by Robert Alstead

Game Over: Kasparov and the Machine (January)
Human mind battles artificial intelligence in this documentary charting how Gary Kasparov rose to become the greatest chess player of all time, and then lost his crown to a computer called Deep Blue.
Dear Frankie (March)
Heartwarming story about a mother who, to protect her nine-year-old son, writes letters to him from a fictional dad. However, she finds herself at a point where she must choose to tell the boy the truth or find someone to fill the void. Bring hankies.
Deep Blue (April)
Amazing footage from the BBC’s natural history department captures the richness of oceanic life, from killer whales tossing seals in the air like rag dolls to hardy emperor penguins eking out an existence in the Antarctic. The cameras also take a trip five miles below the surface to where aquatic life is at its most zany and alien.
Asylum (Spring)
Set in 1957, a bored psychiatrist’s wife (Natasha Richardson) falls under the spell of a dangerous but charismatic sculptor at a maximum-security hospital for the criminally insane in this tale of erotic obsession and madness. Based on a novel by Spider writer Patrick McGrath, the story is told through the eyes of another psychiatrist played by Ian McKellen (Gandalf).
The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy (June)
It’s a surprise that Douglas Adams’s wonderfully bizarre comedy has taken so long to come to the big screen. The cult novel, the first in a five-part series, starts with protagonist Arthur Dent waking up to find his home is going to be destroyed to build a freeway. Then he learns from a friend, Ford Prefect, that the Earth is about to be destroyed by construction of an intergalactic freeway and so begins the galaxy-trotting adventure.
My Summer of Love (June)
Pawel Pawlikowski’s simmering, romantic tale shows the developing intimacy between two girls from different backgrounds over the course of a languid rural summer in the rural north of England.
Charlie and the Chocolate Factory (July)
Under normal circumstances, you would say why mess with a classic. But then this remake is by Tim Burton – the mind that brought us The Nightmare Before Christmas and Sleepy Hollow. The film comes hot on the heels of Spielberg’s War of the Worlds.
Brothers Grimm (November)
It’s been seven years since Python member and director of Brazil, Terry Gilliam has given us a film. Now he’s got two in the pipeline. Gilliam recently completed filming on the low-budget Tideland, an Alice in Wonderland type story, which was shot in Regina. In Brothers Grimm, Heath Ledger and Matt Damon play two brothers and collectors of folklore in Napoleonic France who pretend to rid villages of enchanted creatures. However, when they encounter a genuine fairytale curse their bogus exorcisms are no substitute for genuine courage.
King Kong (December)
How do you follow up The Lord of the Rings? We’ll find out if director Peter Jackson has any more tricks up his sleeve when this biggie stomps out into cinemas.
The Five Obstructions (December)
Criticized for being too clever for its own good, this playful investigation into how obstacles to a creative endeavour affect the final results is nonetheless a rewarding one. Dogma director Lars von Trier asks his friend and hero Jorgen Leth to make five different versions of an early art film. Von Trier is trying to restrict him so much that he makes something banal. Leth proves to have a few tricks up his sleeve though.
The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe (December)
C.S. Lewis’s classic fantasy tale about four children’s adventures in Narnia gets the Disney treatment. Directed by Andrew Adamson, this is a live-action feature starring Tilda Swinton and Rupert Everett.

Robert Alstead, who also writes for iofilm, is currently making a documentary about cycling called You Never Bike Alone.