Little Ashes

Artist Salvador Dali (played by Twilight star Robert Pattinson), poet Federico Garcia Lorca and filmmaker Luis Bunuel meet at university in Madrid in 1922. Soon the three become inseparable. But thwarted love affairs, their creative impulses and, in due course, the onset of the Spanish Civil War complicate their relationship.

Martin Hoyle, Financial Times: Pattinson's cult status from Twilight is evidently no squealing flash in the teenage pan. His Dalí develops from vulnerable but obstinate outsider to celebrity-seeking narcissist, epitomised by the scene where, hearing of Lorca's death, the grief-stricken artist smears a canvas with black, only to notice how fetching the paint splashes look on him, his sorrow soon forgotten as he preens and poses before the mirror. (Verdict: three stars out of five)

Stephen Farber, Hollywood Reporter: Ashes makes no claims to be an entirely accurate biopic; it's a speculative, impressionistic portrait without a lot of dramatic force or psychological depth. But it's an elegantly designed film that fascinates as often as it frustrates... Anyone who looks to the film for a lucid analysis of these three seminal artists will be disappointed. Yet the film is often enjoyable to watch, partly because it is so beautifully shot by cinematographer Adam Suschitzky.