Theresa May could probably do with something to take her mind of her current travails, but let's hope that no one suggests she takes a night off to watch Sally Potter's latest feature, The Party. Bearing echoes of the soirées hosted in Mike Nichols's excruciating 1966 film version of Edward Albee's Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? and Mike Leigh's masterly 1977 Play for Today, Abigail's Party, this scalpel-sharp satire shows how quickly triumph can turn to tragedy in the modern-day political sphere.

Following Fred Frith's Shadows-like reworking of `Jerusalem' over the Woody Allenesque credits, we see a visibly shaken Janet (Kristin Scott Thomas) open the door of her London home and point a gun at the unseen person on the doorstep. Flashing back an hour or so, dishevelled academic Bill (Timothy Spall) puts Bo Diddley's `I'm a Man' on the record player, turns up the volume and sinks into a chair with a bottle of red wine. As he stares blankly, he catches sight of an urban fox sniffing at the open patio door.

In the kitchen, his wife, Janet, tries to make vol-au-vents while fielding calls from colleagues congratulating her on becoming shadow health minister and asking her for favours. Old friend April (Patricia Clarkson) arrives with her life coach boyfriend Gottfried (Bruno Ganz) and they temper their enthusiasm with waspish witticisms that betray how far they have strayed from their former idealism.

April notes that Janet's pinny gives her a `postmodernist, post-post-feminist' look and sidles into the living-room, where Bill is having trouble making small talk with Gottfried, who has stopped drinking and is sitting cross-legged on the floor. Newly married lesbian Martha (Cherry Jones) arrives to add her voice to the chorus of approval and joins April in teasing Bill about his wife being more brilliant than he is. As he tries to focus a mind that seems to be elsewhere, Janet talks to her mother and then a well-wisher who is obviously something of a secret admirer. She urges him to stop calling as she peers through the window to see Martha in earnest conversation with pregnant partner Jinny (Emily Mortimer), who has just discovered she is expecting triplets. When the caller rings again, Janet blows him a hurried kiss and slips the phone under her shirt and back into her bra.

While they get over the shock, banker Tom (Cillian Murphy) arrives without his spin doctor wife Marianne and nips into the bathroom to do a line of cocaine on the edge of the tub and fiddles with the gun he is carrying in a shoulder holster. Hurrying into the kitchen, April is amused that Janet will now be Marianne's boss, as she has nothing but contempt for her. She also fails to share Janet's concern that Bill seems a little down and advises her to remind him that his duty now is to follow in her wake like the Duke of Edinburgh and Denis Thatcher.

As a wired Tom stumbles into the kitchen to congratulate Janet and shuffles into the living-room to find Bill, Martha admits to Jinny she was just getting used to them being a couple and isn't ready for them to become a collective. However, they rejoin the party to make their announcement and April notes that Martha sounds more like someone crying for help than proclaiming tidings of joy. Thus, she ignores their news and, having broken a pane in the patio doors with the cork, toasts Janet becoming a minister.

Martha chides Bill for not making an effort and he girds himself to make an announcement of his own. It turns out, he has been diagnosed with multiple terminal conditions that means he hasn't got long to live. Still smarting from April's assertion that this will be their last date, Gottfried tries to console him with the view that doctors know nothing, but Tom rushes to the bathroom in a panic and Jinny feels sick after a single sip of champagne. Dropping to her knees (and cutting her knee on a piece of broken glass), Janet angrily sends her phone to voicemail and vows to resign so that she can care for her husband, as he has always been there for her.

Bill doesn't want a fuss, but Janet is disappointed that he went to a Harley Street specialist because their GP couldn't see him for two weeks. When April browbeats Bill for betraying his wife's party's principals, Janet says she wants the best for him and is shocked he seems to have such a short time left. Gottfried again declares Western medicine to be voodoo and gets into an argument with Jinny, who has endured a torrid time while undergoing IVF (which Martha notes was very private and very expensive).

Meanwhile, Tom (who has just been trying to toss his gun into a wheelie bin) has gone back to the bathroom for another line and emerges in time to challenge Gottfried's contention that Big Pharma exists only to make money. As a capitalist, Tom sees nothing wrong with this and April and Martha join in the ensuing political dispute while Janet tries to break up with her lover by text because her husband is dying. April tries to apologise for her German boyfriend because the Nazis didn't exactly have it right when it came to medical ethics.

When Gottfried protests, April insists that a fascist lurks beneath every aromatherapist and he bridles because he is a life coach and a healer. Martha leaps to his defence by averring that the sins of the father should not be revisited upon subsequent generations and April mocks her for being an atheist who uses religious terminology just in case God is listening. A smell of burning from the kitchen sends Jinny (a former runner-up on Masterchef) to rescue the vol-au-vents, while Janet begs Bill's forgiveness for not noticing that he was ill. She asks him to speak and he cites the various theories he does and doesn't believe in before asking the most basis question of all: `why me?'

April brands Gottfried an embarrassment when he tries to find words of solace and Janet slumps to the floor in frustration because her ideals and achievements can do nothing to help her spouse. Martha leaps to Gottfried's defence and says she gets called a lot worse online and April expresses no surprise she is trolled because she is a professor in `domestic labour, gender differentiation and American utopianism'. But she agrees with some of Gottfried's observations about healthcare and is fascinated by Bill's sudden readiness to ditch the beliefs of a lifetime in order to cling to existence.

