HE MAY not be superhuman, but Michael Keaton is super-energetic. He talks nineteen to the dozen, making constant asides and asking rhetorical questions, so at times it’s almost as if he is debating with himself.

Tom Hardy has joined the cast of 'The Revenant'.

Leonardo DiCaprio will star in 'The Revenant'.

There have been decidedly mixed critical reviews for this grim, dark film but there can be no doubts that once again Bardem shows what a splendid actor he is.

THIS IS the real Javier Bardem, an actor with a profound understanding of both his craft, and, it seems, the human condition.

Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu made his name with 21 Grams, and in Babel (Paramount, €24.99) he teams up with screenwriter Guillermo Arriaga to produce a heady and somewhat baffling work.

As complex a story – several stories indeed – as you’d expect from Inarritu, involving a shooting in Morocco, a Stateside ‘kidnapping’ to Mexico and a troubled teenager in Japan.