TWO buddies in their 30s make a camping trip to the mountains in Oregon in search of hot springs. Will Oldham's Kurt is an unkempt, pot-bellied, pot-smoking peripatetic. His beard is as woolly as his thoughts. Daniel London's Mark is more urbane; he has a heavily pregnant wife at home. He has matured into responsibility.

Subtle moments reveal a friendship grown apart.

Old Joy, taken from the same-titled Jonathan Raymond short story, is hypnotically natural, but poignant and profound. Reichardt's static camera captures time like vital moments being lost forever - it doesn't cut until it has sponged every drop. The deep-rooted sense of place - the drab suburbs, the verdant forest - hinges into a moment of transcendence. It is a film perfectly in tune with itself - a simple joy.

Bobby (Emilio Estevez) Anthony Hopkins, William H Macy, Sharon Stone, Laurence Fishburne, Christian Slater, Martin Sheen, Helen Hunt. Running time: 111 minutes . . .

EMILIO Estevez's debut film is an earnest ensemble drama built around the shooting of Bobby Kennedy and the shattering of the liberal dream at the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles on 4 June 1968. It is in a similar fashion to George Clooney's Good Night, And Good Luck - a love letter to an older era that lays a challenge to America today.

Estevez presents the shooting as a tipping point in US history. His film is lovingly put together - a nimble Altmanesque-sprawl that roams the hotel and its inhabitants. It is a heady atmosphere of '60s politics. Amongst a cast of heavies, enfant terrible Lindsay Lohan sparkles. Meanwhile, Demi Moore's alcoholic singer laments her fading sex appeal to Sharon Stone's sagging hairdresser: "We are like melting ice creams." You said it.

Them (David Moreau) Olivia Bonamy, Michaël Cohen. Running time: 74 minutes . .

FORMULAIC slasher film Them is curious only for its French milieu - unhurried long shots of a bourgeoise couple in various domestic tableaux before the lights go out.

Set in Romania in 2002, and based on real events, Olivia Bonamy plays a French teacher living in an isolated chateau in the woods with her writer boyfriend Michaël Cohen. Then the phone rings. And the power is cut. Their car disappears. Strange lights dance in the window. Perhaps only a Frenchman would go down to the basement in such circumstances armed with only his Zippo lighter.