While Martha backs Bill's right to find answers anywhere he likes, Jinny asks Tom what he was trying to throw into the bin before dashing off to the loo to vomit. Nauseated by the sound, he ambles back into the living-room as Martha lauds Bill's book on Roman civilisation, Reason, Roads and Religion, and reminds Tom that Bill supervised Marianne's PhD thesis. Tom sneers at the connection and suggests that Bill begins his journey towards inner truth by coming clean about his affair with his wife.

Aghast at this revelation (while conveniently forgetting her own infidelity), Janet slaps Bill across each cheek and splits his lip and eyebrow before begging April to make her stop hurting a dying man. As he tries to apologise, Bill lets slip that they have been trysting in Martha's flat and Janet is appalled that a fellow feminist could be capable of such treachery. April tuts that the sisterhood is an outmoded concept, as Tom strains to contain his fury and he rushes outside to get rid of his gun. Meanwhile, Jinny has turned on Martha because Bill has revealed that they slept together a couple of times when they were university roommates.

Fighting back the urge to lash out, Janet goes to the bin to throw away the charred vol-au-vents when she sees the gun. Locking herself in the bathroom, Janet takes another call from a party colleague and tries to work out what to do next. April knocks on the door and declares that this is no time for parliamentary democracy, as it requires a swift solution like murder. Tom has already reached the same conclusion, although Gottfried tries to show him that he and Bill have feelings in common through Marianne and that they should pool their masculine power to find a resolution. Ignoring the New Age waffle, Tom responds to Bill's taunt that Marianne prefers him by lashing out. However, the punch to the gut floors Bill and, while Gottfried tries to bring him round, Tom changes records in the hope of finding something inspirational.

While Martha and Jinny try to settle their differences outside, April joins Janet in the bathroom and informs her that she will have to change her hairstyle if she is ever to lead the party and govern. She also suggests that she drops the fake political certainty, as no one believes her party has the answers any longer. But, just as Janet is about to confess to her affair, Tom bursts in to vomit in the bath and Martha asks April to come and check on Bill (if possible without bringing Janet).

Rushing to her husband's side, Janet gives him CPR and he jolts back into life and looks up into her eyes and asks how it has come to this. April whispers to Gottfried that she is beginning to think they have the best relationship in the group, as there is a knock on the door. Realising who it must be, Janet barges into the bathroom to recover the gun she has hidden in the linen basket and opens the door to point it at Marianne and accuse her of treachery - after they had sworn eternal love to one another.

Few will be surprised by this final twist, but everything else about Potter's succinct screenplay is top notch. The zingers relished by Patricia Clarkson are undoubtedly the highlights, but the gentle drip of damning detail and the inexorable emergence of the secrets and lies on which this incestuous group has built its friendships is judged to perfection. It helps enormously that Potter has chosen to film the action like a stage or television play, as the confined spaces intensify the emotions and ensure that each new revelation cuts deeper than the last. Luis Buñuel and Lindsay Anderson would be proud. But so would Noël Coward and Alan Ayckbourn.

Fittingly, the result of the Brexit referendum was declared during the two-week shoot for this bleakly hilarious study of broken Britain. But, ironically, events have rather overtaken it and the lament for the left's seemingly fatal redundancy has been replaced by the gasps of incredulity that greeted the collapse of one nation conservatism. They do say that the secret of good comedy is timing and this is exhibited by every member of the exceptional cast. Exuding self-satisfaction as she savours the prospect of power, Kristin Scott Thomas manages to maintain her veneer of control (and deceit) in spite of everything (and the opening image that gives away how she will ultimately react), while Timothy Spall drolly succeeds in fooling himself into thinking that Bruno Ganz's mumbo jumbo can save him.

Emily Mortimer and Cillian Murphy limn different levels of desperation, while Cherry Jones does a nice line in midlife dread. But the acerbic Clarkson (who channels both Bette Davis and Celeste Holm) manages to upstage her co-stars, with a world-weary faith in realism that enables her sneeringly to look down on everyone. Alexsey Rodionov's shimmering monochrome photography, Carlos Conti's impeccable production design and Emilie Orsini and Anders Refn's nimble editing are also outstanding. But special mention should be made of a knowing diegetic soundtrack that comments on the action through Sidney Bechet's rendition of Cole Porter's `What Is This Thing Called Love', Albert Ayler's interpretation of the Gershwin classic `Summertime', John Coltrane riffing on `My One and Only Love' and Henry Purcell's `Dido's Lament', as well as contributions by members of the Buena Vista Social Club, and Osvaldo Pugliese's take on `Emancipacíon', the tango written by Alfredo Bevilaqua to mark the centenary of Chilean liberation from Spanish rule. Maybe Theresa May might raise a smile after all.

