Directed by David Yates (Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix; Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince; Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 1 & 2; State of Play (TV Mini-Series)) and starring Eddie Redmayne (The Theory of Everything; The Danish Girl; Les Misérables), Dan Fogler (Taking Woodstock; Kung Fu Panda; Horton Hears a Who!), Katherine Waterston (Steve Jobs; Michael Clayton; Sleeping with Other People), Alison Sudol (various tv series and shorts), Johnny Depp (Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl; Finding Neverland; Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street), Colin Farrell (In Bruges; Miss Julie; Winter's Tale; The Lobster) and Samantha Morton (In America; Sweet and Lowdown; Minority Report).

Fantasy adventure, 133 mins, 6+

Based on a book by J.K.Rowling as a spin-off of the hugely-successful Harry Potter series of children's books, the story is set in 1926 when Newt Scamander (Eddie Redmayne), who prefers the company of animals rather than humans, lands in New York from Britain to seek out a specific animal (fantastic beast). What he finds is that wizadry is being pushed underground in the US where they use different terminology, for example American muggles are called No-Majs.

Through a series of events, he meets Jacob Kowolski (Dan Fogler) who tries unsuccessfully to get a bank loan to start up a bakery. A couple of the animals in Newt Scamander's case escape and start to wreak havoc and confusion. The CGI is well done, with the creators coming up with some interesting animal characters, including a kleptomaniac platypus.

They team up with Tina (Porpentina Goldstein, played by Katherine Waterston) and her sister Queenie (Alison Sudol) who has a crush on Kowolski, as they try to escape from the clutches of Grindelwald (Johnny Depp) and Graves (Colin Farrell). Along the way they come across a huge number of lesser characters, but it is the creativity concerning the "Fantastic Beasts" which really makes this film so entertaining. Yes, the plot is interesting, but there are arguably too many characters, and the style is different from the Harry Potter series too.

Fantastic acting from Eddie Redmayne and Dan Folger in particular.

This is expected to be first first of a series of 6 such films, all direted by David Yates.