Michael Dwyer's A-Z of all the big movies on release in thefirst part of 2006

AEON FLUX Charlize Theron plays an underground assassin in this hi-tech futuristic action movie from Girlfight director Karyn Kusama. With Frances McDormand, Jonny Lee Miller and Sophie Okenedo. Feb 17

BASIC INSTINCT 2: RISK ADDICTION Sharon Stone's feisty Catherine Tramell is the only link to the 1992 hit in this sequel where she gets in trouble with the law again, as novelists do.With David Morrissey and Charlotte Rampling. Michael Caton-Jones directs. Mar 10

BREAKFAST ON PLUTO Neil Jordan's second collaboration with Patrick McCabe (after The Butcher Boy) stars Cillian Murphy in a remarkable portrayal of a young transvestite from an Irish border town. With Liam Neeson, Stephen Rea, Brendan Gleeson, Ian Hart, Gavin Friday and Bryan Ferry. Jan 13

BROKEBACK MOUNTAIN Ang Lee's tender, captivating film of Annie Proulx's short story follows the complicated love affair between two cowboys - played with rapport and conviction by Heath Ledger and Jake Gyllenhaal - in conservative 1960s Wyoming. Jan 6

CAPOTE Philip Seymour Hoffman nails the fey, affected voice of Truman Capote and the author's narcissism in this exploration of his fascination with the killing that inspired his innovative non-fiction novel, In Cold Blood. Feb 24

CASANOVA Heath Ledger plays the eponymous seducer in Lasse Hallström's movie, featuring Sienna Miller and Jeremy Irons. Feb 17

CHICKEN LITTLE Disney's first fully computer-animated feature is a chicken-who-cried-wolf fable in which the title character is ridiculed for mistakenly claiming that the sky is falling. Feb 10

A COCK AND BULL STORY Steve Coogan and Rob Brydon head the spirited cast in Michael Winterbottom's wickedly funny picture of a cast and crew working on a film version of Tristram Shandy. Jan 20

DERAILED Clive Owen and Jennifer Aniston play executives whose adulterous affair attracts the attention of a blackmailer (Vincent Cassel). Feb 3

L'ENFANT Winner of the Palme d'Or at Cannes this year, the best film to date from Belgian brothers Luc and Jean-Pierre Dardenne deals with a feckless young man with a chillingly irresponsible attitude to his newly born son. Mar 10

EXILES Tony Gatlif's road movie features Romain Duris (from The Beat That My Heart Skipped) and Lubna Azabal as volatile lovers on a journey from France to their parents' homeland in Algeria. Jan 13

FINAL DESTINATION 3-D Another new cast and another new director (James Wong, who wrote the 2000 original) assemble for another tale driven by another premonition of a shocking accident. Feb 10

FIREWALL Richard Loncraine's thriller features Harrison Ford as the head of security for a global bank, which he is forced to rob when his family is kidnapped. With Paul Bettany, Virginia Madsen, Robert Forster and Alan Arkin. Mar 31

THE FOG Smallville star Tom Welling heads the cast in the remake of John Carpenter's quite spooky 1980 thriller. Feb 24

FUN WITH DICK AND JANE The remake of the 1977 comedy starring Jane Fonda and George Segal features Jim Carrey and Téa Leoni as the well-to-do couple turning to robbery when their money runs out. Jan 20

GET RICH OR DIE TRYIN' Jim Sheridan breaks away from Irish themes to chart the raps-to-riches rise of a performer loosely based on the leading actor, 50 Cent aka Curtis Jackson. Jan 20

GOOD NIGHT, AND GOOD LUCK George Clooney turns director with a critically lauded picture of the 1950s confrontation between celebrated CBS newsman Edward R Murrow (David Strathairn) and infamous senator Joe McCarthy. Feb 17

HIDDEN/CACHE In Michael Haneke's edgy, disturbing French drama, Daniel Auteuil and Juliette Binoche play a couple whose bourgeois lifestyle is shattered when videotapes arrive in the post. Jan 27

THE ICE HARVEST The Christmas Eve weather plays havoc with a financial scam in this comedy-thriller featuring John Cusack, Billy Bob Thornton and Connie Nielsen. Feb 3

