30. “War For The Planet Of The Apes”
Director: Matt Reeves (“Cloverfield”)
Cast: Andy Serkis, Judy Greer, Woody Harrelson, Steve Zahn, Gabriel Chavarria
Synopsis: With the apes and humanity firmly at war, Caesar wrestles with his darker instincts as he’s drawn into conflict with the human leader, the ruthless Colonel.
What You Need To Know: What could have been another brain-free, cynical reboot — of a series that had already had one rotten re-do thanks to Tim Burton — has, after “Rise Of The Planet Of The Apes” and “Dawn Of The Planet Of The Apes,” evolved into one of the smartest and most unconventional blockbuster franchises we’ve ever had. Aided by ground-breaking performance capture technology and a mighty lead performance by Andy Serkis, the films have flipped the story on its head, with a most non-verbal, non-human lead character and a rooting interest that, if not against humanity, is certainly pro-primates. The third installment, which sees ‘Dawn’ director Matt Reeves returning, is most under wraps right now, but given politics at the minute, by the summer, monkey apocalypse will probably look like idealistic escapism rather than horrifying dystopia.
Release Date: July 14th
29. “A Ghost Story”/“The Old Man And The Gun”
Director: David Lowery (“Pete’s Dragon”)
Cast: Rooney Mara, Casey Affleck/Robert Redford, Sissy Spacek
Synopsis: An elderly bank robber and serial prison escapee looks to get back in the thieving game.
What You Need To Know: David Lowery is one of the busiest directors around right now, and with good reason: he’s an enormously talented filmmaker who has celluloid running through his veins. And off the back of his excellent “Pete’s Dragon” in the summer, we could well get a double dose of him in 2017. First up, at Sundance, is “A Ghost Story,” a movie he shot quietly last summer with his “Ain’t Them Bodies Saints” stars Casey Affleck and Rooney Mara (with Will Oldham also popping up), while in the spring he’ll shoot “The Old Man And The Gun” with Affleck and his “Pete’s Dragon’ star Robert Redford, who’ll play a real-life elderly bank robber, and has said that the film may be his last on screen appearance. If that is the case, with Lowery at the helm, it should be a fitting finale.
Release Date: “A Ghost Story” bows at Sundance next month, while “The Old Man And The Gun” shoots soon after, and we imagine will aim for an awards season berth if it’s ready in time.
28. “Lean On Pete”
Director: Andrew Haigh (“45 Years”)
Cast: Charlie Plummer, Travis Fimmel, Chloe Sevigny, Steve Buscemi, Steve Zahn
Synopsis: A fifteen-year-old in Oregon begins working at a stables and forms a friendship with a black stallion.
What You Need To Know: If there was any doubt that Andrew Haigh was one of our most talented young directors — and “Weekend” and “Looking” certainly suggested he was — 2015’s masterful “45 Years” should have put that to rest — it was an accomplished and assured a movie as we’ve seen in recent years. He takes another left-turn with his next movie, steering into full-on Americana with an adaptation of a novel by Richmond Fontaine frontman Willy Vlautin, which might sound like a heartwarming kids flick, but assuming it stays close to the source material, is likely to be anything but. At this point, we’d be excited about Haigh’s next movie even if he was making a “Transformers” film, but this sounds like it should play to his strengths beautifully.
Release Date: Didn’t wrap until September, so Sundance and Berlin might be a bit early, but we wouldn’t be shocked to see Haigh making his Cannes or Venice debut with the film.
27. “Under The Silver Lake”
Director: David Robert Mitchell (“It Follows”)
Cast: Andrew Garfield, Riley Keough, Jimmi Simpson, Topher Grace, Zosia Mamet
Synopsis: A noir set in modern day Los Angeles
What You Need To Know: David Robert Mitchell already seemed like a major talent after his feature debut “The Myth Of The American Sleepover,” but no one was expecting that he’d be able to translate the woozy charms of that into genre fare, and yet “It Follows,” which took the retro coming-of-age vibes of ‘Myth’ and added one of the most original horror conceits in years, proved a triumph. As such, expectations are much higher for Mitchell’s next picture, which sees him switch gears again to attempt a fresh take on the neo-noir. Not much is known beyond that, but A24 have snapped the rights up, which bodes well, and he’s assembled a superb cast, and also Topher Grace.
