20 items
Shot in 2017 and set for release in 2018, this younger and hotter offshoot of Fox’s X-Men series — starring Maisie Williams as Wolfsbane and Ana Taylor Joy as Magik — has faced a daunting series of setbacks for director Josh Boone. First, the Disney takeover, then the megaflop of last summer’s Dark Phoenix, and […]
It’s been, like, 30 years since Alex Winter (Bill) and Keanu Reeves (Ted) last played the dimwitted duo, fighting Death for their souls in a game of Battleship. Director Dean Parisot (Galaxy Quest) doesn’t pull an Irishman and de-age his heroes, still underachieving in middle age, but determined to save the future with a song. […]
As this season’s steamy frightfests go, it will be hard to beat this hothouse thriller starring Janelle Monáe as a bestselling author who can’t dial 911 to save her from being swept up in the horrors of slavery in the Civil War-era South. Gerard Bush and Christopher Renz directed from their own screenplay. It comes […]
Director Patty Jenkins and star Gal Gadot return for the sequel to the 2017 superhero hit, only now there’s a twist: The first film was set in 1918. Now, it’s 1984 and Diana Prince, a.k.a. Wonder Woman, is primed to take on Kristen Wiig’s supervillain, Cheetah. Eighties fashions (big hair, shoulder pads) are back — […]
This sequel to 2015’s way-better-than-anyone-would’ve-thought Sponge Out of Water is completely 3D, with SpongeBob (voiced by Tom Kenny) comin’ at ya as he tries to save Gary (also Tom Kenny), who has been snail-napped by Poseidon. Patrick the Starfish (Bill Fagerbakke) joins SpongeBob on the rescue mission. (In theaters)
Spike Lee, fresh from the Best Screenplay Oscar he won for BlackKklansman, tackles the moral hangover left by Vietnam. Four veteran African American soldiers, led by Delroy Lindo, go back in-country to find a buried treasure and make peace with the memory of the deceased fifth blood, played in flashbacks by Chadwick Boseman. (Netflix)
In this culture-clash comedy from first-time director Brandon Trost, Seth Rogen plays Herschel, a 1920s immigrant who gets brined in a pickle barrel for a century. He wakes up in the here-and-now to find that his great-grandson (Rogen again) is a computer coder who blows his mind in all the wrong ways. (HBO Max)
Whale Rider director Niki Caro steps up to prove that you can make a live-action version of a Disney animated hit that’s better than the original. The key: dropping the musical numbers and bringing rousing action to the legend of Mulan (Yifei Liu), the defiant daughter who disguises herself as a man to take her […]
No one knows much about Christopher Nolan’s time-bending thriller with John David Washington and Rob Pattinson, except that it will be the first jumbo-budget summer epic to fly in the face of the pandemic and open in every theater it can find. Nolan has a near-religious belief in the theatrical experience. The question now is, […]
Charlize Theron puts her action-movie chops to good use as the leader of a group of immortal warriors who must stop Big Pharma from cracking their genetic code for profit. Asked if they’re good guys or bad guys, one of the team members answers, “Depends on the century.” As of right now, it’s war. Having […]
Andy Samberg hooks up at a Palm Springs, California, wedding with the drunk maid of honor, played by Cristin Milioti. Just another rom-com? Nope. There’s a twist, and we’re not spoiling it — let’s just say that director Max Barbakow’s debut (co-produced by Samberg and the Lonely Island crew) takes an old idea and runs […]
No, it’s not the official movie of Lin-Manuel Miranda’s groundbreaking Broadway musical — it’s simply director Tommy Kail’s filmed record of the original-cast production of Hamilton, shot onstage in 2016. That includes Miranda, as Alexander Hamilton, and Leslie Odom Jr., as Aaron Burr, the self-described “fool who shot him.” It was meant to debut in […]
Forget the Roman arena; it’s Gladiator in traffic! Russell Crowe gets his road rage on to a play a driver who doesn’t like the way a single mother (Caren Pistorius) treats him at a stoplight. Derrick Borte directs the ensuing carnage in a thriller that becomes the first film this summer to open in multiplexes. […]
Movie prospects just got brighter with the addition of Jon Stewart’s election-year satire about how the media and political parties spend money. Steve Carell stars as a Democratic political consultant who decides to play kingmaker for a retired Marine colonel (Chris Cooper) running for mayor in Wisconsin. Will our electoral process get the skewering it […]
There’s a strong Zoolander vibe in this farce starring Will Ferrell and Rachel McAdams as Icelandic singers whose confidence in themselves as Nordic rockers is entirely unjustified. Yet they enter the annual Eurovision Song Contest that made stars of ABBA and Celina Dion back in the day. Director David Dobkin, working from a script co-written […]
Did you know that Pete Davidson had a firefighter dad who died on 9/11? With the help of director and co-writer Judd Apatow — who hopes to do for the SNL comic what he did for Amy Schumer with Trainwreck — Staten Island homeboy Davidson parses his own life into a hilarious and heartfelt tale […]
Kenneth Branagh directs this take on the young-adult fantasy novels of Eoin Colfer. Aretmis Fowl II is a 12-year-old Irish prodigy (played by Ferdia Shaw, the grandson of Jaws shark hunter Robert Shaw). His mission? To rescue his criminal-mastermind father (Colin Farrell) from an underground cult of sinister fairies. (Disney+)
You may not see a better performance in 2020 than Elizabeth Moss’ go-for-broke portrayal of horror author Shirley Jackson. Director Josephine Decker subverts the usual biopic clichés, as The Lottery writer and her professor husband (Michael Stuhlbarg) play “get the guests” games out of Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf with the young couple (Logan Lerman, […]
Filmmaker Andrew Patterson’s sci-fi debut about an alien invasion is set in a small town in 1950s New Mexico, where the fate of the world comes down to a teenage radio DJ (Jake Horowitz) and a switchboard operator (Sierra McCormick). The fun comes in watching Patterson make his low-budget indie perform high-wire miracles. (Amazon Prime)
The summer season kicks off with a screwball farce starring Issa Rae and Kumail Nanjiani as a New Orleans couple who decide to break up. But first, they have to run an all-night race against frat boys, blackmailers, orgiasts, and a crooked cop who wants them dead. The Big Sick director Michael Showalter is calling […]