20 to see in 2015
As usual, I’ve still yet to see some of my picks from last year (A Most Wanted Man, Maps to the Stars, Inherent
Vice, Big Eyes) while yet others
were held over and crop up below, or beneath below (Jupiter
Ascending, Knight of Cups, Mortdecai, Our Kind of Traitor). Then there were 2014's big fizzlers (Transcendence, The Monuments Men). I expect there'll be a couple of stinkers in the following countdown. Nevertheless, these are the movies I’m most excited to see,
most intrigued by, or just plain curious to discover whether an unmitigated car crash may have occurred.
20. Mortdecai
(23 January)
A maybe last year, I’ll admit that, as much as I rate David
Koepp as a director and Johnny Depp doing silly voices (yes, I’m his remaining
fan), the trailers haven’t sold me on this slapstick farce concerning art
dealer Charlie Mortdecai. The Kyril Bonfiglioli novels aren’t nearly as good as
the PG Wodehouse comparisons suggest, so it may be just as well that they’re
merely a jumping off point.
19. Child 44
(17 April)
Anything featuring Tom Hardy is de facto worth seeking out,
even if he ends up being the only good thing there. This thriller, adapted from
Tom Rob Smith’s 2008 novel by Richard Price (Sea of Love, Clockers, Ransom) is based on the case of the Rostov
Ripper, who committed 52 murders in part thanks to a Soviet system unwilling to
admit one in their midst had a propensity for such crimes. This case previously
formed the basis for HBO’s Citizen X
with Donald Sutherland.
As with most films today, Ridley Scott was attached at one
point, but it was passed to Daniel Espinosa, director of the serviceable Safe House. Providing more than
substantial support are Noomi Rapace, Gary Oldman, Joel Kinnaman, Jason Clarke,
Charles Dance, Vincent Cassel, Paddy Considine and Tara Fitzgerald.
18. Black Mass
(18 September US)
There is reasonable cause to be dubious about this
on-again-off-again biopic of Boston crime lord Whitey Bulger. The long-since
tepid Barry Levinson was attached for a time, vacating the picture in favour of
Scott Cooper, who did a complete rewrite. Cooper is big on atmosphere, but both
his previous pictures (Crazy Heart, Out of the Furnace) had their content issues.
Depp wrangled over his fee, before presumably getting what
he wanted. The last time he went gangster (Public
Enemies) the box office and reviews weren’t so stellar (but then, there’s Donnie Brasco), and there’s a general
feeling that if he’s going natural no one much wants to see him. It remains to
be seen if his bald pate here is closer to his fake nose in Blow or the chrome dome triumph of Fear and Loathing.
The greater spotted Benedict Cumberbatch plays Whitey’s
senator brother, and there is no doubting the cast is filled out commendably;
Peter Sarsgaard, Corey Stoll (hopefully naturally bald), Kevin Bacon, Julianne
Nicholson, Joel Edgerton and Jesse Plemons.
17. Mission: Impossible 5
(26 December UK/25 December US)
Can 5 top Ghost Protocol? I’ve had a good time
with this series, the sophomore outing aside, and Christopher McQuarrie proved
himself as a clean, precise action director with Jack Reacher. I’m still a bit cautious about his aptitude for the scale involved
here, however, and I’m expecting reliability rather than necessarily great
things.
Drew Pearce (Iron Man Three) is credited with the screenplay but I’d be surprised if
McQuarrie didn’t perform a polish and see to onset revisions. Sean Harris can be relied upon to bring the
uber-nasty, even if he’s a bit of an obvious choice (his bank manager and agent
will be ever-so grateful). Most of the rest are returnees; Paula
Patton, Jeremy Renner (dreams of leading man-dom forever tarnished), Simon Pegg,
Ving Rhames (well, that’s good at least; there can never be enough Ving Rhames).
With an additional sprinkling of Alec Baldwin. A shame there’s still no Maggie Q back.
