If you’re one of the growing millions packing your suitcases, planning to jet far, far away from the misery of January, beware! There are many pyschological pitfalls to avoid whilst airborne. The films you watch on your journey to paradise significantly influence your sanity. Luckily, we’ve created a fool-proof guide of What Not To Watch. Adjust your seatbelt, put up your tray-table and join us in the skies…

3D films – exciting big screen trend or pointless use of technology? This week’s Face/Off swings the spotlight on this re-emerging technique currently embarrassing moviegoers at a cinema near you. Whack on your crazy specs and get ready for one crazy ride as we debate the ins, outs and “Ooh, it’s going to touch my face!”s of 3D.

And so another decade comes to a close. Come with us down memory lane as we recall the snakes-and-ladders-esque ups and downs of Hollywood’s movers and shakers from 2000-2010.

2009 certainly brought us a few cinematic corkers, from sci-fi epic Avatar to comic-book crunching goodness from Christopher Nolan’s The Dark Knight and Watchmen. But it wasn’t all wham, bam and explosions – will 2010 be a year of smarter movies? Judging this list… maybe.

In this week’s Face/Off, we turn our attention to Christmas films. Classic feelgood fare or cynical attempt to convert a religious holiday into sweet sweet cash? Our dedicated team of writers take up the stance: optimism vs. pessimism, festive joy vs. humbuggery, Santa vs… well, Satan, we guess.

At least, not always. Films that studios allocate ridiculously bloated publicity budgets to are not always likely to be showered in glowing reviews and critical acclaim. Here we chronicle 2009’s most hyped films, some of which delivered and some that blew up in the studios’ faces big time.

“It is better,” said the essayist and moralist Joseph Joubert, “to debate a question without settling it than to settle a question without debating it.” In the spirit of such a great man that we just found out about on Wikipedia, we present you, gentle reader, with the first in what may well be a series of debates on the state of modern film.

On December 11th, The Lovely Bones gets a limited release Stateside, with the full shebang rolling out a whole month later on the 15th. Over in the land of Blightly, we’ll get our fill of Peter Jackson’s latest a full six weeks later on January 29th, pretty much last in the world release queue. Not that we should feel maligned – the release date has been endlessly shunted about (it was originally slated for March 2008), ostensibly to ensure The Lovely Bones a spot on the Oscars shortlist.

There’s a lot to worry about when it comes to the delicate, supple young minds of our children. But rather than bubblewrapping the family computer and locking the shed, maybe we should look a bit deeper into what kids films tell our children about life. We’ve examined (in great, hasty detail) the classic films kids love to watch and we must say, the results are urine-inducing…

Like turkey, disappointing crackers and the traditional game of ‘find grandad’s wig’, Christmas films are always the same. And the strange thing is, we wouldn’t want it any other way. What is on your essential Christmas film list? We bet you’ll find at least a few of them here…