As we head into popcorn movie season, there’s reason for moviegoers to hope this summer.
Yes, there will be retreads, reboots and sequels. Sometimes they’ll be inexplicable, that is until you check the predecessor’s global box-office numbers. (“Smurfs 2?!”) But many promise deeper theater pleasures, because the talent behind them is nimble.
J.J. Abrams leads the pack in that regard but the director of the “Star Trek” sequel is not alone. Director Christopher Nolan, the guy who made Batman relevant, helps rethink Superman. There’s even Guillermo Del Toro, wise to the more tender lures of the popular, at the helm of “Pacific Rim.”
Who says you can’t find kernels of truth in that big ol’ tub of popcorn?
MAY
Shane Black may be a new director to this franchise, but he’s no stranger to Robert Downey Jr. He wrote and directed “Kiss Kiss Bang Bang.” Better still, the scribe of the original “Lethal Weapon” is an old hand at the crackling banter delivered by billionaire Tony Stark. This installment’s baddie: Ben Kingsley as The Mandarin. (May 3)
Baz Luhrmann reteams with “Romeo + Juliet” star Leonardo DiCaprio for this 3-D-shot, visually opulent (and pricey) take on F. Scott Fitzgerald’s tale of class, excess and the American character. (May 10)
Gifted rebooter J.J. Abrams’ was a warp-speed pleasure. Can he keep James T. Kirk (Chris Pine) and his Enterprising crew boldly going? Benedict Cumberbatch steps in as the nemesis. (May 17)
INDIE ALERT: This recounting of Thor Heyerdahl’s daring 1947 journey by raft from Peru to Polynesia is a smart ticket. Note: Summer’s version of Norway’s best foreign-language Oscar entrant is in English. (May 17)
We’d lift a glass and say “bottoms up” to the finale of this hit (and miss) comedy juggernaut. Only, given how raunchy Todd Phillips’ franchise has been, we’d fear we’d be tempting more naughtiness. This time, Alan (Zach Galifianakis) struggles with his father’s death and the Wolfpack (Bradley Cooper and Ed Helm) tangles with mobster Mr. Chow (Ken Jeong). (May 24)
Will Smith is grooming son Jaden for big things — off and onscreen. When the pair land on Earth a thousand years after humans fled, they must embrace an ageless value to survive: trust. (May 31)
INDIE ALERT: Actress-director Sarah Polley (“Take This Waltz”) discovers family secrets in this unusually told, utterly personal documentary about fathers and a daughter. (May 31)
JUNE
Vince Vaughn and Owen Wilson play out-of-work Luddites who crash the Googleplex to vie for coveted intern spots. Here’s hoping Google’s vast campus gets a funnier close-up than Princeton’s did in Tina Fey’s “Admission.” (June 7)
The presence of Christopher Nolan (“Dark Knight” ) as producer and co-story creator bodes well for a serious return to a nearly invincible, understandably burdened superhero. Henry Cavill (“The Tudors”) dons the “S.” Castle Rock-native Amy Adams promises a smart, feisty Lois Lane. (June 14)
INDIE ALERT: Sofia Coppola has made privileged ennui her domain, whether she finds it in Tokyo, Versailles or L.A’s famous Chateau Marmont. Based on actual events, her latest stars the blossoming Emma Watson as one of a gang of L.A. teens who begin burglarizing celebrity homes. (June 21)
When did two of Pixar’s finest — James “Sulley” Sullivan and Michael “Mike” Wazowski — become such fast friends? During college, of course, this prequel argues. Besides John Goodman’s and Billy Crystal’s winning repartee, the romp features a dame as a dean: Helen Mirren. (June 21)
Is any star as loyal to a project as Brad Pitt? For years he stuck with “Moneyball.” Now, six years in the making comes this cataclysmic thriller with Pitt as a U.N. worker tracking the roots of an infection that is killing thousands then reanimating them as unnervingly fleet swarms of the undead. (June 21)
Seemingly perfect comedic pairings don’t always lead to perfect fare. So we’re cautious. Sandra Bullock does well as foil or goofball. Melissa McCarthy is one funny lady but filmmakers don’t always know what to do with her. Paul Feig should: He directed her in “Bridesmaids.” (June 28)
