Five must-see movies at this year's Edinburgh International Film Festival

Scotsman film critic Alistair Harkness casts his expert eye over the 2018 EIFF programme
Anna and the ApocalypseAnna and the Apocalypse
Anna and the Apocalypse

An Elephant Sitting Still

26 and 30 June

29-year-old debut director Hu Bu committed suicide shortly after completing this four-hour epic about the vicissitudes of contemporary life in newly capitalist China, above. Serious cineastes have already anointed it a future classic.

An Elephant Sitting StillAn Elephant Sitting Still
An Elephant Sitting Still

Searching

21 and 22 June

Innovative social media detective thriller starring the always excellent John Cho as a father who turns digital gumshoe to find his missing daughter.

Flammable Children (AKA Swinging Safari)

27 and 29 June

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The Neighbours reunion you never knew you wanted. Guy Pearce re-teams with Kylie Minogue for this kitschy comedy about randy suburban living in 1970s Australia. Radha Mitchell (another Ramsay Street escapee) co-stars.

Anna and the Apocalypse

29 and 30 June

A Christmas-themed zombie high school musical set in Glasgow, this horror hybrid, below, has won plenty of admirers on the festival circuit. See it off-season here.

Piercing

29 and 30 June

Nicolas Pesce follows up The Eyes of My Mother with this twisted tale about a new father (Christopher Abbot) whose plan to commit the perfect murder goes seriously awry when his intended victim (Mia Wasikowska) turns out to have a few kinks of her own.

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