Release Date: Unclear: Cannes, where “It Follows” bowed, seems early, so look for it at TIFF instead.
26. “The Square”
Director: Ruben Ostlund (“Force Majeure”)
Cast: Elisabeth Moss, Dominic West, Claes Bang, Terry Notary
Synopsis: An artist sets up a space in a European town square where people are meant to follow a shared common interest.
What You Need To Know: Though savvy cinephiles knew his name from the festival circuit for a long while, Swedish filmmaker Ruben Ostlund found his widest audience to date with 2014’s “Force Majeure,” a savage, yet oddly human, comedy of manners about a man’s cowardly reaction to an avalanche in a ski resort. His follow up’s taken a little while, but with a couple of big-name English-language stars in Elisabeth Moss and Dominic West, this should bring even more fans of his work. The premise, apparently inspired by a real-life incident that Ostlund went through with a beggar, sounds very much in his territory in terms of examining human morality, but we’re perhaps most intrigued by the presence in the cast of Terry Notary, a performance capture expert on “Avatar” and the ‘Apes’ movies.
Release Date: Expect it at Cannes.
25. “Downsizing”
Director: Alexander Payne (“The Descendants”)
Cast: Matt Damon, Kristen Wiig, Christoph Waltz, Alec Baldwin, Jason Sudeikis
Synopsis: Realizing that his life has gotten out of hand, a man agrees to shrink himself.
What You Need To Know: We’ll be completely honest: the more Alexander Payne’s work gets embraced by the establishment, as with the Oscar-friendly “The Descendants” and “Nebraska,” the less we like it. He has a particular world view that sings in hard-edged dark comedies like “Election” and “Citizen Ruth,” but plays less well in more would-be heart-warming stories. Which is why we’re psyched about “Downsizing,” which seems in some ways to be a return to the kind of spiky social satire that he made his name with initially, albeit with a fantastic conceit, heavy special effects use, and a starry cast. It’s the kind of idea that could go horribly wrong, but Payne should bring the best out with it.
Release Date: December 22nd
24. “Loveless”
Director: Andrey Zvyagintsev (“Leviathan”)
Cast: Unknown
Synopsis: An estranged couple in the midst of divorce must search for their 12-year-old son when he disappears.
What You Need To Know: Andrey Zvyagintsev already made a good case for being one of world cinema’s foremost talents — and certainly Russia’s best living director — thanks to films like “The Return” and “Elena,” but he cemented that reputation with 2014’s masterpiece “Leviathan,” a wrenching state-of-the-nation epic. He’s been touting this project since then, but, while it’s harder to know these things for sure away from the eyes of the trades, we believe he’s been in production on his new movie, and it should be ready to go this year. He’s reuniting with most of his “Leviathan” behind-the-camera team for the movie, and it sounds like the scope will be more intimate this time, but details remain thin on the ground.
Release Date: Cannes seems likely, if it’s done in time.
23. “Golden Exits”
Director: Alex Ross Perry (“Listen Up Philip”)
Cast: Jason Schwartzman, Mary-Louise Parker, Chloe Sevigny, Analeigh Tipton, Emily Browning
Synopsis: A foreign girl spending time in New York upsets the status quo in two Brooklyn families.
