Asked how he feels about having a film opening against a blockbuster line-up on Boxing Day – the country's biggest ticket-selling day of the year – Australian filmmaker Kriv Stenders cackles maniacally.

It takes a few seconds for the director of the original Red Dog and the new prequel, Red Dog: True Blue, to compose himself.

"I'm hoping that we fit into our own little place in the market," Stenders says. "Our film is for everyone and it's Australian so I just hope we can offer something unique that those other films can't."

Red Dog: True Blue director Kriv Stenders. Photo: Aaron Harris

But Stenders also recognises the drawing power of rival movies starring such big names as Ryan Gosling, Emma Stone, Brad Pitt, Marion Cotillard, Dwayne Johnson, Matthew McConaughey, Scarlett Johansson, James Franco and Bryan Cranston.

"Hoping is one thing and reality is another," he says.

Christmas is always a season of hope for fans of good movies.

Past box office success means certain types of movies always open at this time of the year: a fantasy blockbuster, a big animation from Disney or Pixar, a broad comedy with edge enough to appeal to teenagers, an upmarket British drama – usually with a royal connection for some strange reason – and a bright foreign-language offering, often French.

Those formulas are repeated again this year.

Felicity Jones as Jyn Erso in Rogue One. Photo: Lucasfilm

The fantasy blockbuster has already opened, Rogue One: A Star Wars Story, and will no doubt still be popular on Boxing Day despite mixed reviews. Also trying to get in ahead of the Christmas competition are Jim Jarmusch's gently touching drama Paterson, with Adam Driver as a bus driver who writes poetry, which opens on December 22, and Nitesh Tiwari's Indian drama Dangal, about a family of wrestlers, out on December 23.

That still leaves a big field of new movies on the first real day of the summer movie-going season that lasts until the Australia Day weekend.

Stenders will be watching his film with extended family while on holiday in Queensland.

"My sister and her family haven't seen it yet so we're thinking of making a family trip and seeing it when we're up in Noosa," he says. "I'll be anonymous in the crowd. I always like going in to see a movie, seeing how an audience reacts without knowing that I'm there."

No doubt hoping others follow his example, the director plans to leave the blockbusters to the following week.

FOR THE FAMILY

Red Dog: True Blue

Prequel to the 2011 hit about a wandering kelpie in the Pilbara.

Director: Kriv Stenders (Red Dog, Kill Me Three Times)

Stars: Levi Miller (Pan), Jason Isaacs (Lucius Malfoy in the Harry Potter movies), Bryan Brown

Buzz: A warm-hearted origin story about Red Dog's early life, set in 1968. Miller plays Mick, an 11-year-old dispatched to his grandfather's remote cattle station, who bonds with a scruffy kelpie who turns up after a storm.

Peter Capaldi and Matt Lucas in Doctor Who: The Return of Doctor Mysterio. Photo: Simon Ridgway

Doctor Who: The Return Of Doctor Mysterio

60-minute Christmas special plus two featurettes.

Director: Ed Bazalgette (Poldark).

Stars: Peter Capaldi, Matt Lucas

Buzz: The Time Lord teams up with an investigative journalist (Charity Wakefield) and a superhero (Justin Chatwin) to save New York from an alien threat in a light-hearted episode. Screenings include shorts on Doctor Who's concept of a modern superhero and the making of the Christmas special. The same episode screens on the ABC on Boxing Day at 7.30pm.

FOR ROMANTICS

La La Land

Modern-day musical set in Los Angeles.

Director: Damien Chazelle (Whiplash)

Stars: Ryan Gosling, Emma Stone, John Legend, J. K. Simmons

Buzz: Charming and beautifully shot romance between a struggling actor working in a cafe on the Warner Bros lot and a frustrated pianist who wants to open his own club. Deservedly one of the favourites to win best picture, director and actress at the Oscars.

Disney's Moana is set to be popular with the kids. Photo: Disney

FOR KIDS

Moana

Vibrant Disney animation

Directors: Ron Clements and John Musker (The Little Mermaid, Aladdin) with Chris Williams and Don Hall (Big Hero 6).

Stars: Voices by newcomer Auli'i Cravalho, Dwayne Johnson, Temuera Morrison, Jemaine Clement

Buzz: A spirited teenager, the daughter of a tribal chieftan, sets out to lift a curse that threatens her Pacific Island in a comic adventure. It has been described as a "tropical Frozen", with infectious songs by Lin-Manuel Miranda of Hamilton fame.

Sing

Animated jukebox musical.

Director: Garth Jennings (The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy)

Stars: Voices by Matthew McConaughey, Reese Witherspoon, Scarlett Johansson, Seth MacFarlane

Buzz: A koala with an American accent runs an amateur singing competition to save his rundown Broadway theatre, attracting all sorts of animals to sing pop hits, in an upbeat musical from the animation studio behind Despicable Me and The Secret Life of Pets.

FOR COMEDY FANS

Why Him?

Raunchy comic antics.

Director: John Hamburg (Along Came Polly, I Love You, Man)

Stars: Bryan Cranston, James Franco, Zoey Deutch (Dirty Grandpa).

Buzz: A sunny student falls for an obnoxious Silicon Valley billionaire to the dismay of her protective father in a bromance full of crass gags.

FOR LOVERS OF GLOSSY HOLLYWOOD MOVIES

Allied

Romantic spy thriller

Director: Robert Zemeckis (Forrest Gump, Cast Away, The Walk)

Stars: Brad Pitt, Marion Cotillard

Buzz: A World War II tale about two spies who fall in love on a mission to assassinate a senior Nazi in Casablanca. "I loved the story," Cotillard tells Shortlist. "I read the script five years ago. The producer told me that it was not in production yet but they just wanted to know if I responded to the material and if I ever wanted to be part of the project if they ever did it. I said yes right away. I thought the story was really powerful. Three years later they called me again asking if I was still interested and Robert Zemeckis and Brad Pitt were on board. I said yes, yes, I'm still interested." The film looks stunning, but doesn't quite live up to its dramatic promise.

FOR FANS OF QUALITY BRITISH DRAMAS

A United Kingdom

About an African prince's controversial mixed-race marriage to an English woman

Director: Amma Asante (Belle)

Stars: David Oyelowo (Selma), Rosamund Pike (Gone Girl)

Buzz: A real-life romance with political implications when the heir to the kingdom of what becomes Botswana falls for a straight-talking office worker while studying in London in the 1940s. A drama in the tradition of The Queen and The King's Speech, it's a good story not as well told.

Rosalie Blum is adapted from a graphic novel. Photo: Supplied

FOR LOVERS OF FOREIGN-LANGUAGE FILMS

Rosalie Blum

Quirky French comic drama.

Director: Newcomer Julien Rappeneau

Stars: Noemie Lvovsky(Camille Rewinds), Kyan Khojandi (a television comic), Alice Isaaz (Elle)

Buzz: A shy hairdresser becomes obsessed with a shopkeeper to the point where he starts following her around. Adapted from a three-part graphic novel, it's a wistful Gallic lonely hearts story.

FOR SERIOUS MUSIC FANS

On very limited release – one cinema in Sydney and two in Melbourne – are two music documentaries. Jim Jarmusch's Gimme Shelter is about the Stooges and Amy Berg's Janis: Little Girl Blue is about Janis Joplin.