The 40 Films I Loved Most in 2016 - #40 to 21

Like Christmas decorations and Michael Bublé festive albums, critics' best-of lists start appearing earlier every year. Empire magazine was first out of the gate in 2016, publishing its list of favourites with December barely under way. Oddly, later in the same month, they had to reshuffle their initial selection to find space for Rogue One, making me wonder what the point was of publishing that earlier list in the first place. Crazier still, I heard one critic complain that another film publication had asked her to submit a top-five films of the year selection IN OCTOBER!

In stark contrast to all that, my own personal top 40 is late and unapologetically so - I've taken my time to see as many films from 2016 as possible (171 at the last count) and these are my favourites. They're not necessarily the most innovative, the best acted or the most beautiful to look at, but they are the ones that made the most personal connection with me over the last 12 months. The ones that made me laugh, made me cry, made me think or, occasionally, managed all three.

I keep hearing about how terrible modern cinema is from people who should know better but this has been an excellent year, quality-wise. Yes, there were some disappointments along the way, and maybe you have to increasingly avoid the multiplex if you want to discover the really interesting stuff, but this list could easily have been a top 60 or 70 with every title on it a winner. That's more than one very good to great movie released every week, which can't be bad.

The vagaries of UK release dates always cause problems for year-end best-of lists. You'll find the likes of Spotlight, Joy, and The Big Short on here but in the US and elsewhere they were all 2015 films. Likewise, you will see no mention of Manchester By The Sea, Moonlight or Elle, because they simply haven't been released here yet and therefore don't qualify for inclusion. Basically, if a film was released in the UK between 1 January and 31 December 2016, it was eligible to be featured here.

To avoid confusion/apoplexy, though, I've included the UK release date of all 32 movies - but please feel free to double check my information against this excellent and informative website: www.launchingfilms.com

Now, on with the show...

40. Eye In The Sky
Director: Gavin Hood, UK release date: 15 April
Helen Mirren and the late Alan Rickman are part of a top-secret mission attempting to take out a Kenyan terrorist cell, via drone, without harming the civilians in close proximity. Whether it's an even-handed exploration of modern warfare or a dishonest piece of right-wing military propaganda, Frears' film is certainly an incredibly tense and morally complex affair.

39. Suburra
Director: Stefano Sollima, UK release date: 24 June
Italian mob thriller set on the mean streets of Rome and centring on an ambitious - and entirely crooked - plan to turn the waterfront area into the new Las Vegas. As the scheme causes friction for gangster and politician alike, Sollima (Gomorrah) turns the bombast up to 11, cleverly playing with themes of apocalypse and judgement, while extracting fine performances from his ensemble cast.

38. Chi-Raq
Director: Spike Lee, UK release date: 2 December

Lee's ambitious, free-wheeling adaptation of the ancient Greek play Lysistrata sees a group of women (led by the excellent Teyonah Parris) organise against gun violence in Chicago's Southside. Their decision to withhold sex from the male perpetrators (No peace, No pussy!) causes divisions and conflict. Overlong and a little convoluted at times, but full of great moments, political anger and sheer chutzpah, it's Lee's best film in years.

37. Florence Foster Jenkins
Director: Stephen Frears, UK release date: 6 May
Meryl Streep plays the titular New York socialite with a singing voice like a faulty bull horn in a delightful comic farce that nevertheless has a sliver of tragedy at its core. Streep is a hoot as the pampered 'songbird' convinced of her own greatness and desperate to put on a show at Carnegie Hall. Even better is Hugh Grant (yes, Hugh bloody Grant) as her hero/villain husband.

36. Under The Shadow
Director: Babak Anvari, UK release date: 30 September
Slow-burn psychological horror set in Tehran in 1988, during the Iran/Iraq war, which sees a mother and daughter menaced by a djinn spirit in their apartment block. Anvari's film starts off at a languid pace then gathers speed, tension and atmosphere, building to a gloriously deranged - not to mention frightening - final act. In Farsi, Under The Shadow was the UK’s submission for the foreign language film award at this year's Oscars.

35. Queen Of Earth
Director: Alex Perry, UK release date: 1 July
Dark melodrama which sees broken Catherine (Elizabeth Moss) going to stay with old childhood friend Virginia (Katherine Waterston) at her remote lakeside house. But the two quickly realise they have drifted apart over the years as the tensions between them start to bubble. Both leads are fantastic in a downbeat story about fragility - both of friendship and the human heart.

