15 Best Films Of 2016 (So Far)

If you’d have told me at the start of the year that The Jungle Book would gross more than Batman V Superman I’d have laughed you out of the man village. While Cinderella had the right idea, Disney’s remake binge felt too restrictive to really be worth the effort and doomed to have stifled creativity. But then Jon Favreau made the whole enterprise suddenly seem fresh and exciting with his effects spectacular, earning deserved praise from critics and audiences alike.

It’s shockingly good, taking the broad strokes of the original animation and expanding it into a proper movie that tells a proper, emotional narrative (the 1967 version is basically a handful of music videos linked with tenuous scene set-up) realised with impeccable CGI/live-action blending. The animals and landscapes, which were all created in a computer, look incredible, able to convey and interacting with the impressive child star Neel Sethi.

One element of the original I completely expected to be dropped were the songs - they are iconic, sure, but that brings with an unweildly amount of pressures - yet they're here and completely work. Three are reprised with tonally suitable covers (and that's a massive deal in an otherwise straight movie) but, most beautifully, Bear Neccesseties gets the symphonic version it now feels like it always deserved.

For more on The Jungle Book, check out 8 Reasons The Remake Is Better Than The Original Animation.