This week's movie releases

The sprawling web of Marvel Comics franchises spins off in yet another new direction with The Amazing Spider-Man. What started life as the fourth installment in Sam Raimi’s Spidey series morphed into a reboot as the fittingly named Marc Webb ((500) Days of Summer) came aboard and took things back to the beginning in touchy-feely style.

British actor Andrew Garfield, excellent in The Social Network, takes over from Tobey Maguire as Peter Parker/Spider-Man, a high-school kid living with his aunt (Sally Field) and uncle (Martin Sheen) and experiencing first love with sweetheart Gwen Stacy (Emma Stone). Curious to know more about his missing parents, he finds a suitcase that leads him back to the lab of his father’s former partner, Oscorp scientist Dr Curt Connors (Rhys Ifans), aka The Lizard, and a fateful encounter with a genetically modified spider.

Delicate matters

French romantic comedy Delicacy stars Amélie’s Audrey Tautou as a high-flying Paris business executive devastated by the sudden death of her husband of three years, who to her, his and everyone’s else’s surprise finds her passions reignited by her average-looking office underling François Damiens. Directed by David and Stéphane Foenkinos, based on the former's own bestseller.

El secreto de los 24 escalones is a Catalan-language adventure about a group of teenagers holidaying in the Pyrenees while looking for a cursed Knights Templar cemetery and a priceless medal believed to lie within. Helped by a historian and an ancient scroll, their hunt is threatened by a gang of art thieves. Directed by Santiago Lapeira, it stars Maxi Iglesias, Ona Casamiquela, Aida Flix and Albert Adrià.