The plays of William Shakespeare have long provided film-makers with inspiration. Japanese maestro Akira Kurosawa kept returning to the First Folio, with Throne of Blood (1957), The Bad Sleep Well (1960) and Ran (1985) being respectively based on Macbeth, Hamlet and King Lear. The Scottish play has also been reworked in Ken Hughes's Joe MacBeth (1955) and Vishal Bhardwaj's Maqbool (2003), while the Elsinore saga resurfaced in Edgar G. Ulmer's Strange Illusion (1945) and Aki Kaurismäki's Hamlet Goes Business (1982). Lear has been relocated to Iowa and Liverpool for Jocelyn Moorhouse's A Thousand Acres (1997) and Don Boyd's My Kingdom (2001), while London and Villepreux replaced Venice as the setting for the Othello-like scenarios in Basil Dearden's All Night Long (1962) and Claude Chabrol's Ophelia (1963).

Elsewhere, Romeo and Juliet (Robert Wise and Jerome Robbins's West Side Story, 1961), Henry IV (Gus Van Sant's My Own Private Idaho, 1991), The Taming of the Shrew (Gil Junger's 10 Things I Hate About You, 1999) and Twelfth Night (Andy Fickman's She's the Man, 2004) have all been re-imagined in modern settings. Perhaps The Tempest has been most imaginatively rethought in Fred M. Wilcox's Forbidden Planet (1956) and Peter Greenaway's Prospero's Books (1996). But first-time solo director Shakirah Bourne has largely been content to make the odd tweak in bringing A Midsummer Night's Dream to Barbados in A Caribbean Dream.

As Theseus (Aden Gillett) returns to his Bajan home to marry Hippolyta (Sonia Williams), he is asked by Egeus (Anthony Troulan) to speak to his daughter, Hermia (Marina Bye), about her refusal to marry Demetrius (Sam Gillett) because of her fixation on Lysander (Jherad `Lord Zenn' Alleyne). Aware of the rumour that Helena (Keshia Pope) has designs on Demetrius, Theseus urges Hermia to think carefully about committing to a relationship that could cost her dear. But she decides to elope and tells Helena that she is leaving the way clear for her to make a play for Demetrius.

Meanwhile, Theseus has announced a talent contest to help celebrate his nuptials and a group of fishermen from Six Men's Bay decide to enter, with a production of a new play entitled, The Untold Love Story of King Ja Ja and Young Becka. Peter Quince (Simon Alleyne) appoints himself director and he casts Bottom (Lorna Gayle) as King Ja Ja and has to persuade her to focus on her own part rather than also try to play the roles given to Hook (Angelo Lascelles), Line (Ishiaka McNeil) and Sinker (Matthew Murrell).

As night falls, the fairies come out in the woods and King Oberon (Adrian Green) berates his queen, Titania (Susannah Harker), for refusing to hand over a young boy (Mikkel Broby) she has taken under her wing. Therefore, he orders his mischievous servant, Puck (Patrick Michael Foster), to source a flower whose essence has the power to make a slumbering soul fall in love with the first living creature it sees upon waking. Oberon touches Titania's eyes as she sleeps and she is woken by the sound of Bottom singing nearby. The fishermen have come into the forest to rehearse their play, but Puck has turned Bottom into a donkey and it's in this guise that he enchants Titania when she stirs.

While Bottom is led away by fairy acolytes Peasblossom (Shakira Forde), Cobweb (Kaya Bellori). Moth (Tiffany Skinner) and Mustardseed (Shannon Arthur), Oberon overhears Helena pleading with Demetrius to accept her devotion. The king commands Puck to coat the youth's eyes so that he becomes besotted with Helena. But the sprite mistakes the couple for Hermia and Lysander, who are sleeping at a chaste distance from each other in a glade, having got lost during their flight from Egeus. Thus, when Lysander wakes on hearing Helena's voice, he is transfixed by her and Oberon is furious with Puck for having made such a foolish mistake.

In a bid to rectify the situation, Oberon puts the spell on Demetrius and orders Puck to bring Helena to his side. But, while Demetrius becomes instantly smitten with Helena, Lysander feels slighted and brushes Hermia aside when she demands to know why he suddenly has the hots for Helena. As the men fight, Hermia tries to scratch out Helena's eyes and Puck watches on in bafflement at the oddness of human behaviour. However, he also grabs a picture on his phone so Oberon can see Titania canoodling with the asinine Bottom. The king is pleased with this outcome, but he dispatches Puck to lift the curse from Lysander. On his return, Oberon uses the flower to restore Titania's vision and they embrace, as Bottom is restored to normal while he dozes.

Following a downpour that clears the air, Theseus, Hippolyta and Egeus come across the young lovers spooning on the edge of the woods. As Demetrius insists that his love for Hermia has melted away like the snow, Theseus suggests a triple wedding and, later that afternoon, the brides and grooms leave the church to the cheers of the locals. However, the talent show laid on by events manager Phil (Levi King) proves less successful and the bored Theseus selects Quince's players in the hope of livening up proceedings. He is rewarded by Bottom and Hook inexpertly exchanging words of love through Sinker's galvanised fence panel before tragedy overcomes them hard by Line's Emancipation Statue.

With the revelries over, the newlyweds repair to bed with the blessing of Oberon and Titania. Surveying the scene, Puck asks forgiveness if the play has offended and reminds viewers that it has been nothing but a dream. As, indeed, it proves, when the young boy who has been fought over by the fairy monarchs wakes on the beach beneath a fishing net blanket to the sound of the gently lapping waves.