34. Everybody Wants Some!!
Director: Richard Linklater, UK release date: 13 May
'Spiritual sequel' to the director's superior Dazed And Confused, this time focusing on the members of a 1980 Texas college baseball team. Beer is downed, weed is smoked, trash is talked, and occasionally these likeable jocks get around to hitting a ball or two. Good clean fun bathed in enough rose-tinted nostalgia to float a battleship.

33. Mapplethorpe: Look At The Pictures
Directors: Fenton Bailey and Randy Barbato, UK release date: 22 April
Fascinating documentary chronicling the life and controversial career of US photographer Robert Mapplethorpe, who died of AIDS in 1989. As well as presenting an honest portrait of his many relationships (including with Patti Smith), it expertly charts the increasing sophistication of his work. There was an awful lot more to the (admittedly, somewhat difficult) man than a dozen or so notorious S&M shots.

32. Remainder

Director: Omer Fast, UK release date: 24 June
Tricksy but inventive memory-loss drama in which Tom Sturridge forgets vast swathes of his past when he is hit on the head by an object falling from a London office block. Fast's film has you constantly on the back foot as you aren't sure what's real, what's imagined or simply wrongly recollected, the plot shifting from downbeat melodrama to surreal crime caper as it glides effortlessly through the gears.

31. Little Men
Director: Ira Sachs, UK release date: 23 September
Sachs' poignant tale of gentrification and the poisonous impact it has on two families sees Greg Kinnear's Manhattanites move out to Brooklyn when they inherit a property from a dead relative. His decision to increase the rent of the woman who leases a dress shop in the same building provokes conflict, bad blood and, ultimately, threatens to destroy his son's only real friendship. A coming of age drama steeped in melancholy.

30. Sing Street
Director: John Carney, UK release date: 20 May
John Hughes meets Roddy Doyle in a joyous tale of love, escape and music set in '80s Dublin. Ferdia Walsh-Peelo is Conor, a smitten teenager who forms a band purely so he can spend time with aspiring model Raphina (Lucy Boynton). But his feelings for her bring out the pop star in him and it isn't long before the titular band are dreaming of the big time. There's so much warmth and wit here, and so much about Carney's screenplay that rings true, that it would take me all day to list its merits. Even the songs are great.

29. Café Society
Director: Woody Allen, UK release date: 2 September
A real return to form for the Annie Hall legend after his post-Blue Jasmine slump. Set in the 1930s, Jesse Eisenberg is the Brooklyn boy who travels to Hollywood to take up a job with his uncle (Steve Carrell), the powerful head of a movie studio, only to fall in love with the man's secretary, Kristin Stewart. Suffice to say the path of true love runs anything but smooth in a sharply scripted, beautifully shot and bittersweet dramedy.

28. Zootropolis
Director: Byron Howard & Rich Moore, UK release date: 25 March
Rabbit cop Judy Hopps (Ginnifer Goodwin) teams up with conman fox Nick Wilde (Jason Bateman) to unearth a massive conspiracy in this utterly charming anthropomorphic adventure from Disney. Under the ubiquitous 'You can be anything you want to be' life lessons, there are laughs aplenty, some seriously impressive world building and surprisingly adult themes. The year's best animation.

27. Joy

Director: David O. Russell, UK release date: 1 January

This unconventional biopic of Miracle Mop inventor Joy Mangano has some interesting things to say about the entrepreneurial spirit and American capitalism - i.e. battling to get rich can harm your relationships, strip you of your innocence and play havoc with your dress sense. Jennifer Lawrence, in the title role, is as ridiculously charming as ever, while Russell shakes up the biopic template with dream/fantasy sequences and smart humour.

26. Heaven Knows What

Director: Josh Safdie & Benny Safdie, UK release date: 29 April
Bleak, brutal drugs drama about a homeless heroin addict living from high to high on the streets of New York. Arielle Holmes, who co-wrote the screenplay, is outstanding as vulnerable, damaged Harley. The fact you're told nothing about Harley's past and made to witness her every painful, self-sabotaging act is a smart bit of storytelling because it invites you to condemn her behaviour and lifestyle. To see her and her friends as less than the desperate human beings they are. It's a provocation, but a forcefully delivered one.

25. Anthropoid

Director: Sean Ellis, UK release date: 9 September

Cillian Murphy and Jamie Dornan are soldiers parachuted into Nazi-occupied Czechoslovakia to assassinate SS General Reinhard Heydrich, the Reich's third in command (after Hitler and Himmler) and the architect of the Final Solution. On the face of it, Anthropoid - based on a true story - is a compelling and visceral war-time action thriller, but dig beneath the explosions and espionage, and you'll find a heartfelt paean to bravery and sacrifice. Powerful stuff.

