As fall approaches, along with the welcomed change in weather the season will also usher in a new batch of films at movie theaters around the world. But for residents of Philadelphia and especially Delaware County, probably the most anticipated film this fall will be "Silver Linings Playbook" which opens this November.
Starring Bradley Cooper and Robert De Niro, the film was shot last year all around Delaware County and when the trailer hit local movie theaters this past summer, audiences were treated to familiar shots of Lansdowne Avenue and the Llanerch diner. In the film, Cooper plays a recently divorced man who moves back home with his "Philadelphia Eagles Obsessed" parents. Something tells me the movie will be sold-out on opening night in movie theaters across the region.
Of course you don't have to wait until November to see what movies this fall will bring. This coming weekend Clint Eastwood, fresh off his bewildering appearance at the RNC, will be seen in "Trouble With The Curve", directed by his longtime producing partner, Robert Lorenz. In fact, it's the first movie Clint hasn't directed himself in since 1993! In "Curve", Clint plays an aging and ailing baseball scout who takes his daughter (played by Amy Adams) along for one last recruiting trip. From the trailer, the film looks like it's going to be either an instant classic, or a clichéd mess.
The week of September 28th brings the first of two animated kids fare that share a spooky theme. “Hotel Transylvania” is a computer animated family friendly horror fest that looks a lot like 1967’s “Mad Monster Party”. Only here, Frankenstein, Dracula and their contemporaries are held up in a “monsters only” resort when Dracula’s teen-aged daughter disrupts the peace by dating an unwelcome human visitor. The film features the voices of Adam Sandler, Kevin James and Selena Gomez and looks to be fun for the whole family.
Then just one week later on October 5th, another animated fright fest aimed at kids will come in the form of “Frankenweenie”. Tim Burton has updated his live action short from 1984 with this puppet-animated full length feature which tells the story of a Frankenstein-like house pet resurrected from the dead, only to reek havoc on his peaceful neighborhood. The film features the voices of SCTV vets Marin Short and Catherine O’Hara, as well as horror legend, Christopher Lee.
Lee Daniels, director of “Precious” debuts his follow up film with the pulp thriller / exploitation film, “The Paperboy’ this October. The movie did well at Cannes earlier this year, and features an all-star cast including Nicole Kidman, Matthew McConaughey, John Cusack, Macy Gray and Zack Efron.
The film centers around a smalltime reporter who returns to his Florida hometown to investigate a death row inmate. The film which highlights a deviant subculture should have no trouble sparking controversy.
Also this October, Actor-director Ben Affleck’s film “Argo“, which offers up one of those strange-but-true stories that centers around the 1970s Iranian hostage crisis, is getting a lot of early Hollywood buzz. The film stars Affleck as a CIA specialist who concocts a bizarre plan to rescue six American’s held up in the Canadian embassy in Iran, by staging a mock science fiction film shoot in the Iranian desert. The cast in this dark comedy/drama includes Bryan Cranston, John Goodman, Kyle Chandler, and Oscar-winner Alan Arkin.
Another anticipated fall film with a middle east theme is “Zero Dark Thirty”. Kathryn Bigelow, Oscar-winning director of “The Hurt Locker” follows up that best picture winner with a detailed look into the raid that killed 9/11 mastermind, Osama bin Laden. The film is already sparking controversy over the White House and CIA’s apparent cooperation with the filmmakers. As well as the producer’s pledge to not release the film until after the November election. Whatever your political affiliation, the trailer promises to be an intense and action packed film much like the one that made Bigelow the first woman in history to win an Oscar for Best Director.
For presidential politics of an older kind, Steven Speilberg’s long awaited “Lincoln” lands in theaters on November 9th, just days after the election. Spielberg has been in production on this film for several years, first planned to star Liam Neeson in the title role, but in the end Daniel Day-Lewis will appear onscreen as our nation’s 16th President. The film is based in-part on historian, Doris Kerns Goodwin’s book, “Team of Rivals” and focuses on the last few months of Lincoln’s presidency. There’s Oscar buzz all around on this one, and with a stellar cast that also includes Tommy Lee Jones and Sally Field as Mary Todd Lincoln, how can Spielberg miss? But will movie goers be tired of politics by November 9th?
Well, if so they can also look forward to “Skyfall” the latest James Bond film released on the same day as Spielberg’s “Lincoln”. Will it feature a sky-diving Queen Elizabeth II along side Bond star, Daniel Craig? I doubt it, but Craig fans will be lining up for this latest Bond adventure nevertheless. This time James Bond’s loyalty to M is tested as her past comes back in ways she’d like to be forgotten!
December holds some big names and big films too, starting off with the release of Peter Jackson’s “The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey.” Another first film in what is expected to be a two-part prequel to the three Lord of the Rings films Jackson gave us in the past. Ian McKellen returns along with others in J.R.R. Tolkien’s tale of curious Hobbit, Bilbo Baggins who along with a gang of dwarves searches for stolen treasure among the mountains. All of the elements are in place for another successful fantasy filled pair of epic films by the master filmmaker from New Zealand.
It’s been a while since a musical captured the movie-going public’s fascination, and will a big-screen adaptation of the popular Broadway classic, “Les Miserables” be the next? Hugh Jackman, Russell Crowe and Anne Hathaway head up the stellar cast, but can they sing? Well, we already know that Jackman can hold his own on Broadway and in the West End, but the verdict is still out on Crowe and Hathaway, and one only has to think of Lucille Ball’s “Mame (1974)” to see how a star’s lack of talent as a singer can sink an otherwise good film fast. This adaptation of the classic Victor Hugo novel is being directed by Tom Hooper who gave us last year’s “The King’s Speech”, so expectations are high to say the least. Look for it when it opens on December 14th.
The end of this year will be a mix-bag of comedies and violent dramas that will test movie-goers tastes as 2012 closes. Quentin Tarantino’s ultra violent “Django Unchained” starring Leonardo DiCaprio and Jamie Foxx will shake up the history of slavery in America much in the same way Tarantinos’ “Inglorious Bastards” did to World War II Germany, as Foxx plays a slave-turned bounty hunter who sets out to rescue his wife from a southern plantation owner played by DiCaprio.
If audiences are in a mood for more moderate fair after the holidays, they’ll find comfort in two comedies released the same week as “Django.” First up is “The Guilt Trip” starring Barbra Streisand as mother to inventor Seth Rogan as they set out on a unlikely road trip. But Streisand will be battling at the box-office with Bette Midler who teams up with Billy Crystal for “Parental Guidance”. Crystal and Midler play grandparents who battle with daughter Marisa Tomei on how to raise her kids. No doubt, a lot of star power in one weekend for movie-goers to chose from. And just who will win the day? Well, we’ll all have to wait till after the new year to find out!