IMAGINE ME AND YOU It's lesbian love at first sight when a London bride (Piper Perado) is about to marry her fiance (Matthew Goode) and she sets eyes on the wedding florist (Lena Headey). Ol Parker directs. Feb 17

INSIDE MAN Denzel Washington, Clive Owen, Jodie Foster and Willem Dafoe lead the formidable cast in Spike Lee's hostage drama. Arsenal striker Thierry Henry is in it, too. Mar 24

JARHEAD Sam Mendes charts the experiences of US soldiers waiting in the desert for the first Gulf War to start. Jake Gyllenhaal, Peter Sarsgaard and Jamie Foxx head the cast. Jan 13

LADY VENGEANCE The concluding film in South Korean director Park Chan-wook's revenge trilogy is a challenging, unsettling psychodrama in which a child killer is released from jail with a score to settle. Feb 10

MANDERLAY In Lars von Trier's sequel to Dogville, again shot on a soundstage with minimal props, Bryce Dallas Howard replaces Nicole Kidman as protagonist Grace, now tackling slavery in 1930s America. Mar 10

THE MATADOR With tongue firmly in cheek, Pierce Brosnan plays a washed-up hitman drawing a morose businessman (Greg Kinnear) into his messy life and work in this blackly comic tale. Feb/Mar TBC

MATCH POINT Woody Allen turns serious again and stays behind the camera for an arresting moral drama starring Jonathan Rhys Meyers as an ambitious young Irishman drawn to the affluent lifestyle of a wealthy English family. With Scarlett Johansson. Jan 6

MEMOIRS OF A GEISHA Rob Marshall's film of an apparently legendary geisha's experiences in 1930s Kyoto has been controversial in Japan for casting Chinese actors - Zhang Ziyi, Gong Li and Michelle Yeoh - in the leading roles. Jan 20

MUNICH Steven Spielberg's second film in six months features Eric Bana as the leader of the Mossad agents assigned to kill the Palestinians held responsible for murdering 11 Israeli athletes at the 1972 Olympics. With Geoffrey Rush, Daniel Craig, Ciarán Hinds and Mathieu Kassovitz. Jan 27

THE NEW WORLD Colin Farrell plays 17th-century explorer John Smith, with newcomer Q'Orianka Kilcher as Pocahontas in director Terrence Malick's fourth film in 32 years. With Christian Bale and Christopher Plummer. Jan 27

NORTH COUNTRY Whale Rider director Niki Caro assembles three Oscar winners for this factually based story of a Minnesota miner (Charlize Theron) who, in 1991, filed the first class action suit for sexual harassment. With Frances McDormand and Sissy Spacek. Feb 3

THE PINK PANTHER Busy Steve Martin is the new Inspector Clouseau and Kevin Kline takes over as Chief Inspector Dreyfus. With Jean Reno and Beyoncé Knowles. Mar 17

PRIME Ben Younger, who made Boiler Room, directs a romantic comedy starring Uma Thurman as a 37-year-old divorcee smitten by a 23-year-old painter (Bryan Greenberg). With Meryl Streep. Feb 3 PROOF Gwyneth Paltrow plays a woman fearing she has inherited insanity from her mathematician father (Anthony Hopkins) in John Madden's film of David Auburn's award-winning play. With Hope Davis and Jake Gyllenhaal. Feb/Mar TBC

THE PROPOSITION Guy Pearce, Emily Watson, Ray Winstone and John Hurt star in a western set in 19th-century Australia and scripted by singer Nick Cave. Mar 3

RIZE David LaChapelle's documentary charts the spread of a dance movement devised as a response to the Rodney King riots in South Central Los Angeles. Jan 13

ROMANCE & CIGARETTES John Turturro directs a quirky musical dealing with marital problems and starring James Gandolfini, Susan Sarandon, Kate Winslet, Steve Buscemi and Christopher Walken. Mar 17

RUMOR HAS IT . . . The concept is intriguing: A woman (Jennifer Aniston) is about to marry her fiance (Mark Ruffalo) when she learns that her family was the inspiration for The Graduate. With Kevin Costner and Shirley MacLaine. Directed by Rob Reiner. Jan 27

