An unashamed exploitation movie with teeth, this has all the dinosaur devilry and gung-ho soldiering you could want. There’s even a sweet Tyrannosaur love story in the mix.

Haunting, serenely composed and beautiful, this is an elegy for a life and a country that America used to be. 

Dreams and nightmares, innocence and experience, civilisation and nature… an elegiac horror/neo-noir debut that captures a snapshot of America’s lost soul. Director Joshua Erkman is one to watch.

It loses sight of its own heroes amid the hustle and bustle of its wildly entertaining environment, but Zootropolis is still a blast to visit for a couple of hours.

Dusted with magic — and more than a little malevolence — this is one of those films you want sink into on a cold winter’s night.

This is not the messiah. Nor is it a very naughty boy. There was an opportunity for a truly original spin on the so-called Greatest Story Ever Told here, but The Carpenter’s Son pulls its punches to make a rather rote horror that amounts to little.

Celebrating the triumphs of a brave female athlete, and boasting a strong central performance from a transformed Sydney Sweeney, Christy is a well-meaning but meandering feminist parable.

Gothic, iconoclastic, engrossing, slyly excoriating of modern-day America and very funny to boot, it’s another solidly satisfying whodunnit from Benny B. Keep them coming, please.

Dylan Southern’s film lacks the complexity of Max Porter’s book. But there are strong scenes, and Cumberbatch delivers a performance to crow about.

Finnish him! Gore-soaked and unbelievably bloody, this will make you wince, gasp and cheer for the little guy. Another authoritarian regime is in for a bad day, and that’s a lovely thing to watch.

Wicked: For Good, sure — but not quite Wicked: For Great.

A surreal, endlessly creepy exploration of love and desire, with a terrific turn from Tatiana Maslany, makes for an exciting and unpredictable departure in Osgood Perkins’ oeuvre.

Well-paced, expertly performed, and an urgent call to stand up to fascism, Nuremberg is a powerful, sweeping story of the attempt to bring an unthinkable evil to justice.

It doesn’t hit the heights of Raw and Titane, but strong performances and the moving familial drama mean Julia Ducournau’s third feature is still an impactful watch.

Gurinder Chadha’s Dickens do-over is a typically original perspective on a canonical classic, if let down by its stretched production values and unlikable songs. But it aims only to be a crowd-pleaser, and may yet become one. 

Now You Three Me, as it should be called, offers ample 2010s nostalgia, but not quite enough brainless fun lands successfully. Put this rabbit back in the hat.

Edgar Wright’s biggest film yet feels like something out of both the future and the 1980s: a scathing satire that’s also a lot of fizzy blockbuster fun.

Lynne Ramsay’s raw and animalistic character study proves to be the perfect vehicle for Jennifer Lawrence. She’s never been better as a woman on the verge of a nervous breakdown.

If you can get on board with the paradigm change, this is an amped-up rock-gig of a movie and the most fun Predator since the original.

There’s trouble in this paradise: bleak without much of a point to make and bloody without any particular reason, this is an odd attempt at satire that takes a fascinating slice of real-life stranger-than-fiction history and somehow makes it less interesting.

A promising debut that stumbles in its final act, but its pseudo-documentary and found-footage sequences make Shelby Oaks a suitably creepy calling card.

With Ahmed and James’ connection holding it together, this is a tight, tense throwback to the paranoid thrillers of yesteryear that just about sticks the landing.

Riveting, unhinged, and sardonic to its honey-soaked core, this is another Lanthimos-Stone winner. (With a great opening-title typeface, to boot.)

A genuine disappointment from an intriguing, potentially even subversive premise. It’s another commanding performance to add to Monroe’s oeuvre, but this Cradle is more frustrating and forgettable than it is thrilling.

Solid performances can’t keep this from being a tonally erratic disappointment. Here’s hoping the next Hoover adaptation is a little less regrettable.

A crime thriller with no interest in thrills and not much in crime, this is an at times frustrating character study of a guy who can’t get out of his own way.

Tessa Thompson has never been better as the titular not-so-desperate housewife in Nia DaCosta’s bold, stylish reimagining of Henrik Ibsen’s timeless play.

Driven by a boss Jeremy Allen White performance, Scott Cooper’s Bruce Springsteen biopic — just like its subject — finds its true voice once it stops trying to play the hits.

Certainly not your standard music flick, Ebony & Ivory is challenging, abrasive and utterly, utterly odd. But if you’re on Jim Hosking’s weirdo wavelength, it’s a demented delight.

Carmen Emmi compellingly mines thriller tropes to capture the fraught experience of suppressed sexuality, but it's Lucas and Andrew’s heart-rending, beautifully performed love story that endures.

Though Farrell does great work and the film is a visual feast, Ballad Of A Small Player is an impenetrable story of redemption that’s both too obvious and too baffling.

It’s not as scary or as effective as the first film, but points for the performances, and for trying hard to do something different and fresh.

An anti-capitalist fable that lets down its star power with an underdeveloped script. All of Good Fortune’s good intentions don’t make up for it being such a mediocre time at the movies.

