Five of the best … films

1 Blade Runner 2049 (15)

(Denis Villeneuve, 2017, UK) 163 mins

It has been a long wait, but this sequel lives up to expectations. Like its predecessor, it leads you through dystopia with a noir-ish detective mystery (Ryan Gosling makes a discovery that threatens to overturn the slave-based social order, not to mention his own sense of self). There are also new sights to behold, underpinned by an existential depth worthy of academic study.

2 Daphne (15)

(Peter Mackie Burns, 2017, UK) 88 mins

Emily Beecham is a smart Londoner whose self-destructive impulses complicate what ought to be a charmed life. Prone to drunkenness and meaningless hook-ups, she’s often compelling with it. Without over-egging the dramatics or over-explaining its heroine, this character piece typifies a detached, modern life.

3 The Ornithologist (NC)

(João Pedro Rodrigues, 2016, Por/Fra/Bra)

A kayaking birdwatcher (Paul Hamy) gets lost in the Portuguese wilderness in this mysterious oddity. Encounters include Chinese pilgrims, a cult and a gay shepherd named Jesus. Plus, of course, birds. Often confusing (a knowledge of Catholic saints is handy) but agreeably so, in a Weerasethakul sort of way.

4 The Road to Mandalay (15)

(Midi Z, 2016, Mya/Tai) 108 mins

This depiction of Burmese immigrants in Thailand is all the more affecting for its factual currency and subtle emotions. Wu Ke-Xi excels as a woman thrown into a hardscrabble existence, wondering if dreams of a better life will come true. Her would-be suitor Guo (Ko Kai) adds romance to her plight.

5 On the Road (15)

(Michael Winterbottom, 2016, UK) 121 mins

You don’t have to be a fan of Wolf Alice to enjoy this, but it helps. We follow the guitar band’s UK tour in snatches of performance, backstage banter and downtime; but throughout, Winterbottom threads a fictional romance between two crew members. From one angle, it’s a different type of music doc; from another, it’s a different type of romance.

SR

Five of the best … pop and rock gigs

1 Little Mix

With last year’s Glory Days album cementing their status as the world’s biggest girl band, non-stop pop factory Little Mix set out on their annual tour of UK arenas with a setlist of gold-plated mega-bangers and earnest self-help ballads in their stretch Lycra back pockets.
Aberdeen, 9-10 October; Newcastle, 11 October; Birmingham, 13 October; touring to 26 November

2 Slowdive

Three years after they re-formed, and 12 years after their last LP, shoegaze pioneers Slowdive returned in May with their powerful self-titled fourth album. Much more “band revitalised” than “quick nostalgia cash-in”, which is rare these days.
Glasgow, 9 October; Manchester, 10 October; Leeds, 11 October; London, 13 October

3 DJ Shadow

The pioneering and much-imitated 1996 debut album Endtroducing... eventually boxed DJ Shadow in, which may explain why his subsequent four have veered between genres. Last year’s The Mountain Will Fall offered a more streamlined electronic sound, but expect him to run the full gauntlet of sonic experimentation at this tour closer.
Roundhouse, NW1, 7 October

4 Dream Wife

Inspired by Debbie Harry, Grimes and the Spice Girls, Icelandic-Brightonian trio Dream Wife make expertly ramshackle grunge-pop. Initially formed as a “fake girl band” as part of an art project, they have since grown into the real deal.
Twisterella festival, Middlesbrough, 7 October; Liverpool, 11 October; Glasgow, 13 October; touring to 25 October

5 Lethal Bizzle

Having blasted out of the gates with 2004’s Pow (Forward), before losing his way slightly with some ill-judged dance dalliances, Dame Judi Dench’s favourite UK rapper has followed a similar career trajectory to most grime MCs. He’s returned to his roots, however, on this year’s Skepta collaboration, I Win.
Fusion & Foundry, Sheffield, 12 October; O2 Institute Birmingham, 13 October; touring to 20 October

MC

Five of the best … classical concerts

1 Mariinsky Orchestra

If the currency of Valery Gergiev’s conducting has become devalued in London recently, his performances with the St Petersburg orchestra still provide reminders of what he can produce at his best.
Cadogan Hall, SW1, 8-9 October; Ulster Hall, Belfast, 11 October; Symphony Hall, Birmingham, 12 October

2 From the House of the Dead

It is so long since David Pountney’s superb production of Janáček’s final stage work was seen at Welsh National Opera that its return seems like a brand-new show. For the revival, WNO’s music director Tomáš Hanus conducts.
Wales Millenium Centre, Cardiff, 8 and 12 October; touring to 29 November

3 Voices

The London Sinfonietta begins its 50th-anniversary season by reviving one of the major works it premiered in the 1970s. Hans Werner Henze’s evening-long song cycle is a wonderfully varied polyphony of musical and poetic voices. The Sinfonietta’s founding music director David Atherton returns to conduct.
St John’s Smith Square, SW1, 11 October

4 A Celebration of Howard Skempton

One of Britain’s most distinctive living composers gets a well-deserved 70th birthday tribute. Six of Skempton’s chamber and choral works feature, while the concert opens with tributes from four other composers.
King’s Place, N1, 13 October

5 The Last of the Romantics

Mahler and fin-de-siècle Vienna is the subtitle of this autumn’s lieder festival and the opening concert – with a performance of Mahler’s song cycle Das Lied von der Erde – sets the tone.
Various venues, Oxford, 13-28 October