SHOOTING DOGS John Hurt gives one of his best performances, as a Catholic priest who, with a young English teacher (Hugh Dancy), is caught up in the horror of the Rwandan genocide in 1994. Michael Caton-Jones directs. Mar 31

SHOPGIRL Steve Martin stars in the movie of his own novella, as an older man vying with a struggling musician (Jason Schwartzman) for the attention of an aspiring artist (Claire Danes) who worksin a department store. Jan 20

STAY Marc Forster, who made Monster's Ball, directs a thriller with Ewan McGregor as a psychiatrist, Ryan Gosling as his suicidal patient, and Naomi Watts as a troubled artist. Mar 3

STUDS Paul Mercier's film of his own popular stage play stars Brendan Gleeson as the new manager who brings hope to a bottom-of-the-league Dublin football team. Mar 17

SYRIANA George Clooney, Matt Damon and Jeffrey Wright head a formidable cast in Stephen Gaghan's compelling, multi-layered political thriller dealing with oil, politics and covert activity in the US and the Middle East. Mar 3

THREE BURIALS Tommy Lee Jones turns director and co-stars with Barry Pepper in a handsome western that recalls Peckinpah's Bring Me the Head of Alfredo Garcia. Mar 31

TRANSAMERICA Desperate Housewives regular Felicity Huffman is wonderfully subtle as a pre-operative transsexual whose problems are compounded by the discovery of a son from a forgotten one-night stand. Mar 10

TRISTAN & ISOLDE Made in Ireland, the new version of the historical romantic drama features James Franco and Sophia Myles as the doomed young lovers. Kevin Reynolds directs. Mar 24

TSOTSI Based on an Athol Fugard novel, Gavin Hood's film follows six days in the violent life of a young Johannesburg gang leader. Mar 17

TWO FOR THE MONEY Al Pacino plays the operator of a sports betting hotline and Matthew McConaughey is his new recruit, an uncannily accurate tipster. With Rene Russo. Mar 10

V FOR VENDETTA In this graphic novel adaptation set in a totalitarian Britain, shaven-headed Natalie Portman plays the ally of a revolutionary (Hugo Weaving) known as V. With Rupert Graves, John Hurt, Stephen Rea and Sinead Cusack. James McTeigue directs. Mar 17

WALK THE LINE Joaquin Phoenix gets under the skin of Johnny Cash and Reese Witherspoon sparkles as vivacious singer June Carter. Unlike Jamie Foxx in Ray, they do all their own singing in this biopic directed by James Mangold. Feb 3

THE WEATHER MAN Nicolas Cage plays a Chicago TV weather forecaster whose personal life is traumatic when he gets a shot at a national show. With Michael Caine and Hope Davis. Mar 3

THE WHITE COUNTESS The final film from the team of James Ivory and the late Ismail Merchant is written by Kazuo Ishiguro and set in 1930s Shanghai, where a blind US diplomat (Ralph Fiennes) befriends a Russian countess (Natasha Richardson) working as a prostitute and taxi driver. With Vanessa and Lynn Redgrave. Mar 31

THE WORLD'S FASTEST INDIAN Roger Donaldson's factually based film features Anthony Hopkins as a New Zealand motorcyclist who, at 72, set a new world speed record. Feb 24

YOURS, MINE AND OURS Dennis Quaid and Rene Russo take the roles played by Henry Fonda and Lucille Ball in this remake of a 1968 comedy, as a widower with 10 children and his second wife, a widow who has eight. Mar 31

ZATHURA: A SPACE ADVENTURE In this sequel of sorts to Jumanji, a magical board game propels two feuding young brothers into space. Jon Favreau directs. Feb 3

Release dates are subject to change

DATES FOR THE DIARY

Jan 16: Golden Globe awards ceremony, Los Angeles

Jan 31: Academy Award nominations announced

Feb 17-26: Dublin International Film Festival

Feb 19: Bafta awards ceremony, London

Mar 5: Academy Awards ceremony, Los Angeles