It's always exciting hoeing into the first column of the year. As January's a bit early for new music I'll skip to the ‘plus' bit of ‘Music Plus' and look at the raft of exciting films heading our way.

Some space opera sequel may currently be dominating box offices, but Award Season kicks off next week with the Golden Globes and there're
a bunch of great movies on the horizon.

First though, as with many things during the holiday season, a tradition has developed around this initial column. In fact, much to my surprise, I've already had an email from an over-eager reader curious about this year's offerings.

I'm talking about the reveal of Christmas presents received by my Special Lady Friend. Specifically, since she is what we politely call a Product Junkie, items aimed at making her face and skin even more beautiful than usual.

Leaving aside the Instant Revitalizing Mask that contains 'contains a rare plant extract called Nasturtium” (some thoughts for the manufacturers: they're really not that rare. There's a big bank of nasturtium just behind the Weekend Sun offices at No.1 The Strand. The leaves are great in salads.), I'll go straight to this year's favourite...
Snail Mucus.

Yep, snail mucus. Made in Korea. It's a Moisturising Face Mask. It's 'formulated with snail mucus extract to enhance skin elasticity”.

Possibly something has been lost in translation by its manufacturers but, according to gobbledygook on the packet, it 'empowers a superior moisture retention power to hold the essence, it enhances through penetration into skin.” And, sure enough, on the list of ingredients, just after the ever-popular dipotassium glycyrrhizate, is 'snail secretion”. Use three times a week it says. Can a world snail shortage be far off...?

The nominees are...

OK. Back to the movies. We're about to experience a deluge of films. Whether they will end up nominated for Oscars is anyone's guess. The Academy does have a history of ignoring the best and brightest in favour of populist mainstream fare.

That may happen to ‘The Revenant', Leonardo DiCaprio's latest, from the Oscar-winning director of last year's Oscar-winning ‘Birdman'. ‘The Revenant' is simply mind-blowing. It is like nothing you've ever seen and will leave you nailed to your seat. It is also over two and a half hours long, bleak, brutal and not without several unpleasant things happening to animals.

It takes place in early America, 1820, and follows an isolated group of trappers collecting pelts. They are hunted by Native Americans and Leo, a tracker left for dead by an all but unrecognisable Tom Hardy. The cinematography is astonishing and surely an award shoo-in.

And if Leo gets an actor nod for this one then Hardy will surely be there for his double turn as the Kray brothers in ‘Legend', a flawed film but with a central performance that just about pips Jeremy Irons in ‘Dead Ringers' for the Best On-Screen Twins Eva Award.

Also set in the snow is Quentin Tarantino's latest, ‘The Hateful Eight', a cabin-bound western that is very much a chamber piece fuelled by Tarantino's sparkling dialogue. Regulars Kurt Russell, Samuel L Jackson, Tim Roth, and Michael Madsen are joined by Walton Goggins and Jennifer Jason Leigh, all seemingly having a bunch of fun.

Also running on dialogue is ‘Steve Jobs', a collaboration between two Oscar winners, director Danny Boyle (‘Slumdog Millionaire') and Aaron Sorkin (‘The Social Network'). It presents the late designer in a mere three extended scenes, all backstage before particular product launches. The cast (Michael Fassbender, a brilliant Kate Winslet, Seth Rogan) are excellent and the dialogue dazzling, if a little theatrical.

That's four treats in store. Also watch out for eye-popping financial drama ‘The Big Short', journalistic exposé ‘Spotlight', and child soldier thriller ‘Beasts of No Nation'.

It's going to be a good year...