Dwight (Blair) is living in his bullet-riddled rusty blue Pontiac when he hears that Wade, the man who killed his parents, is out of prison. So he quietly stalks him, discovering that killing him is harder than he thought it would be. Afterwards, he runs to his sister (Hargreaves) to wait for the other shoe to drop. Surprisingly, Wade's relatives never call the police, opting instead to get their own revenge. And battling off this heavily armed family of rednecks isn't easy. So Dwight turns to his old pal Ben (Ratray) for help.

Blair is terrific as this hapless, woolly loser whose life has been off the rails since his parents died. Taking baths in empty homes while keeping a low profile, his sudden focus is a jolt, as he fixes his car, shaves his beard and buys a gun. This adds a level of emotion to what follows, creating gut-wrenching tension as well as some genuinely grisly moments of freaky, unsanitised violence.

Writer-director Saulnier tells this story with minimal dialog, letting the characters' faces reveal everything. Cleverly shot and edited, the film continually surprises us as these desperate people go about the messy business of evngeance. It's certainly not as clean-cut as the version Hollywood usually depicts; these outbursts of nasty violence are deeply shocking, offering a parallel political interpretation about how the rush to violence only makes things worse for everyone involved.

It's fascinating to see Dwight change as these events unfold. He's like a different person with each new set of clothes, and yet it's clear that he's not moving forward: he's caught in a cycle of violence in which everyone is attacking without thinking first. Where this goes is deeply personal and darkly visceral, revealing a sense of desperation that's intriguingly undefined. And even as we discover what sparked all of this hatred, we despair that there's no happy ending possible. So we just hope someone gets out alive.

The only survivor of the helicopter crash that killed his parents, 4-year-old JJ Greystoke (voiced by Garner) takes the name Tarzan, meaning "ape with no hair", as he's raised in the African jungle by a kindly gorilla. As a teen, Tarzan (now Zetterholm) has his first run-in with humans, meeting Jane (Locke), the daughter of his father's former colleague Jim (Bubb), who still runs a research centre nearby. And a few year later, Tarzan (now Lutz) runs into Jane once again, accompanied by new company boss Clayton (St John), who has a nefarious plan.

It's this plan that gives the movie a bit of trouble, since Clayton is after a mythical meteor that has freakish powers. This requires a primordial prologue showing the meteor wiping out the dinosaurs, followed millions of years later by the Greystokes getting caught in its moody power surge. The idea seems to be that we must care about this vast hunk of angry rock, which should remain undisturbed by humanity. But we never buy it.

Fortunately, there are far more engaging plotlines to hold our interest, even if everything feels deeply simplistic. First, there's a violent usurper in the gorilla community who makes Tarzan's life difficult while growing up, leading to the expected challenge for authority, which is startlingly brutal. There's also the "Me Tarzan, you Jane" romantic thread, which has some pungent moments of sexual attraction in between Jane's wearily constant need to be rescued.

The animation is a mix of awkwardly stiff movement and creepy dead eyes, but it's livened up by bracingly realistic motion-capture, gorgeous settings, whizzy 3D gags and references to iconic moments from Tarzan's back catalog. Voice work is solid, bringing the sometimes corny dialog to life. And the most intriguing element on-screen is the relationship between humans and the more-realistically rendered gorillas. This gives the film's environmental message a nice kick that would have been even stronger without the otherwise ridiculous plot.

When intrepid war photographer Rebecca (Binoche) is injured in a Kabul bombing, it's the final straw for her husband Marcus (Coster-Waldau). He's tired of waiting for that dreaded call, then having to tell their two daughters: sullen teen Steph (Canny) and demanding youngster Lisa (Cramer Curtis). After Kabul, Rebecca is happy to change her life and stay at home in Ireland. But she's too politically aware not to care about what's happening, so when Steph asks to travel to Kenya for a school project, Rebecca goes along, quickly sniffing out the bigger story.

While the plot is rather too insistent, pushing the characters here and there in ways that aren't particularly organic, it still manages to focus in on issues that bolster the story. Rebecca's personal journey is remarkably provocative, refusing to take a simple route as she struggles with her conflicting inner yearnings. And the bigger picture is breathtaking, as her photographs reveal the truth that Westerners prefer to ignore about events around the world.

"Readers are more interested in seeing pictures of Paris Hilton without her knickers on than what's happening around the world," Rebecca rants. "I want people to choke on their coffee when they open the paper - to think, feel, react." Binoche plays Rebecca with an astonishing internal fire. Even in her softer scenes with the terrific Coster-Waldau and sparky Canny, she exudes curiosity and compassion that are both selfless and self-serving at the same time. This doesn't always make her likeable, but we understand her urges.

Even more important is what's at stake: the world needs people willing to risk their lives to tell the truth. Filmmaker Poppe overstates this idea in an unnecessary (but admittedly moving) sequence, but the power of Rebecca's photographs is undeniable. Not only do they move us to consider the real situations of our fellow human beings, but they can force political bodies to react. This is just the edge this film needs to counter-balance its dramatic excesses. Well, this and Binoche's magnetic eyes.

In 1975 Australia, independent-minded Robyn Davidson (Wasikowska) decides to walk nearly 2,000 miles across the Outback from Alice Springs to the western coast. She knows she'll need at least three camels to carry her supplies, so she spends nearly a year working for camel dealers (Bock and Flaus), building her knowledge while earning money to buy the camels themselves. She also gets sponsorship from National Geographic, which sends photographer Rick Smolan (Driver) to document her along the way. Of course, the journey is packed with adventures and colourful people.

Wasikowska is terrific in the role, a fearless young woman who puts herself through an outrageous feat of courage and endurance, trekking 1,700 miles over nine months as a response to events from her childhood (her explorer father disappeared on a similar journey). And Robyn's ultimate observation is a sobering challenge: "I'd like to think an ordinary person is capable of anything." Wasikowska finds real grit in Robyn's determination, even as director Curran portrays her childhood in Malick-style sun-drenched flashbacks.

At least these visual touches add colour to the film, and Curran catches the hues of the Outback in all their glory: red, brown, white, tan, green and blue. So it's odd that the film feels relatively small by comparison, focussing on warm, homey emotions and the ragtag collection of eccentric people Robyn meets along the trail. Even so, all of this adds texture to the story and imagery, and Robyn's intrepid spirit can't help but be inspirational.

It's also enjoying to watch this gritty loner as she is forced to rely on other people for help, both physical and emotional. Wasikowska creates a terrifically prickly chemistry with Driver, and her scenes with the Aboriginal elder Eddie (Mintuma) are particularly lovely. But the film feels like it skims over the surface of her journey, showing bits of culture and small discoveries without capturing a sense of either the big sky or Robyn's deeper motivations.