‘Pride’
September 26 (limited)
Pride premiered at the Cannes Film Festival, and so far it has received nothing but extremely high praise. All 11 reviews filed on Rotten Tomatoes are positive.
Pride was inspired by a true story. Set in the summer of 1984, Margaret Thatcher is in power and the National Union of Mineworkers is on strike. Because of this, a London-based gay and lesbian activist group raises money to support the strikers’ families. The union originally doesn’t want anything to do with the activist group, but eventually they realize together there is strength in numbers.
The cast of Pride is incredible. Bill Nighy, Imelda Staunton, Dominic West, Paddy Considine, Andrew Scott, Joseph Gilgun, George MacKay, and Ben Schnetzer all star in the film. The film was directed by Matthew Warchus from a script by Stephen Beresford.
October
‘Men, Women & Children’
October 1 (limited)
Adam Sandler is starring in a film with awards potential, and it’s been a while since we’ve been able to say that (unless we were talking about the Razzies). To find a Sandler movie with a fresh approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes you’d have to go back to 2009 with Funny People, and that movie only barely was not deemed a dud by critics.
You’d have to go back even further to see a widely acclaimed Sandler movie: Paul Thomas Anderson’s Punch-Drunk Love in 2002. With that in mind, it’ll be great to see Sandler star in Jason Reitman’s Men, Women & Children.
Assuming last year’s Labor Day was only a minor bump in the otherwise great road for Reitman, this film looks very promising. Featuring an impressive cast that includes Ansel Elgort, Judy Greer, Jennifer Garner, Emma Thompson, Dean Norris, Rosemarie DeWitt, and more, Men, Women & Children looks great.
‘Gone Girl’
October 3
Will Gone Girl be a major Oscar contender or will it be more of a commercial genre film? Can it be both? This is the major question surrounding this movie. It certainly has a lot going for it. From being directed by David Fincher, one of the greatest modern directors, to starring the never-been-hotter Ben Affleck to being an adaptation of Gillian Flynn’s best selling novel, Gone Girl will certainly make a lot of money.
But will the Oscars embrace it? Thrillers don’t usually make their way very deep into the Oscar race, and we can look at the pretty solid Prisoners last year as evidence. Still, the Academy loves Fincher, so it certainly has a shot. It’ll likely come down to critical reception and how hard Fox campaigns.
‘The Judge’
October 10
The Judge is Robert Downey Jr.’s first serious role since 2009 when he starred in The Soloist (which wasn’t any good), and regardless of the quality of this movie it’ll be great to see him in this kind of role again. Yes, we love him as Tony Stark and he’s done a fine job as Sherlock Holmes, but Downey Jr. is one of the greatest actors working today and we should want him to take meaty, Oscar-caliber roles in addition to big blockbuster roles.
Starring alongside Robert Duvall seems like a match made in heaven, and the cast that includes Vera Farmiga and Billy Bob Thornton only makes this sound even better.
Of course, we are wary of a movie directed by David Dobkin, who besides directing the moderately acclaimed Wedding Crashers has also directed some major duds like Fred Claus, I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry, and The Change-Up. Luckily the screenplay sounds more promising as first time screenwriter Bill Dubuque wrote it with Gran Torino scribe Nick Schenk.
‘Whiplash’
October 10 (limited)
Whiplash premiered this January at the Sundance Film Festival and was a major hit. Not only was it the festival’s premiere film, but it won the U.S. Grand Jury Prize in the dramatic category. The movie stars Miles Teller as Andrew Neyman, a young jazz musician who wishes to achieve greatness. He studies under an instructor played by J.K. Simmons. Simmons’ Terence Fletcher character is a ruthless instructor and pushes Andrew Neyman in extreme ways.
Written and directed by Damien Chazelle, Whiplash looks like it will be a great movie, and there’s been lots of talk that Simmons could be a major contender for a Supporting Actor Oscar.
‘Kill the Messenger’
October 10 (limited)
No one has directed more episodes of Homeland than Michael Cuesta, and the director will make his first return to the big screen since Roadie. After directing eight Homeland episodes, he should certainly know something about how to tell a CIA story, and that’s exactly what Kill the Messenger is.
Jeremy Renner stars as Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Gary Webb who uncovers that the CIA imported huge amounts of cocaine into the country and was then the target of a huge smear campaign. Kill the Messenger was adapted by Peter Landesman and also stars Mary Elizabeth Winstead, Michael Sheen, Ray Liotta, Rosemarie DeWitt, Oliver Platt, Tim Blake Nelson, and many more.
‘Fury’
October 17
It’s interesting that David Ayer’s Fury is expected to be such a major Oscar contender. Earlier this year Ayer wrote and directed Sabotage, a movie that was pretty much universally critically reviled. Ayer is back with Fury, another movie that he both wrote and directed, and this one could be a Best Picture frontrunner, or at least a frontrunner to receive a nomination.
Ayer’s 2012 End of Watch proved he has what it takes to make an incredibly strong movie, and a World War II plot is usually enough for the Academy to take notice. The cast is downright incredible too. Brad Pitt stars in the lead role, and the cast also includes Logan Lerman, Shia LaBeouf, Scott Eastwood, Michael Peña, Jason Isaacs, and more.
The film was originally supposed to premiere in November, however, so it could be slowly backing out of the race. Still, Brad Pitt in a World War II movie? We’re in.
‘Book of Life’
October 17
Let’s be honest, an animated day of the dead movie produced by Guillermo Del Toro released just in time for Halloween sounds pretty cool.
Written and directed by Jorge R. Gutierrez (with Douglas Langdale credited as co-writer), Book of Life is a fantastical animated movie that will follow Manolo, a man who has to balance his family’s expectations and what his heart tells him to do. His journey to court Maria takes him on a journey through many worlds.
The vocal cast for the movie is excellent. It includes Diego Luna, Zoe Saldana, Channing Tatum, Ron Perlman, Danny Trejo, Christina Applegate, Ice Cube, and more.
‘Birdman’
October 17 (limited)
If early reviews are any indication, Alejandro González Iñárritu’s Birdman may be the frontrunner for this year’s Best Picture race. Michael Keaton stars as a washed up actor famous for playing an iconic superhero who attempts to recover his family, his career, and himself while battling his ego and attempting to adapt Raymond Carver’s What We Talk About When We Talk About Love into a Broadway play.
The movie will exist somewhat in a meta space as Keaton’s relationship with Batman and this film sounds not all that different from his character’s relationship with Birdman. Early reviews have projected that Keaton’s performance could be the strongest of the year, and the film is said to have many other special elements as well.
A notable one is Emmanuel Lubezki’s cinematography that is made to look as if the movie is one continuous shot. Lubezki won the Oscar for Best Cinematography last year, and it’s possible he could repeat. Iñárritu wrote the screenplay with Nicolás Giacobone, Alexander Dinelaris, and Armando Bo, and the movie also stars Edward Norton, Emma Stone, Zach Galifianakis, Naomi Watts, Amy Ryan, and more.
‘Camp X-Ray’
October 17 (limited)
Even after only watching the Camp X-Ray trailer, we have to notice that Kristen Stewart looks far more at ease in this role as a military guard in Guantanamo Bay than she ever did in Twilight. Given her personality, it makes sense that these kind of roles could suit her more than roles putting her at the center of a romantic plot ever could.
So far Camp X-Ray has only received mixed reviews (it premiered at Sundance), but we can’t wait to see it to see Stewart in a different kind of role like this. Maybe this will be the beginning of a career shift.
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