A powerful story about father and sons, told by a father and son. At once a showcase for a monumental talent, and the arrival of an exciting new one.

A decidedly grown-up thriller that will surely be torn to pieces by teens on TikTok, this feels like a slight wobble for Guadagnino, but is still a sharply entertaining and intense watch.

Lightning, camera, action… Frankenstein is brought to life in glorious, Gothic fashion by Guillermo del Toro’s painstaking artistry and Mike Hill’s elegant creature design. A big film with a huge beating heart.

A highly effective indie horror that overcomes the familiarity of its scares with the brilliantly executed novelty of its canine conceit.

It has about as much depth as a floppy disk, but some lovely, shiny CGI and a stunningly ear-shattering score from Nine Inch Nails makes for a fun if forgettable bit of futuristic fluff. Bio-digital jazz, man!

Not quite vintage Black, and Mark Wahlberg is no Robert Downey Jr, but this is fast and funny enough to be worth a couple of your hours. Squint hard enough and it almost feels like you’re back in the ’90s.

Kathryn Bigelow is back with a bang. This is a bleak but adrenaline-pumping experience that’ll leave you shaken, and searching for the nearest bunker.

As a newly solo director, Safdie summons a thoughtful and moving mood for this unconventional sports film; as a newly serious dramatic actor, Johnson is about to win some awards.

In tackling homelessness with deep empathy, one of our most exciting young actors proves himself to be a bold new voice in British filmmaking. Leave some talent for the rest of us, Dickinson.

All Of You might only work for some of you, but the easy, insatiable fire between Goldstein and Poots is undeniable. 

At once explaining too much and not enough, this middle segment of the trilogy fails to amp up the stranger danger. Perhaps the scariest thing is the end title: To be continued…

A trippy mix of horror, thriller and sports movie, Him is a very wild ride. A launching pad for its director and lead, and a shining moment for Wayans.

Derek Cianfrance delivers a hugely empathetic, very entertaining depiction of an extraordinary life, featuring one of Channing Tatum’s best performances. Expect laughs, tears, and noughties nostalgia.

The fire scenes are terrifying and may well sear themselves into your brain, but however well-intentioned, the human element is less involving than the disaster they must endure.

Making full use of Cillian Murphy’s emotional range, Steve is a rallying, railing portrayal of a broken education system — and contemporary cinema’s worthy answer to Dead Poets Society.

Though The Man In My Basement juggles a few too many ideas, Nadia Latif has crafted an unnerving thriller with dynamite performances from leads Willem Dafoe and Corey Hawkins. 

In years to come, when this appears on TV late at night, it’ll be impossible to switch off. It’s just one of those films. A stone-cold, instant classic.

Though occasionally inventive and affecting, A Big Bold Beautiful Journey is a tonal mess. Romantic and other emotional struggles depicted may ring true, but that and strong lead performances can’t save the uneven whole.

The filmmaking is a tad formulaic, but On Swift Horses is a beautifully shot piece of period escapism with a mesmerising central performance from Daisy Edgar-Jones.

This collection of tired jokes is enough to prompt the question, “What day did the Lord create Spinal Tap II: The End Continues, and couldn’t he have rested on that day too?”

Fellowes’ dewy-eyed swansong isn’t likely to make many Film Of The Year lists, but it still does Downton proud, closing the book on his Faragian utopia of stiff upper lips and British brio in a way that would do Cousin Violet proud.

There are colourful characters and cool moments to keep you entertained on the road to nowhere, but they can’t disguise the fact that this is a shaggy-dog story with no real point.

The first of two King-as-Bachman 2025 thrillers featuring a deadly reality show in a dystopian future. Edgar Wright’s The Running Man will need to bust a lung to keep up.

A fun blend of scares and sentiment, this largely justifies a lengthy run time with effective frights and a valedictory feel. Just don’t watch it before trying to clear out the attic.

An animated film showing you “how it’s done, done, done” — as HUNTR/X would put it — this is a stunning musical treat, a joy for all ages. Now warm up the vocal cords and bring on the sequel.

An entertaining, frivolous ride through a wacky, well-realised world, The Toxic Avenger is a charming underdog story offering plenty of laughs. The very opposite of toxic.

It’s not the toothless remake we feared, and is often very funny, but there’s a slight imbalance between the Roses that blunts some of its effect.

For the most part, Caught Stealing is a riotous, rollicking ride studded with New York’s concrete grit — but its sharper edges prove more difficult to endure.

Maybe this would hit the spot for a Sunday-night sofa slump but it’s more patronising than perceptive when it comes to portraying ageing. As disappointing as a stale scone.

A heck of a debut from first-timer Shawn Simmons, and another powerful argument for A-list status for Samara Weaving. Bring on the sequel, which is obliged to be titled Miny Moe. 

Denzel Washington’s unshakeable gravitas anchors a dazzling, jazzy riff on the crime drama that somehow feels wildly uplifting for all its grit.

