19 best films to watch at the cinema now and new movies releases for 2021

Cinemas across the UK can re-open their doors to the public from May 17, for the first time since last year. There are still safety restrictions in place, including social distancing and the use of masks (keep up to date with the latest rules here), but the cultural world is roaring back to life. In this guide, our critics pick the summer's must-see films, screening from May to August.

Best new movie releases to watch

Nomadland

Yes, it’s already available to stream on Disney+. But Chloé Zhao’s Best Picture-winning masterpiece is the ideal way to reacquaint yourself with cinema’s communal, horizon-broadening pleasures. Cinemas from May 17

Sound of Metal

An Oscar-winner for Best Sound and Editing, this study of sudden deafness afflicting a heavy-metal drummer (Riz Ahmed, terrific) demands the kind of immersion only a big screen can truly give you. Cinemas from May 17

Army of the Dead

Seventeen years after his Dawn of the Dead remake defibrillated the entire zombie genre, master pop-cinema stylist Zack Snyder returns to the undead apocalypse from whence his career lurched. Netflix from May 21, cinema release TBC

Cruella

There’s more than a hint of Joaquin Phoenix’s Joker about Emma Stone’s punky-outcast take on the 101 Dalmatians villainess’s early years. Cinemas and Disney+ from May 28

First Cow

Kelly Reichardt is a treasure, and this is peak form for the Oregon-based filmmaker : a drama of settlement, friendship and dairy poaching in the 1820s, with long-range historical themes and a scene-stealing cow called Evie. Cinemas from May 28

Dream Horse

The story of Dream Alliance, the racing stallion raised in a Welsh mining village, was a classic British underdog yarn. Now it’s a classic British underdog film, with Toni Collette and Damian Lewis. Cinemas from June 4

A Quiet Place: Part II

Tattered posters nationwide were promoting this post-apocalyptic sequel for March last year; now it’s finally coming out. Emily Blunt returns as the mother battling scary, blind monsters by not making a sound. Cinemas from June 4

The Father

Best Actor at the Baftas and Oscars for Anthony Hopkins makes his the most feted film performance yet to be widely seen, in Florian Zeller’s moving adaptation of his own play about a man with advanced dementia. Cinemas from June 11

Luca

Pixar continues to plunge into uncharted waters with this animated coming-of-age fable, about two merboys passing a formative summer on the idyllic Ligurian coast. Cinemas and Disney+ from June 18

In the Earth

Dreamt up and shot under Covid restrictions, Ben Wheatley’s sublimely unsettling folk horror parable casts two scientists adrift in an old English forest atwitter with strange forces. Cinemas from June 18

In the Heights

Before he created Hamilton, Lin-Manuel Miranda wowed Broadway with this exuberant, Wide-Side-Story-esque musical, here brought to the screen with killer choreography and a captivating lead performance from Anthony Ramos. Cinemas from June 18

Supernova

A tender and humane Alzheimer’s drama that leaves no tear duct unsqueezed, with Colin Firth and Stanley Tucci as a middle-aged couple on one last, reflective road trip. Cinemas from June 25

Black Widow

After a two-year hiatus, the Marvel Cinematic Universe returns to big screens everywhere, with a spy-themed, Scarlett Johansson-led chapter that fleshes out the pre-Infinity War timeline. Cinemas and Disney+ from July 9

Fast & Furious 9

Yep, it’s 9 by now: who’d have guessed the mileage on this hotrod? Vin Diesel rounds up the usual suspects, with John Cena as their latest nemesis, and both Helen Mirren and Charlize Theron scheming on the sidelines. Cinemas from July 9

Deerskin

Here’s a genuine oddity: it’s a comedy-horror of sorts from extremely French writer-director Quentin Dupieux. Jean Dujardin plays a man so obsessed with a deerskin fringe jacket that he psychopathically ruins his life. Cinemas from July 16

The Sparks Brothers

The oddball art-pop duo Sparks’s twisting 50 year career is the subject of Edgar Wright’s first documentary, which opens in cinemas the morning after its Sundance London premiere. Cinemas from July 30

Jungle Cruise

Emily Blunt and Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson star in a larksome, Romancing the Stone-style swashbuckling throwback, based on a vintage Disneyland ride. Cinemas from July 30

The Green Knight

From David (A Ghost Story) Lowery comes this supremely eerie-looking treatment of the old Arthurian legend, starring a tousled Dev Patel as Sir Gawain. Cinemas from August 6

The Beatles: Get Back

Let it Be, legendary live rooftop session and all, has always been treated as a fraying band’s farewell. Peter Jackson’s eagerly awaited doc recuts all the footage and finds “a lot of joy”, to quote Ringo Starr. Cinemas and Disney+ from August 26