Best films of 2019 so far, from The Irishman and Vox Lux to Knives Out

Also including 'Can You Ever Forgive Me?', 'Avengers: Endgame' and 'Eighth Grade'

2019 is shaping up to be quite a year for cinema.

Last year saw an unusually strong number of quality films being released – so much so that several efforts (see: Leave No Trace, You Were Never Really Here, Annihilation, First Reformed) flew largely under the radar when it came to the box office as well as awards season.

With this in consideration, it was doubtful that 2019 would provide quite so many cinematic delights. But, just a few months in and the UK’s seen the release of Yorgos Lanthimos’s razor-sharp period satire The Favourite – which won Olivia Colman a Best Actress Oscar – as well as Marielle Heller’s well-crafted Lee Israel biopic Can You Ever Forgive Me?, which stars Melissa McCarthy.

Then there’s If Beale Street Could Talk, Moonlight director Barry Jenkins's lyrical James Baldwin adaptation.

Here are the best so far, as determined by The Independent’s critics.

With long-anticipated tentpole releases from heavyweights Martin Scorsese and Quentin Tarantino arriving later in the year, 2019 was always likely to be a note-worthy year for film on its own merits.

You can find our rundown of the year’s best TV show so far here.