16. Blood Father
Has Mel been out in the wilderness for long enough? Has he
served his time? Can he ever serve his time? He’s on familiar ground in this
crime flick (an ex-con saving his daughter from some fiendish drug dealers),
and working with Jean-Francois Richet (Mesrine, the so-so Assault on Precinct 13 remake). Mel's beard alone makes Blood Father worth a look, if his mere
fact of getting work doesn’t offend your sensibilities.
15. The Sea of Trees
It’s hard to forsee if this will just sort of sit there pontificating
earnestly, without reaching any level of profundity, or cross over and fulfil
the promise of its premise. Gus Van Sant hasn’t exactly set the world on fire
lately, with worthy but unremarkable Milk
and most recently the unremarkable but worthy Promised Land. Matthew McConaughey, so hot right now, journeys to
Mount Fuji’s “Suicide Forest” (so known for obvious reasons) with the intention
of offing himself. There, he meets Ken Watanbe, present for the self same
purpose (topping himself, not McConaughey) and the two men set forth on a
process of self-discovery. Naomi Watts also stars.
14. High-Rise
(Autumn 2015)
I haven’t been quite as sold on Ben Wheatley’s work thus far
as everybody else, it seems, but there’s no denying he has vision aplenty (not
enough to overcome terrible scripts during his Doctor Who stint, unfortunately).
Tom Hiddleston and Jeremy Irons star in this adaption of JG
Ballard’s novel of societal breakdown amid the titular edifice. Nicolas Roeg
was going to direct it at one point during the 1970s (someone should interview
him about his great maybes, including Flash
Gordon), and more recently Vincenzo Natali attempted to get it off the
ground.
13. Knight of Cups
Terrence Malick invokes the tarot with his title, and dives
into the waters of Christian Bale awakening from a bout of Hollywood hedonism.
The trailer hasn’t been especially illuminating, other that showing Christian
partying it up and standing on a beach, but that’s par for the course with
Malick. This was 17th in last year’s list, but didn’t materialise.
I’m still optimistic it will be more rewarding than To the Wonder. If you were led to wonder, the post title comes from this movie.
12. The Hateful Eight
(13 November US)
Quentin Tarantino assembles a bunch of indescribable bastards
as he scratches his latest western itch. I’ve liked all Tarantino’s movies, Death Proof aside, but I’m no acolyte.
For me, none of his pictures have subsequently attained the classic status of Pulp Fiction. Still, I enjoyed the historical
cheekiness of Inglourious Basterds,
although Django Unchained suffered
from its creator’s self-indulgence (too long, making it’s lead character less
interesting than the support).
11. Kingsman: The Secret Service
(25 January UK/13 February US)
Matthew Vaughn’s take on British spy craft, with a hat
tipped in particular to Bond and The Avengers (Patrick Macnee, that is).
So Colin Firth is a new version of a very English spy, the upper crust kick-ass
mentoring a young chav (Taron Egerton) in a bone-crunching riff on Pygmalion. Reportedly it doesn’t bear
much resemblance to Mark Miller’s comic book, which is probably a good thing.
Whether this was worth dropping Days of
Future Past for remains to be seen (First
Class is easily the best X- movie),
but there is no argument that the title stinks.
10. Blackhat
(20 February UK/16 January US)
Michael Mann’s movie doesn’t have a great deal of buzz
(strange that Universal hasn’t sought to capitalise on Sony’s misfortune), cyber-crime
being the theme of the moment. The trailer makes much of its dangers. It could
lead to the next Pearl Harbour! The next nuclear meltdown! And yet, it’s all
just a game to the bad guy. These movie villains.
This is Mann’s first film in six years, and it’s a decade
since he last had a film out that was generally well regarded. I’m partial to
Mann (even the Miami Vice movie), but
the trailer hasn’t been especially convincing (maximum clichés) and the film
appears to have been abandoned in a mid-January slot. The worry might be; this
is an old guy trying to write the current world of computers (the former title Cyber certainly had a mid-‘90s cheese
factor), drafting in an unsuitable star (Chris Hemsworth as a computer genius?)
but countering that is a director who pays meticulous attention to detail.
