Without family or a support network and straight off the bus from prison, Russell Millings (Hawke) struggles to adapt to normal life but somehow finds a job cleaning dishes at a fast food restaurant. Earning his manager’s trust to lock-up, late one night his life is about to change again, as he hears something when taking the night’s trash out to the dumpsters out back, discovering an abandoned baby in a sports bag.

Overwhelmed by the situation, Millings gives in to his desire to experience something he missed out on while behind bars. He doesn’t call the cops and instead tries to care for the baby himself, but still needing to hold down his job, and keep up meetings with his parole officer, it’s not long before he starts to regret the situation he’s put himself in.

Adopt A Highway the film quite excellently depicts the struggle to adapt back to normal life for ex-cons, showing how the recently released are just thrown back into society with little to no support. Social norms have changed, in the film Millings doesn’t know what email or the internet is, never mind how to use it, and the film does a great job of portraying this as such a steep learning curve.

Of course Adopt A Highway is helped out by Ethan Hawke who is a tour-de-force. It’s such a subtle yet deeply affecting performance, playing a man that quite quickly becomes out of his depth, but is never flustered. Going with the flow when the film takes a change of course for an excellent third act, absolutely not going where you expecting yet it still draws to a very satisfying close.

His first time behind the camera, Adopt A Highway is a hugely impressive debut from actor-turned-filmmaker Logan Marshall-Green. It is a film told with measure, with confidence, and another type of feature from the normally horror-focused Blumhouse Productions. To say they took a chance on Logan Marshall-Green doesn’t give the filmmaker enough credit, but they deserve praise for backing this sort of film when the box office is otherwise dominated by franchises, and original stories often struggle to find a home. Hopefull y the Blumhouse name, the powerhouse Ethan Hawke, and old OC-fans wanting to see what Trey is up to now he’s grown up, mean Adopt A Highway finds the audience it deserves.

Them That Follow is set deep in the wilds of Appalachia, within a community of Pentecostal Christians. Proving themselves before God by handling deadly snakes, the film tells the story of the pastor’s daughter who holds a secret that would tear the community apart. When a non-believer is bitten and his family refuse medical aid – believing prayer will fight off the poison, not medicine – the film challenges its subjects, and audience, to pit what you believe against what you might be seeing before you.

Giving a striking window into a world great stretches of the audience will know so very little about, Them That Follow pitches a classic filmic story of forbidden love in a new setting. Gradually layering different elements of the story until the whole picture starts to come together, this is a dark, brooding and hugely confident film that knows its own pace and won’t budge in how it tells it tale, much like its protagonists.

With co-directors/co-writers Britt Poulton and Dan Madison Savage growing up in similar Christian communities, the window into another world that Them That Follow creates isn’t judgmental but instead invites the audience to interpret the actions on-screen, pitting them against your own religious or spiritual beliefs.

It was a very fine balance, but the film does so well in presenting the characters’ internal struggles when it’s clear their faith could be getting in the way, even harming those they love. Alongside the filmmakers, the cast also deserve great credit too.

In the lead role, Kaitlyn Dever as Dilly gives a naunced performance that sways between power and vulnerability. Opposite her, Lewis Pullman (cast just one day before principal photography began) and Thomas Mann fulfil much more than simple a love triangle, and Walton Goggins gives a masterclass in authority as pastor Lemuel. The ever-brilliant Olivia Colman and Jim Gaffigan in a more serious turn round off a truly superb cast.

All in all this is a thoughtful, and though-provoking film about religion, for all its rights and wrongs . Rich in tone with an amazing soundtrack, Them That Follow is a remarkable feature debut from its co-filmmakers, who show real poise far beyond their relative inexperience.

After being invited to his first kissing party, Max (Jacob Tremlay) is panicked because he doesn’t know how to kiss. So he and best friends Thor (Brady Moor) and Lucas (Keith L. Williams) borrow Max’s dad’s forbidden drone to spy on their high school neighbour making out. But before they know it, the drone is destroyed, and they’re forced to skip school to try and replace it before Max’s dad gets back from a business trip, otherwise Max will be grounded and miss the kissing party altogether.

Mixing the coming-of-age tropes of Superbad and Stand By Me with the pure mayhem of The Hangover, Good Boys plays it younger and the kids’ innocence gives endless opportunities for fun. Crucially though it’s all in good spirit, and Good Boys never makes fun of its three leads; the stars feels innocent despite what’s going on on-screen, and you are always laughing with the boys, not at them.

