2017 is being all too kind to us movie-wise with January and February flooded with massive new releases and, almost without exception thus far, films delivering on the hype and being critically praised. Most of these have already been on screens Stateside last year and hoovering up awards and Manchester by the Sea is no exception. All you need to know going in is that Lee (Casey Affleck), a janitor in Boston with a potentially haunted past, moves back to Manchester (the titul

After squabbles, in-fighting and more shuffling than a Vegas casino I present the best films of 2016: 20. The Jungle Book 19. Captain...

Early awards buzz for La La Land has seen Damien Chazelle's second feature shoot to the top of a lot of 'must-watch' lists and, if it's not already one you've earmarked to see, you must dash to the nearest cinema to catch it. It seems odd for a film in these circumstances to achieve such hype, especially considering Chazelle's first film was a critically (but not commercially) adored indie about a jazz drummer, but it speaks volumes, perhaps, for the lack of musicals in the c

Martin Scorsese returns to his 'religious' strand of films with his latest Silence. Clearly a massive passion project for the great Director, and in production hell for years, his adaptation of the 1966 novel finally comes to screens. Set in 1600's Japan, where Christianity is outlawed on punishment of death, we focus on two young Priests smuggled into the country to find a former mentor thought lost. It's a quiet (no pun intended) and slow film, spread richly over a hefty...

Assassin's Creed is the latest film to try and fill the gaping void marked 'good video-game adaptation.' So many big hitters have tried and failed with last year's Warcraft the latest casualty. It's a shame to say that Assassin's Creed is also wide of the mark but more 'clipping the post' than shooting into row z. A brilliant core trio at the heart of the movie (Director Justin Kurzel and stars Michael Fassbender and Marion Cotillard, who all worked on 2015's Macbeth adaptati

So rounding off 2016 we have the hotly-anticipated and well-advertised Passengers. Brilliantly capitalising on our current obsession with space movies and the critical recognition they've been getting (Gravity, Interstellar, Arrival, The Martian) and casting probably the two biggest stars in Hollywood right now (no wonder there's hardly anyone else in the movie!) Morten Tyldum's film should be a resounding success and a nice way to end a somewhat hit and miss year. Luckily [d

Rogue One: A Star Wars Story, along with last year's spectacular The Force Awakens, is setting a dangerous, if lovely, precedent for future Star Wars movies. Gone are the days of praying and hoping for the best. Now, stroll boldly into the multiplex knowing the latest in the expanding saga will blow your head off. Rogue One doesn't disappoint in these stakes. Perfectly contextualising some of the more frustrating and loose aspects of A New Hope as well as telling a brand new

Music; the great communicator as the Chili Peppers once sang. The media form able to bind our ever-dividing world. A year of turbulence,...

Amidst all the strife of 2016 we always have music to turn to. Chunks of life and artistic expression to take three of four minutes at a...

Allied is another unfortunate misstep that has seemed all too common this year. What appears a brilliant concept: a couple meet in the midst of World War II whilst deep in enemy territory undercover as fake husband and wife before becoming married for real. Then, husband is told his wife may be a German spy (an undercover spy posing as an undercover spy to make things mega confusing) and he has 24 hours to prove she isn't or execute her. A WW2 Mr and Mrs Smith, if you will. I

JK Rowling invites us back into her magical world with the long-anticipated Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them, named after her charity book of the same name. Here, Rowling expands that mock textbook, said to be written by former Hogwarts student Newt Scamander, into a fully-fledged feature showing Scamander's exploits in the 1920's. We start with Eddie Redmayne's Newt arriving in New York in the midst of some magical disturbances and the ongoing hunt for dark wizard Gri

You certainly can't accuse Amy Adams of being lazy. Two movies are gracing the cinemas at the moment featuring her considerable talents and the most-hyped of which is Denis Villeneuve's Arrival. You'll have seen the trailer, or one of the many, many posters by now and you'll know that 12 unusual 'shells' (they look like humongous contact lenses made of charcoal) have conveniently placed themselves at 12 nondescript locations around the globe and it's up to the countries they'