Conceived and adapted by Shakirah Bourne and Melissa Simmonds, this may not be the most polished Shakespearean palimpsest to ever reach the screen. But it's certainly one of the most charming, as it reflects the amdram willingness of the rude mechanicals in bringing a little Bajan spirit to the fantasy. Despite the exotic setting and the carnivalesque atmosphere, Bourne and cinematographer Robin Whenary resist the temptation to over-foreground Barbados, although the lilting tunes dotting Andre Woodvine's score serve as a recurring reminder of the milieu, alongside Leandro Soto's thoughtful production design. Bourne similarly reflects on the island's colonial legacy in making all three romances inter-racial and in having Theseus's domestic staff double up as Oberon and Titania's retinue. She also allows herself a little political joke by having the fishermen keep referring to the Bridgetown monument of Bussa the slave breaking his chains as the `Constipation' rather than the `Emancipation' statue.

As is often the case with this play, Peter Quince and his pals steal the show, with the larger-than-life Lorna Gayle revelling in the role of Bottom. If she evokes memories of James Cagney as the energetic weaver in William Dieterle's 1935 adaptation for Warner Bros, Patrick Michael Foster suggests how Quentin Crisp might have played Puck. Susannah Harker is also suitably regal as Titania. By comparison, the love-crossed quartet seem a little stiff, as do their elders. But the exuberance of the material and the novelty of Bourne's approach ensure that this remains delightfully amusing, particularly in the kitschily cartoonish depiction of the startling impact of the potion, as it epitomises the cheap-and-cheerful way in which costumiers Leandro Soto and Luna Blandford and special effects artists Dan Pryor and Berta Valverde made light of their meagre resources.

Dorota Kobiela and Hugh Welchman's Loving Vincent is the dictionary definition of a `once in a lifetime' project. Seven years in the making and containing around 65,000 frames that were individually hand-painted by some 120 artists, this is a unique account of Vincent Van Gogh's last days in the French towns of Arles and Auvers-sur-Oise. Some might be overwhelmed by these pseudo-rotoscoped Post-Impressionist pastiches, which include around 130 of Van Gogh's most celebrated canvases. Others might be underwhelmed by the flashbacking Citizen Kane-like structure used to investigate the possibility that the Dutch painter did not commit suicide, as is usually presumed, but was the victim of murder. Yet there's no denying the ambition of `the world's first fully painted feature film'.

A year after a newspaper reports that 37 year-old Vincent Van Gogh (Robert Gulaczyk) shot himself in a field outside Auvers-sur-Oise on 27 July 1890 and returned to his room to die two days later, Armand Roulin (Douglas Booth) is instructed by his postmaster father, Joseph (Chris O'Dowd), to deliver a letter to Theo Van Gogh (Cezary Lukaszewicz) in Arles. The testy Armand gets into a scuffle with a soldier outside a bar and drops the missive, which is picked up by a gendarme who challenges the accepted wisdom that Van Gogh had been mad and suggests that he was fine until he made the acquaintance of Paul Gauguin (Piotr Pamula).

Flashing back a few years to a monochrome view of Van Gogh and Gauguin moving into the Yellow House in Arles, all seems set for the friends to establish an artistic colony. But they soon began to feud and Van Gogh severed the lower part of his left ear, which he presented to brothel maid Gabrielle Berlatier, who screams in horror when she realises the nature of his gift. Armand had remembered punching a neighbour who had dismissed Van Gogh as a lunatic, but he is resentful when Joseph finds him drunk in the café and sobers him up before sending him on his errand. He wants Theo to know that Dr Gachet (Jerome Flynn) had held on to the letter and reminds his son to offer his condolences, as Armand may look suave with his dapper moustache and yellow jacket, but he has his rough edges and has little pity for any man who would end his own life.

Unable to find Theo in Paris, Armand visits paint supplier Père Tanguy (John Sessions), who breaks the news that Theo died a few months after his brother. He recalls (with black-and-white accompaniment) how the young Vincent had always felt inferior in his mother's eyes to a stillborn sibling who has been given the same name. He had failed to follow his father into the church and had worked without distinction as a missionary before taking up the brush at the age of 28, with Theo supporting him all the way. Van Gogh had relocated to Paris, where he was teased by drinking companions Henri Toulouse-Lautrec (Adam Pabudzinski) and Camille Pissarro (Keith Heppenstall) for being an egotistical amateur. But Tanguy recognised his talent and was shocked to learn Van Gogh had died after he had seemed so calm after his stay at the Saint-Paul Asylum in Saint-Rémy. He blames Gachet for failing his friend and recalls how he had taken paintings off the wall after the funeral in recompense for his ministrations.

