But the contemporary Church's difficulties, epitomised by each eliminated candidate in turn, are dealt with in a fashion so linear that the final twist is not entirely unexpected.

Conclave has already won a Golden Globe (for Best Screenplay!) and it will no doubt gain more nominations as the year advances. In his own time, Gore Vidal regarded the Golden Age of Hollywood as being in the past; how much further back it seems now.