INDIE ALERT: Director Zal Batmanglij and co-writer-star Brit Marling make unnerving movies together. Take last year’s cult drama Now they give us this uncomfortable tale about a corporate security specialist who goes undercover to ferret out “eco-terrorists.” (June)
Richard Linklater reunites us for a third time with his indelible couple American Jesse (Ethan Hawke) and Frenchwoman Celine (Julie Delpy) in (June)
JULY
It’s all about Tonto, isn’t it? Not just because much-adored star Johnny Depp portrays the famed Indian scout to Armie Hammer’s masked man in this weird Disney undertaking. There’s a prickly sense that this Western comedy, featuring a white man in red face, could go south even under the energetic guidance of director Gore Verbinski. Closer to home: Creede, where the film shot for three weeks, gets a cameo. (July 3)
There’s hope in the fact that this F/X behemoth — robots versus sea monsters — is directed by , maker of the fantastic “Hell Boy” and the fabulist “Pan’s Labyrinth.” (July 12)
Sheriff Roy Pulsifer (Jeff Bridges) partners with newly dead detective Nick Walker (Ryan Reynolds) as ghostly officers who serve we the living, protecting us from supernatural baddies. (July 19)
“Girl Most Likely.” Kristen Wiig plays a playwright who is forced out of New York, back across the Hudson River to Jersey where her mom (Annette Bening), her bro and other sundry oddballs await. (July 19)
INDIE ALERT:“Crystal Fairy.” Gaby Hoffman plays a free spirit in this comedy from Chile, featuring traveling through the country. For his cross-cultural smarts, Sebastián Silva’s film was awarded the Grand Jury prize for directing at Sundance. (July 26)
AUGUST
Given the stars, this could be the perfect Mars/Venus date flick. Denzel Washington and Mark Wahlberg team up, eventualy, in this action thriller about a DEA agent and a naval intelligence officer fooled into investigating each other. Gifted Icelandic filmmaker Baltasar Kormákur directs. (Aug. 2)
Matt Damon and Jodie Foster face off in a sci-fi adventure set in 2154, when Earth’s poorest and richest lie worlds apart. This fable of rampant inequality comes by way of South African Neill Blomkamp, maker of the another resonant sci-fi tale, “District 9.” (Aug. 9)
“The World’s End.” Despite its name, this comedy from Edgar Wright (“Shaun of the Dead” and “Hot Fuzz”) may be the only summer movie not obsessed with catacylsmic destruction. Instead it reunites Wright stars Simon Pegg and Nick Frost in an adventure in nostalgia as they pub crawl their way to a bar called, you guessed it, The World’s End. (Aug. 23)
INDIE ALERT: Taking sorrowful inspiration from a lethal police shooting on a train platform in Oakland in 2009, Ryan Coogler’s debut feature won both the jury and audience prizes at January’s Sundance film festival. “The Wire’s” Michael B. Jordan stars in this last-day-in-the-life-of drama. (August).
Lisa Kennedy: 303-954-1567, lkennedy@denverpost.com or twitter.com/bylisakennedy
Even more coming to a theater near you….
Just to prove there are as many films as there are summer days, here are more heroes and villains, indie docs, comedies and horror flicks.
MAY:
May 3: A man relocates to the U.S. from Pakistan and is radicalized post- 9/11 in Mira Nair’s “The about rare whiskeys and working-class blokes.
May 10: Set in Iowa, shows the lengths Dennis Quaid’s character will go to save the family farm. In Olivier Assayas takes on the volatile 1960s — in Paris. Scandalous? Kerry Washington headlines Tyler Perry Inc.’s latest,
May 17: Hot off the fest circuit comes starring Michael Shannon as hitman/family guy Richard Kuklinski.
May 24: Animation goes environmentally conscious with the action-comedy about a girl who magically joins a band of eco-fighters. Installment six of the franchise suggests if it ain’t broke don’t call a mechanic. Noah Baumbach gets another goofball turn from Greta Gerwig in Pierce Brosnan always brings his A-game to indie films; in he plays a bitter widower. Henry James gets an update in starring Julianne Moore and Steve Coogan as exes in a bitter custody battle.
