Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (1969)

The script is wonderful, as is the strangely suitable Burt Bacharach music. There’s no sentimentality, but there’s plenty of wit and emotion in their relationship. A masterpiece, pretty much. I love the long pursuit scene. Paul Newman and Robert Redford are almost supernaturally charming. I also love Katharine Ross.

The ending is so sad – they know they’re doomed (and we know they’re doomed, too), but they carry on through the pain, talking about starting again in Australia. Poignant indeed.

Vertigo (1958)

Alfred Hitchcock classic. There’s a theme of how hard life is for women when men hold all the power. Worth seeing if only for the lovely San Francisco locations with no one in them. When are cities ever that empty? Also, Kim Novak and James Stewart are spectacular in the lead roles.

Rear Window (1954)

Masterful suspense thriller by Alfred Hitchcock. Confined to his room owing to an injury, a man stares at his neighbours and uncovers a terrible crime. James Stewart and Grace Kelly are unbeatable in the lead roles. I love the slow pace and play-like feel. The luxuriously lengthy, dialogue-based scenes would never be used in modern films.

Rise of the Planet of the Apes (2011)

Surprisingly enjoyable franchise reboot. Scientists test Alzheimer’s treatments on chimps, with miraculous effects on their intelligence. The chimps take matters into their own hands and rebel against their human captors. Meanwhile, the same medical treatment has catastrophic results for the humans who take it.

This is sometimes moving and often horrifying. It’s difficult to watch policemen gunning down animals, even if they are only CGI animals.

The Wooden Horse (1950)

Posh British officers plan to escape from a German POW camp using a vaulting horse to conceal a tunnel. This is an entertaining and exciting war film. The big flaw is that the Nazi guards are simply too nice and friendly. It would have been far more dramatic – and accurate – if the Nazis were less reasonable and more brutal, but not one gunshot is fired. It’s surprising that the film takes this approach because it was clearly made as pro-Brit propaganda. And what would show British resilience and bravery in overcoming adversity better than a truly scary enemy?

The Iron Lady (2011)

Not just a biopic of the British Prime Minister. It’s also a portrait of Alzheimer’s and mental decline, a history of late-20th-century Britain and a love story. 

Mark Thatcher comes out of it badly (as he did in real life), but Carol (Olivia Colman) and Dennis (Jim Broadbent) come across very well. Meryl Streep is highly convincing as Margaret Thatcher. It can’t have been an easy role to play. The film focuses on telling her story rather than passing judgement and as such seems very forgiving of her, despite offering plenty of evidence of the terrible damage she did.

Titanic (1997)

I enjoyed this far more than I expected to. I have always found disaster stories fascinating, and this one is especially well done. The slow build is effective, setting up the theme of class inequality that is just as relevant now as it was in 1912. The scenes of the ship filling up with water are heartbreaking. James Cameron truly understands how to convey scale and spectacle.

I could have done without the “old lady looking back” aspect, which adds little and could have been cut entirely, but I suppose they wanted to make it a century-spanning epic.

Kate Winslet and Leonardo diCaprio are fantastic as the doomed young lovers.

Splash (1984)

Hugely entertaining film about a mermaid and a young New Yorker who fall in love. There’s lots of comedy value in the “life viewed through the eyes of an alien” aspect. There’s also a surprisingly poignant element: the “message” that you should be with the one you love, however “different” they might be. Being a 1984 film, it has the same look, feel, New York setting and music styles as other feel-good films from this time – such as Ghostbusters. In fact, you can almost imagine Bill Murray acting the Tom Hanks part. Best of all is the wide-eyed innocence of Daryl Hannah as the beautiful mermaid with the unpronounceable name (she speaks it once and the high-pitched noise she makes shatters the glass of all the TV screens in the department store). This film is a lot of fun, but it makes you think too. I enjoyed it even more on DVD today than I did at the cinema when it first came out. Plus, the ending is superb.

Aliens (1986)

Ridley Scott’s original 1979 Alien film managed to be amazingly subtle for a space-monster horror film. It was built on excellent pacing, characterisation and suspense. For some reason, James Cameron’s 1986 sequel is like a Vietnam war parody with the emphasis on more monsters, more action and a lot more shooting. The section showing the marines getting ready – accompanied by clichéd “military drumming” – is almost like an episode of The A-Team. This film is in love with weaponry – there are long, lingering shots of machine guns, etc. The supporting characters are poor and the dialogue is weak, with important moments given clunky lines such as “Die, you bitch!” The cry-baby character (who loses it completely) is particularly unconvincing: could they really not find a better actor? The young girl, “Newt”, adds cutesy sentimental value. Sigourney Weaver has huge presence, as always, but the material just isn’t up to her talents. It’s surprising that this very disappointing film is rated so highly when it lacks all the qualities that made the original so compelling.

Your Sister’s Sister (2011)

Memorable comedy-drama that wisely explores the sister–sister relationship rather than go down more standard “rom-com” routes. Some very funny lines, and much poignancy too – along with quite a lot of swearing. It deals with bereavement and loss, but in unexpected ways. Emily Blunt is charming and convincing as Iris, and Rosemarie DeWitt is equally impressive – if not more so – as her sister Hannah. A refreshing film.

Gravity (2013)

This space drama is deeply moving. I’ve seen it three times and every time I found it emotional and stirring in a way that’s hard to articulate. Sandra Bullock and George Clooney are perfect in the lead roles, and the zero-g special effects are such that I never for once doubted that these were real astronauts in real peril. How did they film it?! My heart was pounding. I’ve heard a couple of people complain that the film “has no plot”, and I simply cannot understand this criticism. “Sole survivor of space disaster tries to return to Earth” seems like a pretty strong storyline to me. Perhaps what they mean is that the film is unusually focused – we are isolated up there with Dr. Ryan Stone, without distraction – and doesn’t follow the conventions of a standard drama. No sub-plots. No chitter-chatter between minor characters. And maybe that’s exactly why it stands out as being so exceptional.

Cinderella (2015)

“Have courage and be kind” is the simple message behind this live-action Disney film. It’s incredibly faithful to the original fairytale. I found it immensely powerful to see a story I’ve known all my life suddenly unfolding before my eyes in a newly visualised manner. And the magical scenes were sublime. The highlight was when the coach and horses began breaking down into the pumpkin, mice and lizards that they had been magicked from. Lily James plays it straight in the title role, Helena Bonham Carter is pretty good as the quirky fairy godmother and Cate Blanchett has fun hamming it up as the wicked stepmother.