24. Sonita
Director: Rokhsareh Ghaemmaghami, UK release date: 21 October
Compelling documentary recounting the heart-breaking/uplifting story of a 14-year-old Afghan refugee living in Iran with big dreams of becoming a rapper. The film focuses mainly on the titular Sonita's development as an artist, her friendship with filmmaker Ghaemmaghami but, most of all, on her attempts to break free from the diktats of Afghan culture, as her mum tries to sell her into marriage.

23. Welcome To Me
Director: Shira Piven, UK release date: 25 March
Ghostbuster Kristen Wiig is a revelation as Alice, a bipolar woman who scoops $86million in the lottery and - inspired by Oprah Winfrey - uses the cash to buy her own (bizarre) talk show. It's surreal, sad, funny and human but most importantly refuses to patronise or infantilise its protagonist. One of 2016's most underrated movies and worth checking out for Alice's hilarious 'swan entrance' alone.

22. The Big Short

Director: Adam McKay, UK release date: 22 January

A breathlessly entertaining dissection of 2008's global financial meltdown, seen through the eyes of the men who knew it was coming and got filthy rich as a result. Steve Carell, Christian Bale, Brad Pitt and Ryan Gosling are all great and McKay must be applauded for the inventive, fun ways in which he explains some pretty tricky concepts. Smug? A bit. Smart? Most definitely.

21. Evolution
Director: Lucile Hadzihalilovic, UK release date: 6 May

Set in a seaside town populated only by young boys and women, Evolution evokes David Lynch, David Cronenberg and, perhaps most of all, HP Lovecraft. The boys are given weird medicine and fed disgusting-looking food by the women, who then conduct medical experiments on them at a local hospital. It's a dizzying and disturbing piece of work that is also hauntingly beautiful to look at.

**Next up: Numbers 20-11**

The Neon Demon, Elvis & Nixon and The Legend Of Tarzan: Your Week In Film (October 31-November 6)

Fashion beast: The Neon Demon is a transgressive treat

DVD, Blu-ray, VOD and TV highlights for the next seven days...

Nicolas Winding Refn is at his most fuck-you divisive in The Neon Demon (DVD, Blu-ray and VOD) WWWW, a film that merges horror, satire, high camp and the occult to thrillingly transgressive effect. Elle Fanning plays Jesse, newly arrived in Los Angeles with big ambitions to make it in the cutthroat world of fashion modelling. Her disarming youth and rabbit-in-the-headlights innocence prove an instant hit with photographers, agents and stylists, and it isn't long before she's beating more experienced models to the top jobs. How they loathe and envy her.

Refn takes his time showing Jesse's career ascent but there's an unease tick, tick, ticking away in the background that no amount of cloudless LA skies or beautifully composed tableaux can eradicate. Death and danger permeate every frame here - from the opening shots of Jesse covered in blood for an amateur photo shoot to the recurring images of predatory big cats. You know something bad's coming, it's just a matter of when and how. And when Refn eventually turns up the batshit crazy to maximum, it's well worth the wait - a final half-hour involving cannibalism and necrophilia that fair takes the breath away (Jena Malone will still be asked about one particular scene if she lives to be a hundred).

Gratuitous? No, simply the perfect conclusion to the themes and ideas Refn (Drive) has laid out so masterfully throughout the rest of the film. We live in a culture that chews up and spits out youth and beauty - quite literally in The Neon Demon's case.

Elle for leather: Jesse is drawn into danger in LA

Necrophilia of a different kind now as The Pelvis and Tricky Dicky are dug up and put centre stage for the umpteenth time in Elvis & Nixon (DVD and VOD) WW. Loosely based on a true story and a famous photograph, Liza Johnson's film imagines what really happened when the King of Rock 'n' Roll turned up at the White House one December morning in 1970 to directly petition the president to make him an 'FBI agent at large' (Elvis thought he could go undercover to turn the kids of America away from drugs and radical politics). A broad comedy from which neither character emerges unscathed, it has a certain breathless pantomimic appeal, and Michael Shannon and Kevin Spacey acquit themselves well in the titular roles.