What You Need To Know: With the one-two punch of “Listen Up Philip” and “Queen Of Earth,” Alex Ross Perry went from being seen as a hugely promising up-and-comer to demonstrating he was one of the best filmmakers we have. And when he’s not been writing “Winnie The Pooh” for Disney (yes, you didn’t dream that announcement), he quietly filmed his fourth movie, not revealing its existence until it was wrapped. This seems to mark a move into more Baumbachian territory for the director (maybe it’s just the casting of former Beastie Boy Adam Horovitz), but one of the great things about him is that you never quite know what you’re getting.
Release Date: It’s in competition at Sundance next month.
22.“Zama”
Director: Lucrecia Martel (“The Headless Woman”)
Cast: Daniel Giménez Cacho, Lola Dueñas
Synopsis: The lonely existence of the greedy, paranoid Don Diego de Zama, a Spanish civil servant posted to Paraguay in the 1790s.
What You Need To Know: Across a remarkable run in the ’00s, Lucrecia Martel proved herself to be one of the finest filmmakers working today. But since her widely acclaimed “The Headless Woman” in 2008, we’ve had nothing from the filmmaker. We were expect her latest, “Zama,” her biggest in scope and scale yet, last year, given that it started shooting in the summer of 2015, but clearly it wasn’t ready yet. Still, the extra time can only have helped the movie, and has certainly heightened the anticipation for it, even if we still don’t know all that much about it (beyond that Pedro Almodovar’s producing).
Release Date: We said this last year, but Cannes seems a certainty. Don’t rule out Berlin, though.
21. “Suburbicon”
Director: George Clooney (“Good Night And Good Luck”)
Cast: Matt Damon, Julianne Moore, Oscar Isaac, Josh Brolin, Woody Harrelson
Synopsis: After a home invasion results in an act of terrible violence, a suburban family in the 1950s sink into a swamp of betrayal, adultery and blackmail.
What You Need To Know: George Clooney seems to go by the “Star Trek” odd/even rule when it comes to his directorial efforts. “Confessions Of A Dangerous Mind,” “Leatherheads” and “Monuments Men,” his first, third and fifth films? NOT GREAT, BOB. But “Good Night And Good Luck” and “The Ides Of March,” his second and fourth? Pretty damn good, particularly the former. So that’s reason one to be excited about his sixth. Reason two would be a script from the Coen Brothers, and reasons three through seven would be the cast. Now, previous Coens discards like “Gambit” haven’t turned out that well, but we’re confident, given the cast, that this’ll be something special.
Release Date: Nothing firm, but it’ll be sometime in the fall, likely with a big festival bow at Venice or NYFF first.
PTA’s TWBB was not set in the Depression-era, it was early the early 20th century, starting even before, in 1898, and ending before the Great Depression, in 1927. Any cinefile would know (though maybe not the specifics), and any idiot knows TGD was in the late 1920s through the 30s.
It may not qualify for this film list, but it’s also worth remembering that Twin Peaks makes its return next year as well (and, if rumors are true, may see some form of theatrical release for selected episodes).
Very much doubt the PTA film will be ready by 2017
“Lady Bird” is NOT Greta Gerwig’s directorial debut. She previously directed “Nights and Weekends”, which is one of the greatest movies of the last decade (at least according to me).
It’s her singular directorial debut though since Nights and Weekends was made with Joe Swanberg, and she’s even talked about it in an interview about how it was a new experience for her.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WRtveFQxJC0
You overlooked “The Salesman” by Asghar Farhadi, one of the greatest directors working today.
I would guess that they covered it in their list for 2016. A lot of international films that are likely to get US release dates next year were probably covered there.
OK, the omission of Alfonso Cuaron’s next film is a HUGE mistake in so many ways. 1) It represents a hasty job of making this list 2) You guys had him at #12 in your 100 Best Director list, and said about his next film “going back to Mexico to shoot a smaller-scale Spanish-language drama, only makes us love him more”. ?????? 3) It’s freaking Alfonso Cuaron, and he’s making a Mexican-language film. How do you make a mistake like that?
Definitely an oversight.