Running for the train, Armand is left in no doubt that Tanguy believes Van Gogh to have been a wronged genius. But he is primarily concerned with fulfilling his father's brief and arrives in Auvers to see Gachet. He is in Paris and housekeeper Louise Chevalier (Helen McCrory) wastes no time in informing Armand that she considered Van Gogh to be evil and knew from the moment she met him that he would bring trouble. Intrigued by her hostility, Armand checks into the Ravoux Inn, where Van Gogh passed away, and the owner's daughter, Adeline (Eleanor Tomlinson), recalls Gachet's refusal to remove the bullet from the painter's abdomen, even though he was an ex-military doctor. She overheard Van Gogh claiming to have attempted suicide and recalls how Gendarme Rigaumon (Martin Herdman) came to search his room for the gun. But he died with only Theo at his side and she felt it was a shame because he had seemed so happy and inspired.

Armand is surprised to hear Adeline's assertion that Van Gogh was so organised and contented. She sends him to speak to the boatman (Aidan Turner) to learn about his love of the river, woods and fields. He remembers thinking he was a lonely man because even the sight of a crow stealing his lunch used to brighten his days. But, then, he grew close to Marguerite Gachet (Saoirse Ronan), even though he was twice her age and looked like a tramp beside her when they went for a row on the river. Adeline also mentions an argument between Van Gogh and Gachet and Armand goes to the church to find Louise to ask what she recalls of the incident. However, she hisses her hatred for the Dutchman and claims to have seen him carousing with some local lads on the Sunday morning before he shot himself. Armand is surprised when Marguerite denies that they were close and blames gossips for misinterpreting the fact that Van Gogh was only friends with Gachet and that everyone else had tolerated him for the doctor's sake.

Back at the inn, Armand confides in Adeline about Marguerite and Louise being so hostile and she hardly seems surprised. She also lets slip that the Van Gogh brothers seem to have argued over money and that Vincent had painted on Revoux tea towels to keep working. Adeline also gives Armand a letter that Vincent had written to Theo urging him to visit, as he often feels so alone. As he tries to sleep in the artist's bed and has nightmares, Armand is woken by a redheaded boy at the window and he recognises him again the next day. He chases him through the village and his peasant uncle (James Greene) apologises for him being such a scamp.

The old man remembers hearing the shot on 27 July and swears it came from the barn rather than the fields. He didn't think anything of it as the time, but checked the next day and saw no sign of the gun or Van Gogh's painting things. Louise happens by to inform Armand that Gachet has returned and insists that Van Gogh had used Revoux's pistol to shoot himself and not the doctor's service revolver. Armand asks her about seeing Van Gogh on the morning of the shooting and she confirms that he seemed in good spirits, but avers that he was an unpredictable soul whose mood could often swing.

Returning to the inn, Armand asks Adeline about René Secretan (Marcin Sosinski) and she recalls him putting a snake in Van Gogh's paint box. She suggests they were pals, if not particularly close, and tells Armand not to believe everything Louise says, especially about guns, as her father had sold his pistol shortly after settling in Auvers. Learning from his father that he has lost his metal-working job, Armand seeks solace beside the boatman's brazier after Adeline throws him out. He asks about the gun and the boatman reveals that René bought it for his cowboy outfit, as he was a bit of a wild child and often teased Van Gogh, who probably only socialised with him because he always picked up the tab. Armand asks why the boatman hadn't intervened if it was so obvious that the Secretans were bullying Van Gogh, but he insists it wasn't his fight and he questions what Armand ever did to alleviate the painter's suffering.

Wandering off the worse for hooch, Armand gets into a fight with some local toughs who are picking on the red-haired simpleton. He winds up in the cells after punching Rigaumon, who remembers thinking that Van Gogh looked an odd sort when he first came to Auvers. It didn't come as a surprise, therefore, when he shot himself, although he recalls him not wanting anyone else to get into trouble for the incident. The gendarme also mentions being pestered for his report into the shooting by Dr Mazery (Bill Thomas), who didn't seem entirely satisfied with Gachet's version of events.

The excitable Mazery runs Armand through a reconstruction to show how Van Gogh could not possibly have shot himself in the stomach and Armand is feeling frustrated when Marguerite finds him throwing stones at crows in a cornfield. She sits on a convenient chair and informs Armand that she always knew Van Gogh was a genius and so did her father. He used to copy the pictures in a locked room and he felt a degree of frustration that such an uncouth man could have been given such a gift. Yet Gachet felt that Marguerite was distracting Van Gogh from his work and she started making excuses not to see him. This resulted in a blazing row between the artist and her father, who was powerless to help him when he was wounded.

Armand tells Marguerite not to blame herself because the real culprit was René, who seems likely to get away with murder because everyone believes he is a buffoon. However, she suggests that Armand concentrates more on Van Gogh's life than his death and leaves to put fresh flower's on her friend's grave. Her father also recommends that Armand sticks to what he knows, as he is clearly no expert in melancholia and has jumped to too many conclusions. Gachet recalls Van Gogh being in good spirits when he left Saint-Rémy, but his mood dipped after Theo had visited with his new wife and child, as Vincent didn't want to be a burden on the brother who had given him so much and only had rooms full of unsold pictures to show for it. Dismissing Mazery's theories, Gachet claims that he drove Van Gogh to suicide because he accused him, in the middle of their furious row, of driving the syphilitic Theo to an early grave with worry and he now bitterly regrets saying something so hurtful.