JUNE:
June 7: Sundance hit finds three teens figuring out friendship, manhood and what’s for dinner in the wild. The spirit of Robin Hood lives in as FBI agents pursue four masterful illusionists. finds a family faced with an annual rite of murderous mayhem.
June 14: In the French animated fable “The Painting” subjects of an unfinished artwork decide to complete the darn thing themselves. “No nukes is good news, or is it?” asks the documentary
June 21: Joss Whedon takes a break from directing Marvel’s “The Avengers” to revamp the Bard’s marvelous Cannes winner for best first feature, “Augustine” recounts the relationship of a kitchen maid and her doctor.
June 28: Orthodox Jewish Israeli filmmaker Rama Burshtein scored at festivals with her revealing debut about a young Hasidic woman who must chose between duty and desire. Terrance Stamp! Vanessa Redgrave! in a Brit import about a codger who joins his deceased wife’s choir.
June 28: Denver’s Women + Film Voices Film Fest closer returns for deeper reflection. Roland Emmerich takes aim at the nation’s Capitol yet again with starring Channing Tatum and Jamie Foxx.
JULY:
July 3: Everyone’s favorite adoptive dad and quasi-villain Gru return in “ In the comic takes his show on the road, no DUI pun intended. Fox opens a 3-D version of its iconic blow-everything-up flick “Independence Day.”
July 5: Colorado native AnnaSophia Robb joins Steve Carell and Toni Collette in the coming-of-age dramedy Austrian documentary about bee colonies arrives with lots of festival buzz.
July 12: Proving that adults named Adam Sandler never learn, here comes
July 17: The phrase “moving at a snail’s pace” takes on fresh meaning in “Turbo,” an animated story about a snail with a need for speed.
July 19: Special AARPs, er Ops, agent Frank Moses and company return to fight another good fight in action-comedy Paranormal investigators Vera Farmiga and Patrick Wilson hunt evil spirits in “The Conjuring.” Indie-maverick Andrew Bujalski calls set in the 1980s, “an existential comedy about the oddball geniuses.” Checkmate. And we’re pretty excited about Pedro Almodóvar’s aviation spoof,
July 26: In the clawed guy travels to Japan. Fortunately he’s accompanied by director James Mangold (“Walk the Line” )
July 31: Why are Papa, Smurfette and the gang back for ? Because when it comes to global box office, blue is evidently the new green. Also opening in July: a thriller from Brian DePalma, with Rachel McAdams and Noomi Rapace.
AUGUST:
Aug. 2: proves her “Descendants” performance was no fluke when she appears as a young lover alongside equally lauded co-star Miles Teller in Sundance charmer “The Spectacular Now.” It’s Greece versus Persia on the high seas in the graphic novel adaptation
Aug. 7: Poseidon’s son continues his date with destiny in
Aug. 9: The folks who revved “Cars” hit the runway with A small-time pot dealer is forced into a big-time drug run in pungent comedy “We’re the Millers” with Jason Sudeikis and Jennifer Aniston.
Aug. 16: Hit Girl and Kick-Ass return to take on villains and, worse, mean girls in There’s nothing quite like a Woody Allen ensemble; the one for the under-wraps “Blue Jasmine” includes Alec Baldwin, Cate Blanchett and Andrew Dice Clay. Aubrey Plaza has plenty of summer antics before college in writer-director Maggie Carey’s “The To Do List.”
Aug. 23: The title of horror flick sounds aptly chilling. Contemporary heroine meets ancient foes in fantasy adventure
Aug. 28: Exes team up, sort of, as lawyers in thriller “Closed Circuit.”
Aug. 30: In “Getaway,” a race-car driver (Ethan Hawke) must save his wife with help from a hacker (Selena Gomez.) First Bieber, then Perry: Now comes this summer’s 3D concert ticket,
Also slated for August: Lake Bell’s directorial debut, “In a World,” won a her a writing award at Sundance. Twisting drama finds mom (Penelope Cruz) and son reckoning with loss in Sarajevo. is a flavorful comedy based on the story of Danièle Delpeuch, the cook hired by then president François Mitterrand to be his private chef.
Lisa Kennedy: 303-954-1567, lkennedy@denverpost.com or twitter.com/bylisakennedy