Easy, by him pulling a totally moronic move like making a mexican movie in mexican language. if you want a movie watched, if you want to share some message with your film, it needs to be in ENGLISH, period. It is the de facto standard international language. . It gains the director nothing because it paints him as some douche bag trying to get labled as artistic and brilliant when in reality it just makes you an ignorant ass who doesnt care about his potential viewing audience. The film loses because no one is going to watch it except for hipster douchebags and mexicans who are just going to pirate it because they cant afford a burrito, let alone going to a movie. Us potential viewers lose big time because we miss out on something that might of been a great flick by a talented directed who fkced the pouch by putting it out in mexicali. Its one thing if your uneducated and dont speak english to make a foreign him. But if you not only know english, you have demonstrated you can make a phenomenal english language film,.your just being a moron at best to make a film in anything but english and at worse an arrogant asshat Who thinks making a film in such a way that he guarentees it wont bewatched by almost anyone is some sort of artistic statement instead of being a fool
yep
The PTA movie is set in London not in New York.
‘Woody Allen (“Scoop”)’
wat
You need an editor. For starters, where is The Lost City of Z? You’re not eager to see it next year? It was one of the best reviewed films at the NYFF just a few weeks ago (at 87% on RT right now), ten years in the making, and directed by James Gray. How do you explain an oversight like that? Especially when this list has some real junk. And in what universe is Olivier Assayas considered a “smart young filmmaker”? Bad editing. Pattinson is working with lots of smart, young filmmakers, and I’m far more excited about seeing Damsel, from the Zellner brothers than anything that Assayas might put out. Idol’s Eye is still a pipe dream, Assayas doesn’t know if he can even get it together (according to his latest interview out of a film festival in Argentina). I’d even rather see Harmony Korine’s The Trap than Idol’s Eye.
Seeing as Olivier Assayas is a month away from turning 62, I would wholeheartedly agree he is not young! But the majority of his films have received acclaim (https://www.rottentomatoes.com/celebrity/olivier_assayas/). He’s obviously nothing to sneeze at. On a different note, agreed that Lost City of Z and Damsel (and also Alfonso Cuaron’s currently-in-production drama set in Mexico City) were unduly snubbed.
Lost City of Z we’ve already seen and reviewed so that goes on another list which you’ll see soon.. Harmony Korine’s The Trap is currently on hold, fyi and he may not even make it- certainly not in 2017. So it’s actually the trap that’s a pipe dream whereas Idol’s Eye is actually going forward and has money and backers, etc.. The Cuaron was an omission that we rectified.
The Sicario sequel, Soldado, is actually filming right now and is expected in 2017.
So right about a Phoenix film always feeling like an event 🙂 The films don’t always come through for me, but he does. My favorite film of late is The Immigrant. His performance shook me to tears
Phoenix is on the roll this decade – The Master, Her, The Immigrant, Inherent Vice. Even when the final result is a little bit underwhelming (Irrational Man) he makes the movie interesting. And I agree about ‘The Immigrant’, excellent film and very underrated. Can’t wait for ‘Mary Magdalene’.
I could not get on board with The Lobster. I guess it’s just the whole genre. I didn’t find it funny. But your right Farrell was great. He’s just gotten better and better these days. Raffey Cassidy is so adorable, little nervous about seeing her in a Yorgos film
I loved the hotel section of The Lobster. I thought it got way less interesting once he escaped.
So appropriate to have a PTA/DDL reunion at #1. There Will Be Blood was brilliant and Day Lewis created one of the greatest characters ever, endlessly quotable. You look like a fffffool, dont you Tilford?
I agree I can’t wait I just don’t see how it will be coming out in 2017. My prediction is that it hits Cannes 2018.
“I AM THE THIRD REVELATION !!!” lol
hahaha yes
This is always one of my favorite features of the year, I refer to it often. Thanks, ya’ll.
Thanks guys, great list. Ignore the morons.
