By Chip Chandler — Digital Content Producer
After a disappointing summer, the prestige film season kicks off this month. Here's what to put on your radar.
As I wrote when counting down the summer's most anticipated films, I don't run the theaters or the studios, so I can't guarantee that the release dates are 100 percent accurate, nor that all of the movies will be booked to screen here. But the window between the release of a film theatrically and its release for home viewing is shrinking all the time; chances are, you'll have the chance to see most of these films by the end of the year, particularly the early fall releases.
And if you're an Amarillo movie buff, you already know that you need to watch carefully to see when films will open here. Many small films only play for a week, maybe two, so it's best to hustle. Keep track of what's opening with my weekly Movie Watch column on Thursdays. And look out for a winter film roundup around Thanksgiving with Star Wars: The Last Jedi and more.
September
It
The new adaptation of Stephen King's love letter to coulrophobics is already getting screamingly good reviews. (Sept. 8)
Home Again
Reese Witherspoon stars as a divorced mother who enters into an unusual relationship with a trio of young men. No, not that way (mostly). It's from writer-director Hallie Meyers-Shyer, whose mother Nancy Meyers knows a thing or two about romantic comedies. (Sept. 8)
mother!
Filmmaker Darren Aronofsky returns to thriller territory with this tale of a couple (Jennifer Lawrence and Javier Bardem) who find their peaceful life upturned by the arrival of another pair (Michelle Pfeiffer and Ed Harris). (Sept. 15)
Battle of the Sexes
The ultimate grudge match of the genders is recounted in this historical comedy/drama that relives the famed tennis match between Billie Jean King (Emma Stone) and Bobby Riggs (Steve Carell). (Sept. 22 in limited release)
Kingsman: The Golden Circle
The hit to the semi-surprise hit 2014 action flick finds the surviving British agents working with American counterparts to defeat an unlikely druglord (Julianne Moore). (Sept. 22)
Stronger
Jake Gyllenhaal stars as Jeff Bauman, who lost both legs in the bombing of the 2013 Boston Marathon and became a symbol of hope. Tatiana Maslany (Orphan Black) co-stars. (Sept. 22)
Victoria and Abdul
Judi Dench once again dons the crown to play Queen Victoria (after her turn in 1997's Mrs. Brown) in this true story of her majesty's surprising friendship with a young Indian clerk (Ali Fazal). (Sept. 22 in limited release)
Plus: American Assassin (Sept. 15), Brad's Status (Sept. 15 in limited release), Rebel in the Rye (Sept. 15 in limited release), Friend Request (Sept. 22), The Lego Ninjago Movie (Sept. 22), Woodshock (Sept. 22 in limted release), American Made (Sept. 29), Flatliners (Sept. 29), Mark Felt: The Man Who Brought Down the White House (Sept. 29 in limited release)
Special engagements: Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan 35th anniversary (Sept. 10 and 13), Lupin the 3rd: The Castle of Cagliostro (Sept. 14 and 10), The Heart of Man (Sept. 14), E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial (Sept. 17 and 20), Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind (Sept. 24 and 25), Wall Street (Sept. 24 and 27), Jeepers Creepers 3 (Sept. 26), Steve McQueen: American Idol (Sept. 28)
October
Blade Runner 2049
A young blade runner (Ryan Gosling) searches out predecessor Rick Deckard (Harrison Ford) after unearthing a major secret. Denis Villeneuve (Arrival) directs. (Oct. 6)
The Florida Project
Director Sean Baker's 2015 film Tangerine, which showed a day in the life of a couple of transgender women in L.A., was an absolute gem. This follow-up — which looks at life in a rundown hotel in the shadow of Disney World — looks just as engaging. Willem Dafoe stars with a cast of mostly non-actors. (Oct. 6 in limited release)
Marshall
Chadwick Boseman (the soon-to-be Black Panther) stars as a real-life superhero: future Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall early in his career. (Oct. 13)
The Meyerowitz Stories (New and Selected)
Writer-director Noah Baumbach struck gold at the Cannes Film Festival with this comedy-drama about a dysfunctional family (including father Dustin Hoffman, stepmother Emma Thompson and half-brothers Ben STiller and Adam Sandler. (Oct. 13 on Netflix and limited theatrical release)
Wonderstruck
A young boy in the 1970s and a young deaf girl in 1920s New York have a mysterious connection in this bifurcated new film by director Todd Haynes, based on a children's book by Brian Selznick (Hugo). Julianne Moore, Michelle Williams, Oakes Fegley (Pete's Dragon) and newcomer Millicent Simmonds star. (Oct. 20 in limited release)
The Killing of a Sacred Deer