Riding in the back of a hay cart, Armand reads the letter that Theo's widow had sent Gachet, in which Vincent had vowed to show the world that the lowest of the low had wonderful things in his heart. On reaching home, Joseph shows Armand the last letter that Johanna had copied out to thank him for his efforts. In it, Van Gogh had marvelled at the stars and hoped to become one when he died. He retires to bed in a calm and reflective mood in offering his brother a warm handshake from his `Loving Vincent'.

Following an enigmatic self-portrait, closing captions reveal that Van Gogh sold only one of the 800+ paintings he produced in just eight years and, yet, is now proclaimed the father of modern art. Over Lianne La Havas's tremulously over-emotive rendition of Don McLean's `Vincent', pages turn in a book showing the characters with Van Gogh's portraits of them sitting alongside photographs and brief notes on their fates (among them René's assertion that Van Gogh had stolen his gun). This is a typically thoughtful way to end a painstakingly ambitious feature that tries so hard to do justice to its subject and, yet, keeps falling short.

The attention to detail in the imagery is laudable enough and, while Van Gogh's swirling brushstrokes occasionally threaten to become overwhelming in gentle motion, the animation strains to be sensitive to the original works. Quite whether the monochrome flashbacks work as well is another matter, especially as they dispense with the Van Gogh motifs even though there is no perspectival reason for doing so. Opinion will also be divided as to whether the characters should have resembled the voiceover actors rather than the sitters. But, while this gambit does sometimes distract, it makes more sense in light of the rotoscoping technique being employed than the decision to let people speak in their normal voices, as Robert Gulaczyk's Polish growl and Chris O'Dowd and Aidan Turner's Irish brogue jar against Douglas Booth's Mockney twang.

Ultimately, the timbre of the delivery matters less than the calibre of the dialogue. Thus, while Kobiela, Welchman and co-scenarist Jacek Dehnel are right to make the characters sound like everyday folk rather than museum curators, there's a discordance between the banality of some of the utterances and the floridity of others. The plaintiff strains of Clint Mansell's orchestral score further contribute to this tonal imbalance. But, regardless of one's reaction to the sleuthing element that sets the storyline apart from such forerunners as Vincente Minnelli's Lust for Life (1956), Paul Cox's Vincent (1987), Robert Altman's Vincent &Theo (1990) and Maurice Pialat's Van Gogh (1991), this audacious, but speculative and sometimes specious picture stands and falls on its visuals.

For three decades now, Mancunian Gary Sinyor has steered a laudably eclectic course through the vicissitudes of the film business. On leaving the National Film and Television School, he scripted Jim Shields's BAFTA-nominated short, The Unkindest Cut (1988), before teaming with Vadim Jean to co-direct the award-winning Ealingesque study of breeding and identity, Leon the Pig Farmer (1992). He struck out alone with the romantic fantasy Solitaire For Two (1995) and the heritage parody. Siff Upper Lips (1998), which earned him an invitation to Hollywood to remake Buster Keaton's 1925 silent gem, Seven Chances, as The Bachelor (1999).

A second romcom about the world's most unromantic woman, Love Hurts (2000), was scarcely seen and the same fate befell Bob the Butler (2005) and In Your Dreams (2008). However, Sinyor enjoyed a minor success with United We Fall (2014), which centred on the efforts of legendary football manager Sir Matt Busby (Brian Cox) to coach a Manchester boys' team. But, throughout this period, Sinyor was seeking funding for a thriller about grief, faith and insight and, after 12 years of toil and frustration, The Unseen has arrived on disc after a short run in cinemas.

Returning from a reading in bookshop near her Cheshire home, Gemma Shields (Jasmine Hyde) decides to have a swim in the indoor pool while Irish husband Will (Richard Flood) drives the babysitter home. However, she fails to ensure that the safety cover is firmly in place and, while she has a bath, her young son, Joel, drowns in the pool and his body is only found after a frantic search. Blaming herself for the tragedy, Gemma wants to move house. But Paul advises against any rash decisions, as he cuts his hand removing the child seat from the back of the car.

While recording an audio book of The Psalms, Gemma is so moved by the words that she has to take a break. She goes into Joel's room and faces the accusing stare of a teddy bear that says `I love you mummy' when she presses its paw. Suddenly overcome with emotion, Gemma realises that her sight is starting to blur and, in a panic, she wanders into the street, where she is found by Paul (Simon Cotton), who takes her to the nearest hospital.

Restoring her sight with an injection, the doctor (Ashley R Woods) reassures Gemma that she has no physical damage to her eyes. But he informs her that she is suffering a rare condition that can be controlled with pills. Paul has left by the time Will arrives and he rather unsympathetically suggests that his wife needs to see a psychiatrist. But he is also struggling to come to terms with the loss and Gemma overhears Will talking to Joel in his room and she tiptoes away without intruding.

A few days later, Paul comes to the house and to see how Gemma is recovering. He used to work as a pharmacist, but recently inherited a small estate in the Lake District and is currently turning one of the buildings into a guest house. Gemma shows Paul a photo of Joel and is taken aback when he reassures her that her son is in Heaven, as she doesn't believe in the afterlife. She decides to remove the batteries from the bear and goes to the baker to buy Will a treat. As she drives home, she calls to see how he is faring and is so disturbed to hear Will and Paul playing with the talking bear that he vision begins to distort on the motorway.