9. A Hologram for the King
(November)
Tom Tykwer is an always-interesting director. His English
language pictures (The International,
Perfume: The Story of a Murderer, Cloud Atlas) have been arresting and
different, even if financial success has eluded them. Tom Hanks is the lead
here, but I’m as doubt this adaptation of Dave Eggers’ satire will reach a
broader audience (shades of Charlie
Wilson’s War?) Hanks plays a broke businessman attempting to sell an IT
contract to a member of Saudi Arabian royal family.
8. The Martian
(27 November UK/25 November US)
Ridley does hard science (so poles apart from Chariots of the Prometheans, then), stranding
poor Matt Damon on Mars (Matt’s the title character, which may mislead and
cause indignation from those expecting aliens). Scott is all over the map,
mainly because his scripts tend to be all over the map. Drew Goddard (Cloverfield, The Cabin in the Woods) penned the adaptation of Andy Weir’s novel,
which is promising at least. If nothing else, science fiction brings out the
best in Scott as a visual stylist.
7. The Revenant
(16 January 2016 UK/25 December US)
DiCaprio in a western revenge flick directed by Alejandro
González
Iñárritu,
with Tom Hardy as an antagonist. This is another one that has seen a number of
personnel changes in its path to production (John Hillcoat with Christian Bale,
Park Chan-wook with Sam Jackson). Hugh Glass, the real life trapper and
frontiersman Di Caprio portrays, has also been played by Richard Harris (on one
of those occasions during the 1970s when he wasn’t being a horse). DiCaprio’s
been making very strong choices of late, and has crucially grown into the adult
roles he struggled with for a while (the failures of J. Edgar can’t be laid at his door). If there’s a something to be
wary of, it’s the director’s tendency to self-important conflation.
6. Silence
Martin Scorsese’s long-in-development adaption of Shusaku
Endo’s novel Chinmoku. There was even
a lawsuit over the delays in bringing it before cameras. Previously adapted in
1971, the plot concerns two Jesuit priests seeking out their mentor in
seventeenth century Japan, where Christians are undergoing persecution. An
examination of faith and suffering (Neeson’s character has committed apostasy,
and similar doubts face his protégés), Silence
promises to be as personal and compelling as Scorsese’s other pictures influenced
by his spiritual quest and questioning (Last
Temptation of Christ, Kundun).
The chances are it won’t be hugely commercial, but it is
likely to provoke many column inches in discussion of its themes. Originally
(back in 2009) to have starred Daniel Day Lewis and Benicio Del Toro, Silence now features Liam Neeson, Andrew
Garfield and Adam Driver.
5. Tomorrowland
(22 May)
Brad Bird and Damon Lindelof team for a utopian (or is it?)
sci-fi puzzle based on the Disney theme park ride. In which a teenage girl
escapes a society in a state of upheaval and arrives in the shiny world of the
title, where anything is possible. Plenty of interest in just what this is all about has been sparked
(not least the rather desperate attempts to paint the movie as an objectivist
tract). It looks like Lindelof through and through, however; a quasi-mystical/mythological
approach to science, the teasing of historical artefacts (a big thing in Lost, here we had the “1952 box”) and no
doubt some “BIG” questions will be asked regarding what it’s all about, anyway.
George Clooney provides the star power, although Britt
Robertson is the young lead. Bird is coming off the back of the success of Ghost Protocol (he spurned Star Wars for this), and shares the
screenplay credit with Lindelof (so the latter can’t take all the blame if this
misfires). Bird also performed script duties on The Iron Giant, The
Incredibles and Ratatouille.
Lindelof’s big screen work hasn’t been its best when in tandem with Alex
Kurtzman and Robert Orci (Star Trek into
Darkness, Cowboys and Aliens) or
when scribbling at the behest of others (Prometheus)
so maybe with this he’ll claw back some respect? Probably not, as his naysayers
will credit Bird if Tomorrowland
works.
As for Tomorrowland’s
status as original science fiction, we can but hope it is closer in quality to Edge of Tomorrow (or Live Die Repeat/All You Need is Kill) than the likes of Elysium and Pacific Rim.