AC

Five of the best … exhibitions

1 Dalí/Duchamp

Dalí’s depraved paintings, daubed with excrement and infected by dreams, will make a fine pairing with Duchamp’s witty revelations of the base mechanics of desire. From his allegory of eroticism in the machine age, The Bride Stripped Bare by Her Bachelors, Even, to the sordid materialism of his urinal Fountain, Duchamp mocks the spiritual and pompous. It is 100 years since he “selected” Fountain as a work of art yet this iconic loo is not the limit of his genius. By coupling him with dirty Dalí this exhibition should reveal the rich obscenity of his vision.
Royal Academy of Arts, W1, 7 October to 3 January

2 Arp: The Poetry of Forms

Born in Alsace-Lorraine when Germany and France disputed its sovereignty, Arp joined the Dada Cabaret in Zurich in 1916. Yet his colourful, biomorphic blobs and clouds do not fit anyone’s idea of dada. They cannot easily be pinned down as surrealist or abstract art, either. In short, Arp is one of the great free spirits of modernism: an artist whose vision is fresh and forever young.
Turner Contemporary, Margate, 13 October to 14 January

3 Gary Hume

Glossy and coolly contemptuous of artistic cliche, Hume’s paintings can appear either brilliantly subversive and strange or desperately flip. He is also inconsistent, strolling insouciantly between revelation and idiocy. Which will it be this time? When all is said and done, Hume is one of the most intriguing painters to emerge in Britain in recent decades and always worth a look – even if that is a quick look.
Sprüth Magers, W1, to 23 December

4 Katharina Grosse

The luridly free and spectacularly colourful abstractions of this German artist are painted both on canvas and buildings and even over landscapes. Her art sprawls across beaches and fields in great, surreal blooms of wild colour, blurring the boundary not just between painting and site-specific sculpture but between the gallery establishment and the freedom of street art.
South London Gallery, SE5, to 3 December

5 Reflections: Van Eyck and the Pre-Raphaelites

It is always worth looking at the hallucinatory realism of the great 15th-century painter Jan van Eyck. The National Gallery has one of the best collections of his art on Earth, including a probable self-portrait as well as the renowned Arnolfini Marriage. They are juxtaposed here with the hugely inferior Victorian paintings that Van Eyck influenced.
National Gallery, WC2, to 2 April

JJ

Five of the best… theatre shows

1 Our Town

Regularly performed in US high schools, Thornton Wilder’s 1938 play – set over 12 years in a small New Hampshire town, beginning at the turn of the 20th century – is often derided as sentimental tosh. Sarah Frankcom blows away the dust in an austere production that points to the extraordinary in the everyday. Wilder’s Our Town becomes any town, but particularly Manchester in the wake of this year’s bombing.
Royal Exchange theatre, Manchester, to 14 October

2 The Believers Are But Brothers

Javaad Alipoor’s show takes us into the shadowy world of online extremism. Here, Islamic State recruiters try to tempt young people in the west with glossy propaganda, and disaffected young men with few prospects spend their time hunched over computers as footsoldiers for the far right. Alipoor has done his homework, creating a dynamic piece of theatrical storytelling that uses technology to impactful effect.
HOME, Manchester, 9-12 October

3 Education, Education, Education

It is the day after the 1997 election and Tony Blair’s promise to inject money into the education system is music to the ears of the staff at Wordsworth Comprehensive. Things can only get better, right? The Wardrobe Ensemble’s clever show plays on audience nostalgia but it is a piece that comes with a sting in its tail, suggesting that many of the crises of education today had their roots in the ideologies of 20 years ago. Surreal, funny and melancholy.
The Royal, Northampton, 10-14 October; touring to 4 November

4 The Ferryman

Jez Butterworth’s family drama, set against the background of the Troubles in Northern Ireland in 1981, remains one of the most enjoyable nights out in the West End. This is storytelling writ big and bold, full of fascinating characters, every one of them fully coloured in. It wears its influences – from Sean O’Casey to Brian Friel – visibly on its sleeve and is none the worse for it. Richly rewarding.
Gielgud theatre, W1, to 6 January

5 Oslo

A three-hour play about the Israeli-Palestinian peace process could be dry as tinder but it’s often surprisingly tense (even though you know the outcome) and burns brightly in this intelligent and witty theatrical thriller written by US writer JT Rogers. It’s an evening that is nimbly staged with a terrific ensemble and is very much aimed at those who like their theatre chewy and substantial.
The Harold Pinter theatre, SW1, to 30 December

LG

Three of the best … dance shows

1 BalletBoyz

More creative commissioning from this fine company, with four new works by Javier de Frutos, Craig Revel Horwood, Iván Pérez and Christopher Wheeldon, each working around the theme of balance. Russell Maliphant’s inventive piece Fallen completes the programme.
Sadler’s Wells, EC1, 10-14 October; touring to 2 December

2 Fallen from Heaven

Spain’s Rocío Molina returns in a work about womanhood, pushing against her own physical limits to expose the layers of her identity.
Barbican theatre, EC2, 12-13 October

3 Cockfight

This duet pits an older and a younger man against each other, in a competitive, comic, even tender battle of wills.
Chester, 7 October; Gulbenkian, Canterbury, 10-11 October; Poole, 13 October; touring to 27 October

JM