After a terrifying struggle to navigate a safe path, Gemma has a crash and winds up in hospital with whiplash. Will is furious with her for failing to take the prescribed tablets for her panic attacks and urges her to do as she is told and get well. But, that night, Gemma has a nightmare, in which she is trapped in the pool beneath the safety cover and can't alert anyone to her distress. She feels the need to get out of the house and asks Will if they can take up Paul's offer to stay in the Lakes.

Gemma is hurt by his hostile lack of enthusiasm and swims and makes love with her husband with a sense of alienation. However, he informs her that he doesn't want to leave the house because he can hear Joel's voice in his room. She is sceptical and, when he starts sobbing, suggests that his mind is playing tricks on him. But Will is adamant that Joel needs him to be around and Gemma feels spooked rather than consoled.

She stays awake all night to listen out for her son calling. When she hears nothing, she pleads with Will to come to the Lakes with her. Eventually, he agrees that it might do them some good, even though it's January and will be freezing. As she emails Paul to make arrangements, however, she sees Will pour Joel's goldfish into the gutter outside and is touched by his howl of anguish.

Gemma sleeps for much of the journey north and Paul is in a tetchy mood when they go to the supermarket to get provisions. He becomes irritated by a squeaky wheel on the trolley and Gemma becomes unnerved when he suddenly dashes down an aisle, as though he has seen somebody he knew. Will goes to the nearby church to light a candle and Gemma is so confused when he asks her to hold it and pray that she rushes into the lavatory to vomit.

On arriving at the cottage, the couple find Paul putting the finishing touches to their room. He mentions that his wife is no longer living with him and invites Gemma and Will to supper in the big house because he has forgotten to get any pans for them to cook with. As he prepares the steaks, Paul warns Will that the phone reception is awful and takes him to the top of the house to show him the hub.

Will drinks heavily during dinner and Gemma is embarrassed when he asks why Paul's wife has deserted him. Gemma tries to apologise, but Paul shrugs and promises to respect their privacy, as he knows they need some solitude and tranquility to reconnect. He also recommends that Gemma cuts down her pill dosage to avoid drowsiness and assures her that he is there to help should she need him.

The next morning, Will takes Gemma to the big house to show her Paul's birdwatching apparatus. She finds his mocking tone distasteful and is uneasy at being in Paul's room when he is elsewhere. So, when she sees his boat pulling into the jetty on the lake, she goes down to meet him and helps him carry the new pans back to the cottage.

While out in the surrounding countryside, Will remembers how Joel hated going for walks. They admire the view stretching out before them and Gemma is surprised when Will asks if she thinks they deserved to lose their child because they have sinned. When she accuses him of talking religious nonsense, Will storms off down the hill and Gemma is left to make her own way down in the middle of another turn.

On reaching safer ground, Will demands to know why Gemma only took one of her pills and Paul apologises for interfering. He implores them to stay for a bit longer. But, while Gemma rests on the sofa, Will tells Paul that he misses hearing Joel talking in his room and announces that he wants to return home. Paul suggests giving Gemma some soluble sleeping pills so that Will can get a decent night's sleep. But she wakes to find him sobbing in the bath because Joel is no longer communicating with him.

Needing a microphone for her laptop so that she can do some work, Gemma takes a cab into town. While walking along the street, however, the sound of a squeaking bike reminds her of the fact that Joel had only just had the stabilisers removed from his own bicycle and she has another panic attack. When her sight returns, she finds herself kneeling beside a young boy with a tricycle and she feels disorientated and that everybody is staring at her.

During the taxi ride home, the driver, Himesh (Sushil Chudasama), confides that he has just got married and has lots of pregnancy kits in his pocket. Gemma asks to buy one and returns to the cottage to find that Will has gone home because he needs to be near Joel. She screams when Paul creeps up on her, but decides to stay for a few extra days to finish her recording. However, her sight deteriorates when Paul touches the paw of the teddy bear and it speaks in Joel's voice. She takes another pill to calm herself down and asks Paul if she can borrow his car. Despite knowing that she shouldn't be driving in her condition, he agrees. But, while she is on the road, Paul calls to warn her that it might be dangerous to take strong sedatives while pregnant and she angrily tells him to butt out.

Arriving home, Gemma is disturbed to find that Will has laid out some tea lights in a pentangle on the floor. More alarmingly, he locks her in Joel's room and orders her to apologise to the boy so that he can return. Climbing out of the window, Gemma bawls her eyes out in the car and jumps when Will bangs on the door. Nevertheless, Gemma is able to drive back to the Lakes without an attack and demands to know why Paul has told Will about her pills and pregnancy. He denies being indiscreet and offers to show her the sound recording equipment he keeps at the top of the house. She puts on some headphones to listen to the birds outside. But, as she removes them, she hears `The Flower Duet' from Léo Delibes's opera, Lakmé, which had been playing on the stereo when Joel drowned. Gemma begs Paul to turn the music off and she starts to feel woozy.

