Coming soon...

After the summer famine, a mouthwatering feast of movies. At very long last, some decent British films are nudging into view and there are several starry and thought-provoking Hollywood productions that are bound to figure in the endofyear awards. Christmas, minus the usual Harry Potter and Lord of the Rings franchises, offers some intriguing wild cards - and Jude Law's agent must be very happy with his four movies. Cinema-goers will be spoilt for choice, and that is before they consider the exciting smaller films that space does not allow for here.

The Terminal

Tom Hanks becomes a non-person after his imaginary eastern European country erupts while he's en route to New York, leaving him stranded at JFK airport, passport confiscated. In Steven Spielberg's sentimental comic fable, he observes all life in the high-tech limbo of the international transit lounge while the months tick gently by - and finds romance in the shapely form of Catherine Zeta-Jones's flight attendant. (3 Sept)

Collateral

A surprising and impressive Tom Cruise is cast against type as a contract killer who charters Jamie Foxx's cab and takes him on a turbulent ride through night-time Los Angeles. Michael Mann's buddy/road movie has been highly praised by American critics as both a cool, sleek thriller and a razorsharp character study. (17 Sept)

Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason

Renée Zellweger, Colin Firth and Hugh Grant return in the further adventures of Helen Fielding's tubby heroine and her rival beaux. In this sequel, directed by Beeban Kidron, Bridget becomes disenchanted with Mark Darcy and has a lesbian fling with Jacinda Barrett, from MTV Real World: London. (12 Nov)

THE CONTROVERSIAL ONE

Birth

Jonathan Glazer, British director of the gangster movie Sexy Beast, takes a full-on leap into the bizarre with this tale of a New York woman (Nicole Kidman) who becomes convinced that a 10-yearold boy is the reincarnation of her late husband. Already beginning to stir up trouble for intimate scenes between Kidman and the child, the film also features Lauren Bacall, Anne Heche and Danny Huston. (5 Nov)

THE BIOPICS

Finding Neverland

Johnny Depp plays JM Barrie in a weepie about the Scottish writer's encounter with the troubled family who became the inspiration for Peter Pan. Kate Winslet is the terminally ill single mother of four small boys to whom Barrie becomes a surrogate father; other roles are taken by Dustin Hoffman and Julie Christie. Directed by Marc Forster, who made Monster's Ball. (29 Oct)

The Life and Death of Peter Sellers

Emily Watson and Charlize Theron are Peter's first and second wives, Anne Sellers and Britt Ekland, in this wartsandall biopic based on Roger Lewis's biography of the same name. But the movie belongs to Geoffrey Rush who makes a virtuoso stab at capturing the genius of the elusive chameleon actor and some of his best-known screen roles. (1 Oct)

THE JUDE LAW FOUR

Alfie

Jude Law takes over one of Michael Caine's defining early roles, as the hopeless philanderer, in this remake, which updates the action and inexplicably moves it from Swinging London to New York. Charles Shyer's previous modest claim to fame was as the writer-director of Father of the Bride. The co-stars are Marisa Tomei, Susan Sarandon and Law's new squeeze, Sienna Miller. (22 Oct)

Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow

Huge buzz surrounds this first film written and directed by a 37-year-old ¸ber-nerd named Kerry Conran: a retro sci-fi adventure celebrating Saturday matinee derring-do and remarkable for being shot in an empty studio in front of a blue screen (props and backdrops were added as computer-generated effects). Jude Law, Gwyneth Paltrow and Angelina Jolie do battle with a mad scientist played posthumously by Laurence Olivier. (1 Oct)

Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events

The boom in "kidult" books and movies such as Holes and the Harry Potter series prompts this adaptation of Daniel Handler's Gothic books about a trio of resilient orphans. Jim Carrey is the nefarious Count Olaf, alongside Meryl Streep, Timothy Spall and Billy Connolly, with Jude Law as narrator Lemony Snicket. (17 Dec)