FILM / Critics Choice

Dear Diary Nanni Moretti's film rambles through ideas, incidents and anecdotes to a profound and rather touching conclusion. The first of its three chapters, "On My Vespa", is bright and carefree; its second is a semi-satirical island hop; and the final section traces Moretti on a darkly absurd comic journey through the medical establishment.

Curzon West End W1, Renoir WC1, Locals Princess Caraboo It's 1817, and in a Little England cut off from the Continent by the Napoleonic Wars, an exotic beauty (Phoebe Cates) fetches up in the heart of the West Country claiming to be an abducted Eastern princess. All of high society collapses at her feet. So is she real or is she Memorex? A handsome, likeable and well-performed comedy.

MGM Trocadero WC2, Plaza W1, Warner West End WC2, Locals Tim Burton's The Nightmare Before Christmas This stop-motion animated feature tells of Jack Skellington's innocent attempt to have the Hallowe'entown community administer Christmas one year. It represents the same order of technological breakthrough as Who Framed Roger Rabbit and has escaped Disneyfication.

Odeon West End WC2, Locals