Director Robert Altman is a wry observer of human behaviour. His movies are characterised by a complex plotting and a keen scrutiny of human foibles. Cookie's Fortune is no different. A delightful concoction of intrigue and comedy, this understated murder mystery is missing one thing. A murder.

Rumour has it that ham, pork and bacon sales plummeted after the release of the quirky Australian movie, Babe. Children everywhere pushed aside their plates, refusing to eat a relative of the sweet little pig that could give any cattle dog a run for its money. The latest film to humanise potentially delicious farm animals is the delightful ‘claymation’ comedy Chicken Run. So should the poultry industry be worried?

Sebastian Faulk's novel Charlotte Gray is the third book in a loose trilogy of novels set in France during wartime. The three narratives, while situated in France, are not linked by character or plot or even a specific historical period. They are connected by their exploration of the impact of war on ordinary people.

Making a feature film from a TV series can be a precarious business. While there have been successes like Mission Impossible and The Fugitive, most attempts end in failure. So does Charlie’s Angels join The Beverly Hillbillies, Lost in Space and The Avengers on the rubbish heap?

It’s somehow incongruous that the director of The Madness of King George and The Crucible should be at the helm of a teen drama about wannabe ballerinas. Directed by Nicholas Hytner, Center Stage traces the trials and triumphs of a group of attractive young things training hard at ballet school.

It is one of those questions we have all pondered quietly or been asked at some stage - what would you do if you were stranded on a tropical island? What would you take with you? How would you survive? In Cast Away, Tom Hanks and Robert Zemeckis combine to offer a powerful and thought-provoking perspective on this unimaginable situation that we have all imagined.

How do writers produce new ideas when the range of stories available seems exhausted? When in doubt, modernise a classic. Take a story from Ovid, Marie de France or Shakespeare and slot it into a modern setting. Imbue it with current sensibilities and there you have it. You can even call it post-modernism.

The latest American blockbuster shoot em up - Blue Streak - is your standard black cop white cop buddy film with one exception. Miles Logan is not a cop. He's a jewel thief.

Escaping the drudgery of life through music or dance – particularly in poor communities in Northern England – has almost become a film genre in its own right. Since The Commitments – which was, admittedly, Irish – we’ve had The Full Monty, Brassed Off and Little Voice. The latest addition to the list is low-budget charmer, Billy Elliot.

The business of making movies can offer fertile ground for scriptwriters. David Mamet's marvellous satire State and Main is bettered only by the Robert Altman classic The Player. But every insightful take on the film industry is at least equalled by mediocrity or self-aggrandisement.

Costly love shown in actions not words is a rare subject of modern cinema. The odd hero may wax lyrical about all that they're prepared to do for his beloved but we rarely see any of it played out. Bernardo Bertolucci redresses this imbalance with his mellifluous film, Besieged.

The resume of filmmaker M. Night Shyamalan makes interesting reading. At 31, the man who eschewed medicine for moviemaking has made five films – acting as writer, director and producer on each. The man who had the cherubic Haley Joel Osment whisper ‘I see dead people’ also wrote the screenplay for the children’s hit, Stuart Little. He showed critics that Bruce Willis can act – not once, but twice – and has proved that it’s possible to make popular mainstream films that are actually about something.

For most of us, our ability to see is something we take for granted. We judge, make decisions, come to conclusions based on what we see. Seeing is believing, they say. But in the romantic drama, At First Sight, there's more to sight than seeing with the eyes.

Ok ok, so I like animations. Well, really like them. But let me say that Antz isn’t your typical kid’s production. To begin with, this is no toon. Antz is a computer animation with a difference. Dreamworks and PDI are positively enraptured by their new technology, particularly the facial animation at work in Antz. And it is very good. The ants and other critters (fortunately no spiders) are so ‘real’ they are almost tactile. In fact after a while they don’t seem like ants at all...