When she comes round, Paul admits that his wife has gone for good and leaves Gemma to take a bath. She takes the batteries out of the bear and tries to relax. But she hears Joel's voice and immediately begins to lose her clarity of vision. Struggling out of the tub, she calls to Paul for help and demands that he lets her take a pill and drives her home. However, he insists that the medication won't help her and Gemma asks him to leave her alone. She promises Joel that she loves him and will never abandon him and packs to return to Cheshire.

The following morning, Gemma goes to the top of the house to get a signal to let Will know when to expect her. There is no answer and she idly picks up the headphones and hears the sound of thunder clapping and dripping water. Wandering downstairs, she sees Paul drive up with Will in the passenger seat. He has been sedated and barely knows where he is. She asks him to forgive her for not believing him about Joel's voice and whispers in his ear that they are going to be a family again.

The sound of a tap dripping bothers Gemma, however, and she sneaks up on Paul and finds him listening to one of her audio books on his headphones. Finally, she suspects that he is obsessed with her and, putting the batteries back into the bear, she feigns a loss of sight so that Paul has to help her back to her room. Keeping up the pretence, she starts to undress in the knowledge that he has tricked her into thinking that he has withdrawn. She calls out to him and he makes a show of opening the door to ask what she wants. Gemma claims to have a craving for smoked salmon and chocolate ice cream and snaps at him for not taking proper care of her when he proves reluctant to go shopping.

As soon as Paul drives away, Gemma tries to wake Will. She also calls Himesh to fetch her and starts trying to lug her comatose husband down the stairs. However, she hears Paul returning unexpectedly and just manages to get Will back into his room before Paul pops in to explain that he had forgotten his wallet. Keen to buy time, Gemma asks Paul to collect her things from the cottage so that she can stay beside Will. When he leaves, Gemma goes into the audio room and realises that the entire premises have been bugged so that Paul always knows what is going on.

She is so engrossed and disturbed that she only just manages to hear Paul return and pretends to be having a fit so that she bumps into him, as if by accident. But Gemma is so shocked by the new message spoken by the bear that she betrays the fact she is faking an attack and Paul calmly begins to explain the origin of his fixation. He had first heard her voice on the radio and had bought all of her audio books. Then, he had started attending her readings and his wife had walked out on him because she thought he was mad. Paul plays `The Flower Duet' and starts taunting Gemma about letting her son die because she was such a self-centred parent.

Wounded by his words, Gemma vows not to let Paul defeat her and is relieved to hear Himesh downstairs. When she calls to him, however, Paul confronts him on the stairs and throws him over the banister. He grabs Gemma and attempts to force his hand down her jeans. But she resists and manages to stab him in the foot with a blade. As he reels back, Will comes round and thuds Paul against the wall and he slumps to the floor.

Rushing to the car, the couple prepare to make their getaway. Sitting in the passenger seat, Gemma opens her laptop and opens some files that reveal that Paul had been bugging the Cheshire house and had been present when Joel had drowned. Seething that he had done nothing to save his son, Will jumps out of the car and goes back to finish Paul off. Suddenly unable to see again, Gemma is blithely unaware that it's Paul who returns to the vehicle speaking in an Irish brogue.

However, Paul lets the guise slip once they are back in the house and Gemma tries to remain calm while asking Paul about his wife. He reveals that she is still alive and assures Gemma that she hasn't fallen victim to some twisted master plan, as he could never have envisaged that she would have problems with her sight. He even admits to having got to like Will while eavesdropping on them. Gemma offers to treat the gash in Paul's foot and he is so preoccupied with his own triumph that he fails to see her brandish a pair of hypodermic needles, which she plunges into his chest. As he stops struggling and loses consciousness, she places a cushion over his face and suffocates him.

A few months later, Gemma cradles her new baby. Will looks on indulgently and it seems as though they are making the most of their second chance. But there's just a hint that all is still not quite well with Will, as the deceptively happy scene fades.

Gary Sinyor has long been intrigued by the fact that Rob Reiner followed the classic romcom, When Harry Met Sally... (1989) with the simmering Stephen King adaptation, Misery (1990). So, as he has acquired a reputation for light entertainments, he decided to make a thriller of his own. There is a distinct similarity between the obsessions driving Paul Deitch and Annie Wilkes (Kathy Bates) to imprison their idols. But Sinyor's storyline is far more convoluted and Paul is much less nuanced or menacing, as he is obviously a wrong `un from his first appearance. Consequently, Sinyor struggles to generate much suspense and fails to convince with a grand reveal that exposes just the far-fetched of a narrative that also bears a passing resemblance - in isolating three characters in the middle of nowhere - to editor Carl Tibbets's directorial bow, Retreat (2011), which Sinyor co-produced with Sir David Frost.

On the plus side, however, Sinyor combines imaginatively with cinematographer Luke Palmer and editor Paco Sweetman to convey the disorientation experienced by Gemma during her turns. He also makes canny use of Tom Jenkins's sound design and his remote setting, which was initially going to be a lighthouse. But he fails to bring the best out of Simon Cotton and Richard Flood, who are nowhere near as effective as Jasmine Hyde, who had worked with Sinyor on stage in his provocative biblical satire, NotMoses, and who slips between vulnerability and resourcefulness with a deftness that the overall picture can't quite match.