Oscar nominee screenings, Barbican

Everyone has a favourite to win the Oscar for Best Picture – we certainly do, as you might have noticed. But what's great about the nomination list this year is that, despite one or two oversights and a couple of typical well-intentioned-but-worthy award-baiters, the line-up is incredibly strong. Strong enough, certainly, for the Barbican to screen all the nominees of the course of a week.

There can only be one winner on 26 February (and we'd like to congratulate the judges in advance for giving La La Land its due), but almost all of the films being screened are completely stellar. Here are the ones we recommend.

Moonlight

Moonlight is that rare thing: an adaptation of play (In Moonlight Black Boys Look Blue by Tarell Alvin McCraney) that doesn't feel stagey. But it's also so much more: a dissection of contemporary masculinity, a tender story of stifled sexuality, and 2017's best film so far.

Book here.

Arrival

Denis Villeneuve's film starts clever, but by the time the credits roll it's managed to couple intelligence with genuine pathos. That's not bad for a movie based on a short story by a little-known sci-fi writer. Amy Adams manages to improve on her impressive performance in Nocturnal Animals, and Jeremy Renner demonstrates that he should have been playing mathematicians instead of superheroes all this time.

Book here.

Hell or High Water

Did you like the Coen brothers' 2007 classic No Country for Old Men but wish it had more Chris Pine? (Don't you just wish that about every movie?). Hell or High Water is perhaps the most left-field contender for the Best Picture crown, but it was also 2016's happiest surprise: a film that came out of nowhere to be both incredibly thrilling and dramatically convincing.

Book here.

Manchester by the Sea

Lead actor Casey Affleck is up for Best Actor thanks to his performance in Manchester by the Sea; to see why, check it out on the big screen this March.

Book here.

And did we mention La La Land? Book that here.