The Legend Of Tarzan (DVD, Blu-ray and VOD) WW features another blast from the past as Fantastic Beasts director David Yates becomes the latest filmmaker to have a go at adapting Edgar Rice Burroughs's most famous creation for the big screen. The main problem, I suspect, is that the idea of a white English posho lording it over black Africans is, in these more enlightened times, seen as somewhat racist. Yates and his team tackle this obstacle head on and make a decent fist of repositioning Tarzan (Alexander Skarsgård) as an honourable cove with nothing but love and respect for the tribes he and wife Jane (Margot Robbie) encounter. Putting the iniquities of the 19th Century slave trade front and centre – and giving Samuel L Jackson a sizeable role in proceedings – help too. Skarsgård is suitably butch and brooding as the titular character and Christoph Waltz adds another bravura villain turn to his CV. In a year that has given us the visual delights of The BFG, Doctor Strange and The Jungle Book, some of the CGI wasn't always convincing though.

TV-wise this week you could do a lot worse than check out Joy (from Friday, Sky Cinema Premiere, 13:45 and 20:00) WWW, David O Russell's underrated biopic of Miracle Mop inventor Joy Mangano, an American celebrity who isn't particularly well known in the UK. It boasts a great cast (Jennifer Lawrence as the titular character, Robert De Niro and Bradley Cooper) and has some interesting things to say about the entrepreneurial spirit and American capitalism too. Far from being an unalloyed endorsement of the latter, as some critics suggested, Russell's film explores the murky side of business and how dipping your toes into that world can make a person not just tenacious and determined but utterly ruthless too. It's a story of lost innocence in which Lawrence is, of course, terrific.

Strictly business: Joy Mangano gunning for success

Downton Abbey's Dan Stevens is all ripped abs and convincing Yank accent in The Guest (Saturday, Film4, 21:00) WW as David, a soldier with a very dark secret. It’s one of those “stranger-danger” thrillers so popular in the ’80s in which an innocent family, couple or person is first befriended then menaced by some insidious outsider (see Fatal Attraction, Single White Female, Pacific Heights etc). Action-packed and genuinely funny in parts (Stevens, it turns out, can do comedy too), The Guest lands a couple of slyly satirical jabs square on the jaw of the US army which is probably what I liked about it most.

There's nothing remotely funny or satirical about the soldiers featured in Kathryn Bigelow's Zero Dark Thirty (Friday, More 4, 21:00) WWW. The film, which details the CIA's decade-long hunt for Osama Bin Laden following the 9/11 attacks on New York, was rightly hauled over the coals upon its release for implying information obtained by torture had been utilised successfully in the investigation (it hadn't). However, if you can get over that fairly large obstacle, a slow-burning but genuinely gripping piece of work is your reward.

The excellent Jessica Chastain is Maya, a CIA black ops agent who becomes slowly more obsessed with tracking down the Al Qaeda bogeyman (if Zero Dark Thirty is about anything, it's about obsession). Chastain's role is an astonishingly unglamorous one as she spends the entire film either angry, exhausted or both. Maya is given no external life to speak of - her mission defines her utterly. That kind of narrative austerity is of a piece with the rest of the movie which, far from being the gung-ho spectacle I'd anticipated, lays out the ugliness of the 'Get Bin Laden' operation in some detail.

We see alleged terrorists tortured and brutalised, we see men and women gunned down in cold blood by US Navy SEALS, we see young children terrified for their lives - all in the name of bringing down one man. It's nasty, tawdry work and Bigelow offers up little to cheer, even after Bin Laden's elimination. The Hurt Locker may have won her an Oscar but this is a much better film.

Manhunter: Bin Laden is the target in Zero Dark Thirty

A couple of quickies to end with: Sigourney Weaver returns as Ripley in James Cameron's thrill-a-minute Alien sequel, Aliens (Sunday, Syfy, 21:00) WWWW, while online subscription service MUBI have just the thing for that Halloween night binge-watch - the original Scream trilogy WWW, which does the meta horror thing better than anything before or since.

What I'll be watching this week: Ken Loach's Palme d'Or winner I, Daniel Blake must be doing something right as reactionary pond life (Camilla Long, Toby Young and Iain Duncan Smith) are queuing up to condemn it. Also, Film 2016 (Wednesday, BBC1, 23:15) returns for a new run of eight shows. Presenter Claudia Winkleman is gone, to be replaced, Have I Got News For You-style, with a different host each week. Zoë Ball kicks things off, with Danny Leigh and The Independent's Ellen E Jones on hand to provide critical insights into the week's new releases, which include Nocturnal Animals and The Light Between Oceans. Plus, director Damien Chazelle talks about his new musical, La La Land (which is marvellous).