In the same way Superbad became a cult classic back in 2007, Good Boys is primed to do very same. It’s smartly written, incredibly funny, and stylish without ever trying too hard, as the kids deliver faultless performances across the board. They each show such personality while so much is going on around them, so much that they don’t necessarily understand.

You won’t be surprised this is from the stable of producers Seth Rogen and Evan Goldberg, though director/co-writer Gene Stupnitsky, and co-writer/producer, Lee Eisenberg, also explain the measure and calm brought to such a raucus affair. Both are best known for their work writing and directing on The Office, and co-creating the (excellent and sadly short-lived) Hello Ladies for HBO.

Good Boys shares a lot of similarities (and a cast member) with Booksmart, another SXSW favourite this year, but while this one is more of an all out comedy it still hits on a few deeper levels too. It’s something you could watch over and over again and the jokes won’t get old, Good B oys is a film that’s far better than it ever had the right to be, Superbad for a new generation, even if it’s stars won’t be able to watch it for a few years yet.

Best friends since childhood, Amy (Kaitlyn Dever) and Molly (Beanie Feldstein) are two high school seniors who have killed it in the classroom, but realise on the eve of their graduation that perhaps they should have partied a little more. So determined to go out with a bang, when they hear about a party one of their classmates is throwing, they make a pact to step out of their comfort zones and pack four years of fun into one night – there’s only one problem, they don’t know where the party is.

What follows 102 minutes of all-out, full throttle adventure as the girls charge from scene to scene trying to track down the main event. While the film can go from riotous extreme to riotous extreme, it’s not gross out, Booksmart is an honest, sincere and heartfelt ode to friendship and the gay abandon of youth.

The directorial debut from Olivia Wilde, I didn’t know what to expect of Wilde the filmmaker, but I guess something supremely stylish and effortlessly confident shouldn’t come as too much of a surprise. Music plays a key role, and with a killer soundtrack that always hits the right emotional beat as the film is supremely well-paced, and really does well to not fall foul of the usual restraints of the ‘one night of mayhem’ kind of film. Booksmart doesn’t stop-start, and it’s consistently funny rather than leaving all the laughs to just a handful of blowout scenes. Some superbly entertaining side roles from more experienced stars Lisa Kudrow, Will Forte and Jason Sudeikis definitely help in this regard too.

This is the film last year’s Blockers should have been, an honest coming-of-age adventure that goes beyond the surface, stripping the layers of each character away as the film develops. It can be raw, and it can be raucus, and despite coming across as a touch try-hard at times, this is a minor complaint. Superbad for a new generation, with star- making performances from the two leads and the announcement of Olivia Wilde as a directorial force, Booksmart is an empowering tale that should become a modern cult classic.

In the immediate aftermath of the 2016 election, director Rachel Lears reached out to political action groups wanting to shoot a film about a new kind of candidate. With focus immediately turning to the 2018 Congressional elections, Lears picked four female candidates newly galvanized to represent their communities, and crucially, four who were not career politicians. Those candidates were Amy Vilela, Cori Bush, Paula Jean Swearengin, and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.

Each up against long-time incumbents – often without a primary challenger for years – Lears follows the four challengers’ rocky roads to the ballot box, exploring who they are, why they are fighting, and what is at stake if they do, or don’t win.

Lears gives a remarkable insight into these new politicians’ lives, what it’s like to take on the responsibility of running, and how much they each have to sacrifice for the greater good. This is a film shot with minimal fuss but the narrative is so smartly told; four raw and affecting stories, each so wholly captivating, Lears lets them do their stuff without ever getting in the way.

While it must have been immediately obvious something pretty special could come from (now global superstar) Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Lears still she had to tell the story on-screen that lived up to the real-world events, and she hits every beat with a bullseye.

This is a documentary that will elicit a raw emotional response, of injustice, and of empowerment. Knock Down The House displays the importance of creating a new movement to challenge people that have been in power for too long, and grown complacent.

Whomever is your party, Knock Down The House should be mandatory viewing. That your voice can be heard, than you can make a difference, that you can do what no-one thinks is possible, is a universal message for all. This is a very important film, a galvanising movie that will help inspire the next generation of politicians. It makes the goal seem achievable and creates new role models for aspi ring teens and young adults, and the fact Knock Down The House was bought for distribution by Netflix, thus maximising it’s potential audience, can only be for the better.