4. St James’s Place
(untitled Spielberg Cold War thriller)
(9 October UK/16 October US)
Not likely to be the final title; it isn’t very dramatic,
and that apostrophe is likely to cause no end of headaches. Based on the 1960
U-2 incident, hopefully the ‘berg will be balancing authenticity with the need
to include the requisite Cold War suspense and thrills. It’s been a while since
we’ve seen the old Spielberg magic, unimpaired by self-importance and presumed respectability. Maybe he hasn’t got it any more, but his Tintin
movie proved he could make a fun
movie (Kingdom of the Crystal Skull was
apparently intent on convincing otherwise).
Hanks is the lawyer (James B Donovan) asked by the CIA to
help out securing the release of their pilot, whose plane has been downed over
Soviet airspace. With a script spruced up the Coen Brothers (they’ve been doing
a bit of high profile doctoring lately) this ought to be a very classy affair.
It’s certainly the most intriguing Spielberg project in a decade. I'm rarely have much anticipation for anything he announces, but this is an exception.
3. Avengers: Age of Ultron
(24 April UK/1 May US)
There are no strings on me. Just Spader’s voicing of Ultron
in the trailer was sufficient testament that this is going to live up to the
original. The mass destruction is a given, but my favourite edit in there is
the ballet pose intercut with the crunchy musical action beats. Joss Whedon
successfully pulled together the strings of the Marvel franchises with the
first Avengers outing, and he looks
to be having more fun here. If anyone can handle more main characters than any
self-respecting 2 hour-ish movie should have, it’s Whedon.
I don’t count myself as a Marvel fanboy, and my knowledge of
the intricacies of characters and the various iterations thereof is peripheral
at best. As such, I’m not going to get too excited when I hear such-and-such is
going to be the big bad, or that a particular story leads to a main character’s
death (as with one of the upcoming pictures). But this kind of thing does ring bells; much of it is the same
kind of juggling Whedon was engaging with on his TV series.
The area the Marvel movies have struggled with, not
uncommonly to most blockbusters, is the third act. These tend to devolve into
pixelated spectacle shorn of investment (both Iron Man Three and Avengers
avoided this to an extent). Guardians of
the Galaxy, despite its acclaim as completely fresh, was just the latest of
these (even given the Groot-ing), so I’m doubtful about the advocates of Gunn or
the Russo Brothers coming on board for Avengers
3, I & II. There’s a formula
to be applied, and very few can succeed at it without the joins showing. I can
quite see why Whedon would want to
bail; he has other ideas cooking that actually come from his own noggin rather
than remixing those of others, but I suspect the Marvel universe won’t truly
value him until he’s gone.
2. Star Wars: The Force Awakens
(18 December)
The Star Wars
teaser trailer didn’t have quite the same “wow” factor as the number one on my
list, but then, it’s a very different beast; merely a flavour, a few glimpses
of iconic forms and themes. Reportedly it was a struggle to get JJ to even
surrender that much. It did an important job, however, as it sold the return to
a physical galaxy far, far away, albeit one with extravagant lens flares.
While I’m dubious that JJ Abrams can imbue The Force Awakens with an elusive sense
of substance, the deceptively difficult balance between sincerity and sheer mythical
portentousness that permeates the original trilogy, much of that would require
putting the genie back in the bottle. If that is the case, his Mystery Box approach may be the next best thing.
If you can manufacture a facsimile of the originals’ appeal, audiences might
not realise the essence is absent until afterwards. Presumably he also has
Kasdan there to reassure him that what he’s doing is what Star Wars is really all about. If this ends up rather fanfic-looking,
that may be an inevitable consequence of the copious fanfic (and formerly-canon
fic) of the past three decades.
The danger is, all we get is a continuing Sith-ness and young
rebel stand-ins (the next gen) without anywhere new or interesting to go. The
Empire has to be resculpted, and a new rogue, hero, princess etc. earmarked.
Lucas may have messed up the prequels, and committed a cardinal error by having
them informed by the originals’ characters at every turn, but in terms of plot
he did at least have something distinctive and defined. The real challenge for
Abrams and his successors is not getting the audience to bite, it’s coming up
with a different story.