Ratings

WWWW - Wonderful

WWW - Worthwhile

WW - Watchable

W - Woeful

Joy, Captain America: Civil War and Son Of Saul: Your Week In Film (Monday April 25-Sunday May 1)

Holocaust drama Son Of Saul opens in UK cinemas on Friday

Next Monday is not only a Bank Holiday but also my 50th birthday so, after today, this column is taking a two-week break but will return on May 9 (my hangover should have gone by then). The reviews will be back that week, too. In the meantime...

TV, Radio, DVD, Blu-ray, VOD and cinema picks for the next seven days...

Monday 25th: Joy (DVD, Blu-ray and VOD) is my favourite David O Russell film since Three Kings but it seems to have gone under most people's radar, especially in the UK where its subject - Miracle Mop inventor Joy Mangano - is not really known. And that's a shame because Joy is not only a cracking biopic, but it boasts a great cast (Jennifer Lawrence as the titular character, Robert De Niro and Bradley Cooper) and has some interesting things to say about the entrepreneurial spirit and American capitalism too. Far from being an unalloyed endorsement of the latter as some critics suggested, Russell's film explores the murky side of business and how dipping your toes into that world can make a person not just tenacious and determined but utterly ruthless too. Joy succeeds beyond her wildest dreams but the extraordinary luck she needs to get there and the sacrifices she has to make along the way are clearly and effectively signposted. Her familial relationships ultimately become compromised and her loss of innocence is genuinely quite heartbreaking. Russell doesn't invite you to feel sorry for Mangano (she's a multi-millionaire, so why the hell should you?) but very smartly presents her success as something of a double-edged sword. Is being wealthy better than being poor? Yup, every time... but expect to lose a tiny bit of your humanity to make it happen. Lars von Trier's Nymphomaniac: Volume I (23:25, Film 4) is, essentially, a pornographic film about addiction and whilst the Danish master couldn't make a boring or uninteresting movie if his life depended on it, this one simply isn't in the same league as the likes of Antichrist (a horror film about grief) or the sublime Melancholia (a disaster movie about depression). Charlotte Gainsbourg, Stacy Martin and Stellan Skarsgård star. Mubi are rolling out French New Wave director Jacques Rivette's infamous Out 1 in eight feature-length parts this week, two a day from today. The entire film - a portrait of post-May '68 Paris and its dashed dreams - is 13 hours long but, in mitigation, was originally conceived as a TV series. People seem to recoil from long films but think nothing of binge-watching the latest season of Game Of Thrones or Girls but that's a subject for another day...

Jennifer Lawrence is a joy in, er, Joy

Tuesday 26th: Stay up late for Lars von Trier's Nymphomaniac: Volume II (23:25, Film4). Although the film is a bit exhausting (and not just because of the wall-to-wall boning), it's worth sticking with for two cameos. Uma Thurman is brilliant as a scorned wife turning up with her two young children at protagonist Joe's apartment to show them "the whoring bed", while Shia LaBeouf's 'English' accent is truly a thing of mind-boggling wonder (and I still think he's taking the piss). If that doesn't float your boat, there's Spike Lee's bravura heist drama Inside Man (23:40, ITV4). Denzel Washington, Clive Owen and Jodie Foster star. 

A bank job goes wrong in Spike Lee's Inside Man

Wednesday 27th: Blue Is The Warmest Colour (23:10, Film4) has become defined by its controversies as much by its artistic and commercial success. Abdellatif Kechiche's film is a touching, explicit and quietly devastating story of a passionate love affair between two young women (Léa Seydoux and Adèle Exarchopoulos are Emma and Adèle), and it was no surprise to anyone when it carried off the Palme d'Or at Cannes in 2013. Unfortunately, relations between the director and his stars broke down soon after with Seydoux and Exarchopoulos speaking out about the "horrible" on-set conditions they had to endure, particularly during the movie's main sex scene, which Seydoux claimed took 10 miserable days to shoot. It led to a war of words between the two opposing sides with the actresses vowing never to work with Kechiche again. Additionally, Julie Maroh, the creator of the graphic novel the film is based upon, also spoke out about the sex scene, describing it as a "brutal and surgical display". She also took issue with the director's decision to cast two straight women in the lead roles. For me, whilst it would be difficult to explore the women's relationship without showing its physical side, I have to say the explicit scene in question struck me as entirely gratuitous. We're never left in any doubt about the attraction Emma and Adèle have for each other so chucking in a scene straight out of a porn film tells us nothing we couldn't guess for ourselves about the passionate nature of their relationship. It's a pity because Kechiche's film is otherwise terrific. If all this sauciness (and there's been quite a bit in this week's column) is too much for you, Snake Plissken's back in Escape from L.A. (Netflix UK).