Part end-of-the-world drama, part musical, part coming-of-age ghost story, The Life Of Chuck won’t please everyone. But, if you open yourself to its brazen sincerity, you might just shed a life-affirming tear or two.

An audacious, farcically funny digest of where we are now, and how we got here: the cinematic equivalent of pandemic primal therapy, a mad scream into the void.

Less a black comedy than an indispensable reinvention of the so-called trauma plot, this grounded post-MeToo story is navigated with a light sprinkling of humour and the utmost grace.

Even when supercharged by Kirby’s unwavering star power, this distractingly muddled stab at social commentary baked into a hardboiled thriller lacks the momentum to make it to the morning.

Odenkirk as an ageing action hero is still a violent delight, but the storytelling in this sequel leaves much to be desired.

A modern love story with a dash of Cronenberg for good measure — a brutal portrait of messy, intense long-term love. Warts, blood, bones and all.

A weak shadow of Eddie Murphy’s action-comedy yesteryear, The Pickup would be better off being left unpicked.

A hugely accomplished horror achievement, and a significant step up from Barbarian: tense, sad, hilarious, unsettling, ridiculously entertaining, and ultimately oddly uplifting.

Slightly chaotic plotting under-serves the story in places, but it’s saved by an endlessly entertaining Lohan and Curtis.

A risible attempt to modernise classic science-fiction by adding WhatsApp and political chicanery. This thin, frenetic, soulless adaptation is misguided moviemaking cubed.

The first feature from music-video director Isaiah Saxon boasts wondrous old-school creature effects, but they’ve been applied to a rather derivative fable, an eccentric but skimpy Amblin wannabe.

The result is a film that has a better chance of producing a belly laugh than any in recent memory: one that deserves, as Drebin would say, “20 years for man’s laughter”.

Adam Sandler goes back to his Happy place for this unashamedly stupid sequel. What it lacks in precision or panache, it makes up for in sheer goofy, golf-y geniality.

Though it can be predictable and a little simple, The Bad Guys 2 smooths over some of the frustrations of the first — bringing a sharper and (slightly) more mature sense of humour to its compellingly cartoonish animation.

With an exemplary cast and shiny new alt-universe to enjoy, this is the best Fantastic Four yet. And if that bar’s too low for you, then it’s also the best Marvel movie in years.

A big hand to the Talk To Me directors for navigating the filmic equivalent of that difficult second album. An accomplished and disturbing work, with Sally Hawkins on startling form.

“Nostalgia’s overrated,” warns this vacuous slasher with a wink. Trouble is, other than obnoxious new characters meeting immemorable ends, that’s all it has to offer.

A big old pile of Smurf.

This zany debut dials up the cringe comedy to its most excruciating extremes — and it’s a riot. Andrew DeYoung and Tim Robinson are a match made in heaven.

David Corenswet takes on the blue-and-red mantle admirably, and glimpses of Gunn’s signature sense of fun shine through — but a lack of humanity, originality and cohesion means the movie around them just doesn’t work.

Too much distance has crept in for The Old Guard 2 to feel memorable, and it shows. A convoluted, sequel-baiting mess that proves time is not a healer.

The Shrouds certainly fits neatly into Cronenberg’s filmography but stands apart as his most intimate work. It’s a hypnotic descent into the darkness of grief, punctuated by perverse Cronenbergian pleasures.

A really good, dumb comedy can be a joyous thing, and this is a really good, dumb comedy.

It’s not doing much daring or different but this delivers a fun, well-made summer theme-park ride, with fast highs and slow lows. Pleasurable, though it doesn’t linger.

M3GAN 2.0 is more absurd, self-aware silliness: a riot of timely tech paranoia, with almost no horror but a ton of successful comedy. Slay, queen!

It's easy to see why this has consistently entertained generations of audiences.

The sequel we needed is both the film you expect, and the one you don’t. There’s blood, but also real guts and brain and heart — visceral cinema soaked in viscera.

Joseph Kosinski has done it again. F1 combines unparalleled access, pioneering filmmaking and moving redemption arcs to deliver an exhilarating cinematic experience. What will he attach a camera to next?

Deftly balancing multiple genres, Tornado’s occasional pacing issues are propelled by Jed Kurzel’s ferocious score, Robbie Ryan’s haunting cinematography, and standout performances from Kōki and Tim Roth.

Robert Zemeckis’ Contact for kids. A slow start gives way to a charming, visually inventive adventure that might just inspire a new generation of astronomers to look to the skies.

An intelligent, sapphic-tinged and superbly acted rural thriller with Moore, Sweeney, Gleeson and Shaw all on fine form, only slightly dampened by some blatant product placement.

A different beast to Past Lives, this is a razor-sharp look at the competitive marketplace of dating: both rigorously honest and idealistically romantic.

Does Deep Cover work as an improv comedy? Yes, and it delivers strong characterisation, a twisty crime story, and great performances too. End scene.

It’s clearly made with real love and care, but shows far too much deference to its progenitor. Even in a remake, we need more originality and less playing the hits.