LOVELY to look at and easy on the imagination, Abominable is the third animation this year to cast a yeti as its lead. It comes from DreamWorks - the studio behind Shrek and How to Train Your Dragon - and Open Season director Jill Culton. Sure, its motions are familiar for family fare but Culton never loses sight of that which is most important.

One thing that does stand Abominable apart from the average American ‘toon is an Asian setting and Chinese hero. One not a panda. Chloe Bennet voices Yi, a precociously musical teen whose life is transformed on meeting a Yeti on the roof of her Shanghai apartment.

Voiceless, Abominable’s yeti is someway between that of Smallfoot’s Migo and Big Hero 6’s Baymax in design and twice as cuddly as each. Yi quickly names him Everest and vows to transport him home…to Everest. Joining them are Yi’s neighbours Peng (Albert Tsai) and Jin (Tenzing Norgay Trainor), with Sarah Paulson’s zoologist Zara and Eddie Izzard’s villainous animal collector Burnish hot on their heels.

While unadventurous in narrative, Abominable assuages irony in favour of traditionalism. It’s sweet, beautifully animated and gently enjoyable. Best of all is its recognition of the transcendent ability of music to cast aside division and champion planetary cohabitation.

In Gemini Man, meanwhile, Will Smith doubles up as his past and present self. To the same end as Terminator Genysis, the film utilises de-ageing - that modern favourite of CGI tinkering - to revive the youthful appearance of a former Smith to face off against his modern reality.

He plays both old-timer assassin Henry Brogan and the younger clone created to take him down. Coming from Ang Lee, the visionary behind Life of Pi, Gemini Man is technically sensational, looking every penny of its sizeable budget. Smith proves as engaging a lead as ever, with Mary Elizabeth Winstead a good foil. If only the story weren’t so limp.

Also this week - or, rather, solely on Thursday (October 10) - Billy Connolly lands in Skipton at the Plaza Cinema at 8.15pm with an encore screening of his final stand up show from 2015. Captured on camera during the Australian leg of the Scottish comic’s then tour, The Sex Life of Bandages is sharp, witty and - true to billing - pleasingly outrageous.