Blue Is The Warmest Colour: Mired in controversy

Thursday 28th: On The Film Programme (BBC Radio 4, 16:00), director Laszlo Nemes discusses Son Of Saul, his Oscar-winning movie about life and death in a Nazi concentration camp. The film finally opens in UK cinemas tomorrow (it's also available via Curzon Home Cinema) and is something I've been desperate to see ever since the glowing critical notices it received at last year's Cannes. Films you can see on your TV or other screen today include Martin Scorsese's disappointing Gangs Of New York (22:05, ITV4), the brilliantly strange Duke Of Burgundy (23:15, Film4) and '90s-teenagers-invade-'50s-sitcom oddity Pleasantville (Amazon Prime Video), which I remember really liking way back when.

Son Of Saul won an Oscar for Best Foreign Language film

Friday 29th: Kermode And Mayo's Film Review (BBC 5 Live) boasts special guests Chris Evans and Paul Rudd talking about Captain America: Civil War, which opens in cinemas today. Are you on Team Cap or Team Tony? I'm on Team Isn't It About Time Thanos Actually Did Something? If you're staying in, there's rude gags aplenty in Ted 2 (15:30 and 20:00, Sky Movies Premiere), a director's cut of last year's underwhelming Adam Scott comedy The Overnight (23:55, Sky Movies Premiere), or John Turturro's amusing Fading Gigolo (Netflix) which guest stars Woody Allen in a rare acting role. 

Cap and Iron Man fall out in Captain America: Civil War 

Saturday 30th: Directors the Russo Brothers have had an interesting career. These days they're making mega-budget superhero flicks for Marvel (including the aforementioned Civil War), but in the past they also directed multiple episodes of cult US TV comedies Arrested Development and Community. I first came across their work back in the early '00s on Welcome To Collinwood (23:55, BBC2), an offbeat crime comedy, starring George Clooney, Sam Rockwell, William H Macy and Luis Guzmán. Based on the Italian film Big Deal On Madonna Street, it was a box office flop but remains a winning tale of a bunch of idiots and ne'er do wells getting in way over their heads when they attempt to pull off a 'bellini' - a perfect heist.  

Sunday May 1st: Bridesmaids (21:00, Film4) never fails to make me laugh - the scene on the plane, featuring a heavily-medicated Kristen Wiig, especially. Am I the only person who reckons director Paul Feig will do a good job on the Ghostbusters remake and prove everybody wrong? Yeah, thought so...

Welcome To Collinwood: Honour amongst thieves

The last 5 Films I saw

1. Entertainment: Bleak, baffling and often quite brilliant road movie about a depressive, misanthropic comedian on a stand-up tour of seedy bars and strange visitor attractions in California. Gregg Turkington - aka real-life stand-up Neil Hamburger - stars. It's recently been added to Netflix.

2. Black Mountain Poets: Alice Lowe (Sightseers) and Dolly Wells (Dolly & Em) are two con-artist sisters on the run from the law and posing as beat poets at a weekend retreat in this likable British comedy.

3. A Little Chaos: Charming costume drama set in the court of Louis XIV with Kate Winslet and Matthias Schoenaerts falling for each other during the construction of a grand water feature in the gardens at Versailles. The late Alan Rickman directs and stars as the Sun King himself. 

4. Midnight Special: Jeff Nichols' Spielbergian sci-fi about a young boy with superhuman powers starts strongly but rather falls apart in its final act. Michael Shannon's as watchable as ever though.

5. Gloria: John Cassavetes mob drama starring Gina Rowlands as a former gangster's moll on the run with an endangered orphan. It has its moments but is ultimately torpedoed by a terrible child actor and his total lack of chemistry with the lead.

Entertainment: Bleakly funny and misanthropic

UK box office Top 10

1. The Jungle Book
2. Zootropolis
3. Eye In The Sky
4. Batman v Superman: Dawn Of Justice R
5. Eddie The Eagle
6. The Huntsman Winter's War
7. Fan
8. Theri 

9. Criminal
10. Kung Fu Panda 3

R = Recommended

All information correct at press time