Mike Leigh's mournful study of contemporary family life is the perfect antidote to the slam-bang pyrotechnics of xXx.

Set on a run-down South London housing estate, All Or Nothing is an intimate and emotionally devastating study of everyday people who run scared from the loneliness and despair that underpins their humdrum lives.

Like all of Leigh's films, the character development, rich dialogue and tour-de-force performances are the result of workshops and improvisation between the director and his superb ensemble cast, including regular collaborators Timothy Spall and Lesley Manville.

They play Phil and Penny Bassett, a taxi driver and supermarket cashier who have forgotten how to communicate with each other, and their dysfunctional children Rachel (Alison Garland) and Rory (James Corden).

The dinner table has become a war zone, with verbal grenades and insults flying back and forth, leaving everybody on edge.

Matters come to a head when Rory is rushed into hospital with a suspected heart attack, and Phil and Penny are forced to re-evaluate their crumbling marriage.

Meanwhile, next door, Maureen (Ruth Sheen), who works in the supermarket with Penny, also has family troubles.

Her rebellious daughter Donna (Helen Coker) is involved with an abusive, no-good boyfriend (Daniel Mays), who believes women are put on the Earth purely to serve him.

The only way to stop the circle of violence is for Donna to tell him to go, but is she strong enough?

All Or Nothing is an embarrassment of acting riches, from Corden's overweight and insecure son to Garland's insecure daughter, who witnesses the slow but inevitable disintegration of her family in painful silence.

Spall is truly masterful - the scene in which he begs forgiveness from Manville for being a lousy husband is cinema at its most raw and powerful.

Leigh's direction is assured, coolly witnessing the breakdown of the family unit, and the gradual healing of old wounds which brings kith and kin together again.