What you may need to know

1. Brace yourself.

2. Wealthy New Yorker Will Smith suffers a personal tragedy and, after withdrawing from the world, Makes Sense Of It All™ by writing a series of letters to the universe itself.

3. Miraculously, the universe replies. That, or his friends hire actors to pretend to be his cosmic pen pals. Which would be an extraordinarily cruel thing to do to a man with mental health issues.

4 Hugh Jackman, Jason Segel and Johnny Depp were all set to star before Smith’s Overbrook Entertainment took over and he cast himself. No sign of Jaden this time.

4. Poor old Will Smith doesn’t know whether he’s coming or going these days. A Grammy-winning start in music led to enormous success in TV, before he would become one of the world’s most bankable blockbuster stars. But his forays into dramatic territory over the years have mostly misfired.

5. There’s no denying his charisma, but Sidney Poitier he ain’t. All the way back to and including Ali (despite the Oscar nomination) there’s just always something that doesn’t click. Try as he might, he has just never managed to shake the Fresh Prince.

5.He was mad to turn down Independence Day 2, even if it was tripe.

6. Lots of fine actors slumming it in the supporting cast, in particular the enormously likeable Michael Peña. Catch him next year in a comedy reboot of CHiPs (yes, as Pancho) and also Kenneth Branagh’s Murder on the Orient Express.

7. Ed Norton, Kate Winslet, you’re better than this. Kiera Knightley, as you were.

8. But we’ll watch Helen Mirren in anything.

Verdict: Cinematic Diabetes

Release date: December 30

What you may need to know

1. Moscow Never Sleeps is a Russian-language drama written and directed by Irish filmmaker Johnny O’Reilly. It has been on the festival circuit since last year, and goes on general release this Friday 11th

2. The film is a multi-narrative story set during one day in the Russian capital, where a range of characters find themselves at an impasse in their lives.

3. A terminally-ill movie star, absconds from his hospital bed only to find himself mixed up with a gang of petty thieves. A businessman runs into trouble with dodgy State representatives while his singer wife considers leaving him for an old flame; a pair of squabbling step-sisters go for a night on the tiles only to find their lives in danger. And so on.

4. As one might see from the trailer, the real star of the film is Moscow itself. The director, a resident of the city for the past 10 years and a regular visitor for the past 20, brings audiences on a trek around the city, from its tallest skyscrapers to its scruffiest streets. The soaring shots are a real treat for the curious, and a quite different perspective of the city than what we’re used to in this part of the world.

5. O’Reilly got himself in a bit of hot water last year during this promotional interview for the film, which was cut short when he expressed support for jailed Ukrainian filmmaker Oleg Sentsov.

6. Moscow Never Sleeps takes its title from a popular English-language phrase in the city. According to the filmmaker, everyone knows “hello”, “goodbye”, and “Moscow Never Sleeps”.

Verdict: утонченный

Release date: Friday, November 11

What you may need to know

1. We’re putting the band back together. Director Danny Boyle has reunited the original cast (Ewan McGregor, Robert Carlyle, Johnny Lee Miller, Ewan Bremner and Kelly McDonald), for a sequel to his era-defining 1996 comedy drama based on the novel by Irvine Welsh. Original screenwriter John Hodge is also back on board.

2. We can only hope Welsh will reprise his role as weaselly drug dealer Mikey Forrester; he has hinted as much on twitter. Russian sailors optional.

3. Set 20 years later and partially adapted from Welsh’s 2002 novel Porno, Mark Renton (McGregor) is back in Edinburgh to finally confront his friends after stealing £16,000 from them and fleeing to Amsterdam at the end of the first film. Sick Boy (Miller) and Spud (Bremner) are happy enough to see him, less so Begbie (Carlyle).

4. This feels like a good idea. Trainspotting launched the careers of its cast and director; reuniting exactly 20 years later feels distinctly uncynical. Less a cash-in than a genuine curiosity for them as much as the audience to learn what became of the characters.

5. Trainspotting 2 might have happened years ago, were it not for Boyle and McGregor falling out when the latter was passed over for the lead role in Boyle’s 2000 gap-year adventure The Beach. You dodged a bulled there Ewan, in fairness.

6. There are a quite a few visual references to the original in this trailer, and the remix of Renton’s iconic “Choose Life” monologue feels clunky. One would hope Boyle and co haven’t settled for a rehash. The only other sequel he has been involved in (as executive producer) was the excellent 28 Weeks Later (2007), and a rehash that most certainly was not.

7. On that note, Danny, how about you give us 28 Months Later next?

8. In a 2014 interview, Welsh called Boyle “a colossus”, saying “we’re all protective of the Trainspotting legacy and we want to make a film that adds to that legacy and doesn’t take away from it.”

9.Similarly Robert Carlyle told NME last year it’s one of the best scripts he’s ever read.

“This will be an emotional experience for people. [..] That’s really what the whole thing is about. Have these four characters changed? Have they remained the same? Have they f****d it up completely? Have they achieved anything? And of course the audience are going to be asking themselves exactly the same questions.”

Verdict: Let’s skip the garlic bread and proceed directly to January 27, 2017 (release date).