The best films of 2026… so far!

Featuring blood-curdling horrors, crowd-pleasing comedies and revelatory music docs

T he halftime scores are in. As summer blockbuster season heats up, here’s NME ‘s guide to the most unmissable movies of the year so far. You’ll be glad to know it’s not too late to catch some of them in the cinema…

A burnt orange Ralph Fiennes dancing maniacally to Iron Maiden ‘s ‘The Number Of The Beast?’ It’s just one highlight in this scintillating sequel to last year’s 28 Days Later . Succeeding Danny Boyle in the director’s chair, Nia DaCosta ( Candyman , The Marvels ) keeps things surreal and stomach-churning as Jack O’Connell’s Jimmy Savile-aping gang leader rampages across a zombie-infested Britain. The result? Gruesome proof that some franchises get better with age.

Survival film maestro Baltasar Kormákur ( Everest , Beast ) barely wastes a beat in this lean, mean cat-and-mouse thriller. Charlize Theron shows off her action chops as a rock climber fighting for her life in the outback; Taron Egerton isn’t just seriously creepy as the local weirdo hunting her down, but also played a blinder by suggesting The Chemical Brothers ‘ ‘Go’ for an especially tense scene. Powered by the film’s popularity, it’s enjoyed a huge streaming boost and returned to the charts.

Another member of the YouTube film academy currently storming Hollywood, 20-year-old Kane Parsons’ clever, creepy psych-horror Backrooms combines Lynchian surrealism with the kind of chaotic found footage first popularised by early aughts phenomenon The Blair Witch Project. Adapted from Parsons’ cult web anthology, itself based on a viral meme, this is Gen-Z filmmaking at its freshest and finest.

This feature-length documentary about Marianne Faithfull uses a playful framing device – the fictional The Ministry of Not Forgetting, led by Tilda Swinton – to explore a fitful but fascinating career. Though Faithfull is frequently seen using an oxygen tube in her interviews, she’s still a regal presence who knows exactly how to burnish her legacy. If the results sometimes feel a little pretentious, well, that’s probably what the great lady would have wanted.

For fans of: 20,000 Days on Earth (2014), Poly Styrene: I Am a Cliché (2021)

A suitably detached Charli XCX goes AWOL in Warsaw in this semi-improvised indie gem. At 71 minutes, it’s a slight but beguiling anti-romcom that follows XCX’s Bethany as she uses her cosmic connection to melancholy Nel (Lena Góra) to extricate herself from an impending engagement to boring boyfriend Rob (Will Madden). Not so much a ‘Brat Summer’ as a brief escape from the responsibilities of everyday life, but Erupcja still leaves a lasting impression.