SO WHAT WILL WE BE WATCHING AT THE MOVIES?
Saturday, October 10, 2020 at 3:58PM
Every morning, the world’s moviegoers are waking to news that another major blockbuster has upped stumps and sulked to some far away release date or streaming platform fate. Mulan? Straight to tele. Dune? From December 2020 to October 2021. Pixar’s Soul? Again, tele. Spielberg’s West Side Story? December 2020 to December 2021. Mr Bond’s latest, No Time to Die? April 2020 to November 2020 to April 2021. Gerard Butler’s asteroid epic Greenland? (Ed: ok, we get it...)
Most cinemas are soldiering on (thanks a lot, Regal!), but desperate cinephiles can only take so many retro sessions of The Princess Bride or another pre-COVID Andre Rieu moshpit. So what new release movies will be given the unenviable task of drawing crowd-shy audiences out of their pandemic bunkers and back into multiplexes…?
MINAMATA (Director: Andrew Levitas; Writers: David K. Kessler, Stephen Deuters, Andrew Levitas and Jason Forman. Stars Johnny Depp, Hiroyuki Sanada, Jun Kunimura, Minami and Bill Nighy) Bumped from the first-quarter of 2020, this earnest, Oscar-worthy biopic of Life magazine photographer W. Eugene Smith and his role in exposing mercury poisoning in coastal Japan looks a serious return to form for Depp. Early reviews suggest it is an earnest but important work bound for award season glory, with Ryuichi Sakamoto’s score leading the charge. Early 2021.
FATMAN (Directors, Wrters: Eshom Nelms, Ian Nelms. Stars Mel Gibson, Walton Goggins and Marianne Jean-Baptiste.) The plot? Santa Claus must contend with a hitman sent from a disappointed child. High-concept, sure, but when St. Nick is played by that jolly ol’ screen presence Mel Gibson, and the hitman is should-be-in-everything character actor Walter Goggins, suddenly Fatman becomes that most tempting holiday treat - the anti-Christmas Christmas movie (think Bad Santa, The Ref...oh, ok, Die Hard). Mid-November 2020 in limited US release.
RAMS (Director: Jeremy Sims, Writer: Jules Duncan. Stars Sam Neill, Michael Caton, Miranda Richardson, Asher Keddie, Wayne Blair and Hayley McElhinney) An Aussie reworking of Grímur Hákonarson’s Icelandic arthouse hit of 2015, Jeremy Sims’ sheep station rural comedy centres on two feuding brothers (recast here as Sam Neill and Michael Caton) who better overcome their differences or lose everything. A battle-scarred Roadshow Films are suddenly betting the farm on a yarn using offcuts from past Aussie box-office charmers The Castle, The Dish and Last Cab to Darwin. Cute trailer. October 29 in Australia; other territories to follow.
FREE GUY (Director: Shawn Levy, Writers: Matt Liebermann and Zak Penn. Stars: Ryan Reynolds, Taika Waititi, Jodie Comer and Joe Keery) This looks more like the global blockbuster wannabe destined to drag cinemagoers out of the couch-groove and back to cinemas...right? Ryan Reynolds plays Joe Average, whose normal life in a crazy world is turned upside down when he learns he’s an NPC (non-playable character, apparently) in a vidgame simulation. So...Truman Show meets Deadpool meets The Matrix, I guess. It goes global from December 9 and 10.
NOMADLAND (Director, Writer: Chloe Zhao. Stars Frances McDormand) Based on one of those ‘life-changing bestsellers’, exciting auteur Chloe Zhao (independent ‘It Girl’ after 2018’s The Rider) helms Frances McDormand as Fern, a women from a economically desolate small town who decides to convert a van into a home and travel the great American hinterland seeking work. The film has cut a swathe through the 2020 festival circuit (or what’s left of it), finding favour with juries in Toronto, San Sebastien and Venice. The December 4 US release would usually be on the back of Oscar momentum, but it’s going to take some especially focussed marketing in 2020.
NEWS OF THE WORLD (Director: Paul Greengrass, Writer: Luke Davies. Stars Tom Hanks, Elizabeth Marvel, Ray McKinnon) Another Oscar-heavy line-up (Hanks, of course; United 93's Paul Greengrass, back from the wilderness; Lion scribe Davies) in a western (ew, tough sell) that looks very traditional, though certainly watchable. Could fall to the eye of Ridley Scott's go-to DOP Dariusz Wolski to drag people into cinemas. Hanks alone wasn't enough to keep the war epic Greyhound in Sony's vault; they offloaded it to Apple when COVID hit. Westerns have grand vistas to work with, which might be what it takes to lure TV people away from their big small-screens. December 25 in US; January 1 in UK; other territories later.
