Its heroine, Coco, is a beautiful Shanghai novelist on a journey of self-discovery while she wavers between Tian Tian, her impotent Chinese boyfriend and Mark, her potent German lover.

ECONOMIST: Contemporary Chinese fiction

Hawkes presents a gaunt and gentle threat, not least when he croons a love song to the violated heroine, while Olsen is a beautiful paradox: an actress holding together a movie as a woman who is coming apart.

NEWYORKER: Martha Marcy May Marlene

Young working women identified with the film's heroine Yasmin (Faryal Gohar), a beautiful schoolteacher who rebels against her middle-class, fundamentalist father and elopes with Zar Gul.

CNN: REALITY CHECK