Yorgos Lanthimos' last film, the beguilingly complicated The Lobster, was nominated for an Oscar for original screenplay. In his followup, Lanthimos works again with Colin Farrell, who stars as a heart surgeon who's unhappily wed to Nicole Kidman and takes an odd youth (Barry Keoghan, Dunkirk) under his wing. Creepiness ensues. (Oct. 27 in limited release)
Professor Marston and the Wonder Women
William Moulton Marston (Luke Evans) was a man decidedly ahead of his time. In addition to creating Wonder Woman in the 1940s, he lived in a polyamorous relationship with his wife (Rebecca Hall) and their girlfriend (Bella Heathcote). (Oct. 27 in limited release)
The Square
This year's Palme d'Or winner at Cannes is a Swedish film starring Elisabeth Moss (The Handmaid's Tale) and Dominic West (The Affair) about an art exhibition that gets out of hand. (Oct. 27 in limited release)
Plus: My Little Pony: The Movie (Oct. 6), The Foreigner (Oct. 13), Goodbye Christopher Robin (Oct. 13 in limited release), The Snowman (Oct. 13), Geostorm (Oct. 20), The Mountain Between Us (Oct. 20), Only the Brave (Oct. 20), Same Kind of Different As Me (Oct. 20), Tyler Perry's Boo 2! A Madea Halloween (Oct. 20), Jigsaw (Oct. 27), Novitiate (Oct. 27 in limited release), Suburbicon (Oct. 27), Thank You for Your Service (Oct. 27)
Special engagements: The Tingler (Oct. 1 and 4), Mully (Oct. 3-5), Norma (The Met: Live in HD) (Oct. 7), Monty Python's Life of Brian (Oct. 8 and 11), Die Zauberflote (The Met: Live in HD) (Oct. 14), The Princess Bride 35th anniversary screening (Oct. 15 and 18), Nightmare on Elm Street (Oct. 22 and 25), RiffTrax: Night of the Living Dead (Oct. 25), Spirited Away (Oct. 29 and 30)
November
Thor: Ragnarok
Director Taika Waititi adds gonzo energy to the third film about the Avenger and Norwegian god of thunder — and star power, too. Cate Blanchett signs on as Hela, the Goddess of Death, with Mark Ruffalo as Hulk, Tessa Thompson as Valkyrie and a returning Tom Hiddleston as Loki. (Nov. 3)
Lady Bird
Actress Greta Gerwig makes her directorial debut in this coming-of-age drama about a young woman (Saoirse Ronan) dealing with her mother (Laurie Metcalf) and other misadventures. Gerwig also wrote the film, which is not a biopic of Lady Bird Johnson. (Nov. 10 in limited release)
Murder on the Orient Express
An awesomely star-packed cast (Kenneth Branagh, Penelope Cruz, Judi Dench, Michelle Pfeiffer, Daisy Ridley and more) star in a new adaptation (from director Branagh) of the popular Agatha Christie mystery. (Nov. 10)
Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri
An enraged mother (Frances McDormand) uses billboards to shame the local sheriff's office (headed by Woody Harrelson) into solving the death of her daughter. Martin McDonagh writes and directs. (Nov. 10 in limited release) (Click here for the red-band, adults-only trailer)
Justice League
My hopes for this assemblage of DC's big heroes are much higher than they were before the stunningly successful release of Wonder Woman — and even higher since Joss Whedon signed on to finish the film after director Zac Snyder stepped away for family reasons. (Nov. 17)
Last Flag Flying
A Navy vet (Steve Carell) reunites his Vietnam War buddies (Bryan Cranston and Laurence Fishburne) to bury his son, a Marine killed in the Iraq war, in the latest from writer-director Richard Linklater. (Nov. 17 in limited release)
Mudbound
Two families — one white, one black — face hardship in the Mississippi Delta before and after World War II in this adaptation of an acclaimed novel by Hillary Jordan. (Nov. 17 on Netflix and limited theatrical release)
Molly's Game
Jessica Chastain stars in this real-life story about a former Olympic hopeful who began running an exclusive, high-stakes poker game in Los Angeles. Aaron Sorkin writes and directs. (Nov. 22)
Coco
Pixar's latest explores the Mexican holida Dia de los Muertos as a living boy (voiced by Anthony Gonzalez) is trapped in the afterlife and discovers family secrets. (Nov. 22)
Call Me By Your Name
Armie Hammer and Timothee Chalamet star in this sensual story of a young man who falls in love with an older student of his father in northern Italy. (Nov. 24 in limited release)
Plus: A Bad Moms Christmas (Nov. 3), LBJ (Nov. 3 in limited release), The Man Who Invented Christmas (Nov. 3 in limited release), Daddy's Home 2 (Nov. 10), Lady Bird (Nov. 10 in limited release), Roman J. Israel, Esq. (Nov. 10 in limited release), The Star (Nov. 10), Wonder (Nov. 17), Darkest Hour (Nov. 22 in limited release), Death Wish (Nov. 22) and Villa Capri (Nov. 22)
Special engagements: Kirk Cameron: Revive Us 2 (Nov. 1), I'll Push You (Nov. 2), Casablanca 75th anniversary screening (Nov. 12 and 15), The Exterminating Angel (The Met: Live in HD) (Nov. 18), Howl's Moving Castle (Nov. 26 and 27)
Chip Chandler is a digital content producer for Panhandle PBS. He can be contacted at Chip.Chandler@actx.edu, at @chipchandler1 on Twitter and on Facebook.