1. Mad Max: Fury Road
(15 May)
George Miller’s return to the genre that made his name,
after dabbling in family movies to variable effect, most certainly gave us the
trailer of 2014. Will Fury Road also be
the movie of 2015? Advance word is positive, and, by handing Tom Hardy the
mantle of Max from the disgraced (and a bit too old, by Miller’s reckoning)
Mel, he’s given the actor the role that could make him a bona fide star.
Yes, this is cleaner, more stylised and much flashier, but it also looks like the natural sequel to Mad Max 2, the one we’ll have waited
nearly thirty five years fro. And there may be CGI involved (the sandstorm,
obviously), but we’re promised fully physical stunts. Accompanying the emphasis
on spectacle is a pared down, energised, kinetic narrative; Fury Road is one long chase, with
minimal dialogue. And the existential crisis (crises?) is there announcing
itself too (everybody, not just Max,
is out of their mind).
After the false dawns (a Mel version in the early part of
the century went south) and the sense that Max unfairly faded away with Thunderdome, rather than going out in a
blaze of glory, I doubt that anyone much expected this to happen. That it has,
and has overcome doubts over a Mel-less Max (tantamount to someone else playing
Han Solo, Indiana Jones or The Man with No Name), makes Fury Road even more impressive. So many weak continuations or
reboots of ‘70s/’80s franchises have occurred since that generation grew up,
any anticipation is understandably plagued by doubts. If this lives up to the
footage, Miller will have an instant classic on his hands, In which case, let’s
hope he gets to make his sequel(s).
Nine more to note:
29. Jupiter Ascending
(6 February)
Ever since first glimpse of dogboy Channing Tatum, I’ve been
expecting this latest from the Wachowskis to be lousy. I think everyone is, but
I still have to witness it for myself.
28. Triple Nine
(11 September)
John Hillcoat heist movie with an interesting cast (Kate
Winslet, Norman Reedus, Chiwetek Ejiofor, and Aaron Paul desperately clinging
to some kind of Breaking Bad
afterlife), but as yet he hasn’t quite made good on the promise of The Proposition.
27. Carol
Todd Haynes adapts ‘50s-set Patricia Highsmith, with Cate
Blanchett. Seems like a perfect fit for the director, whose Far from Heaven might be his best film.
26. Anomalisa
Charlie Kaufman co-directs the latest mentalisms of his mind
with Duke Johnson. Jennifer Jason Leigh may be back in the spotlight this year
with this and The Hateful Eight. May arrive in 2016.
25. Our Kind of Traitor
One from last year’s list, a John Le Carré
adaptation with Ewan McGregor and concerning the defection of a Russian
oligarch.
24. Bone Tomahawk
Kurt Russell in his second western of the year, as a sheriff
rescuing good Christian folk from cannibals. Yes, it could be crap, but I have
a yen to see Kurt Russell battle cannibals. And the title is great.
23. Selfless
(31 July)
I always find myself wowed by Tarsem Singh’s visuals but
wishing he could better marry his narratives to them. This finds a dying
billionaire transferring his consciousness to a younger man’s body, but then
being given pause by the memories of former inhabitant. Like The Hand, then, but with box office draw
Ryan Reynolds. Also worth investigating for offbeat Reynolds movies no one will
see; The Voices.
22. Life
(25 September UK)
The latest from photographer turned filmmaker Anton
Corbijn’s, a based-on-fact piece about a photographer (Dennis Stock, played by Robert
Pattison) who photographed a filmmaker (well, film actor; James Dean played by Dane
De Haan).
21. Money Monster
These sounds right up the respective streets of bleeding
heart liberals George Clooney and Jodie Foster. Clooney is TV show tipster held
hostage on air by a man who loses everything on a bad tip, demanding Clooney
gets the stock up beyond a certain point, and ratings for the show surge
accordingly.
There’s potential for a Network-esque
satire, although whether it can be as canny and disturbing as last year’s Nightcrawler is debatable. Clooney has
had some success in this field but one always feels he’s too damn charming to
be out-and-out savage, and Foster’s directorial career has been patchy,
although I liked The Beaver. (This
hasn’t started filming yet, so its appearance is not a dead cert).