Your opinions are insufferable. It seems like you hate pretty much everything, except the usual stuff internet geeks love (PTA etc.). You put Alien Covenant, the new Polanski and the new Allen movies on the list, but rip their recent work apart in the text. Makes no sense.
Recent Ridley Scott isn’t that great. Hoping this is better.
Rooney Mara certainly knows how to choose interesting projects. Her only mistake this decade was ‘Pan’.
She seems to have access to anything she wants
WEIGHTLESS should be in the Top 20 at least. I completely understand why people aren’t enthusiastic about this project anymore but it deserves much more for that glorious cast alone. Best ensemble of the decade ? I think so !
We don’t know how many of them will even make the cut though and how many scenes they’ll get. Knight of Cups had a great cast too but some actors were basically a glorified cameo if you could even identify them to begin with.
Really want a trailer already though.
I hope that at least main six (Gosling, Mara, Fassbender, Portman, Bale, Blanchett) are in the final cut and with as much screen time as possible. If Weightless premieres in Berlin (and it’s likely) then we can expect trailer this month (that was the case with Knight of Cups). Seriously, I’m tired of waiting for this movie.
I hope The Beguiled delivers, and make Elle Fanning earn her first Oscar nomination.
Wait, why was “Loving Vincent” not mentioned? There’s no chance that film is going to be anything other than a mindblowing spectacle of animation. Is it still that relatively unknown?
Are you serious with that Polanski write up? Why are you joking about him sexually assaulting a minor? Is that really not that big a deal to you, do you think it shouldn’t cloud peoples views of his films??
Uh… what?
I got the complete opposite reaction to that. It’s a joke, sure, but a very serious one. What possible reason would they have to mention it so many times if they felt it wasn’t a big deal or shouldn’t cloud peoples views of his films? I mean, I honestly can’t understand how you can have gotten that impression.
I’m a fairly loud feminist and even I found it kind of needless. The only person who deserves to hate him is his victim and she has forgiven him and wants to move on with her life. You can see something close to a filmed apology with the way Polanski handles TESS and DEATH AND THE MAIDEN.
I think an apology would have a greater impact if it wasn’t “assumed” but actually spoken.
he should be in jail
I would put The Glass Castle higher. Short Term 12 was tremendous, should have been the film Larson won for.
1. Episode 8
2. Justice League
3. Dunkirk
4. PTA Fashion Drama
5. Free Fire
Nolan was nominated for an Oscar twice
Confessions of a Dangerous Mind is easily Clooney’s best directorial effort, what are you guy’s talking about?
I’m actually really excited for Power Rangers!
{though the themes of racism and police brutality will undoubtedly make it feel just as of-the-moment}……
Oliver Dear: You neglected to add In Obama’s America to the bracketed statement.
Alien Covenant at 91 is madness, for one I will never understand the Prometheus hate, that was an excellent movie and worthy prequel, the abortion scene is one of the best body horror scenes of all time, for another to get Scott back with the Xenomorphs is just about the most hype thing to happen in cinema for a while.
it sucked
looking forward for the movie “Berlin Syndrome”
I’m a little bummed. Nothing from Leonardo Dicaprio this year??? No!! Would make an interesting awards season with Day/Dicaprio/Phoenix/Oldman…….
I thought Prometheus was great. Don’t write like your opinion is fact.
Seriously. Didn’t even make it through this.
you are wrong and it’s a fact
So you just put Polanski’s next movie on here to remind people 38 times that he’s a convicted sex offender, right?
rightfully so
Woof that Godard biopic sounds fuckin dreadful.
Also, “Venus in Furs” was not “pretty awful.”
Oy.
Well gee, could you at least leave out the innuendo about Polanski? And you said the film stars his “partner”. Your journalistic skills are indeed lacking if you can’t IMDB him and find out Emmanuelle Seigner is not his partner, but his WIFE of 28 years. So please, next time do your actual research and find out that said “13 year-old” has been staunchly on his side for the past almost four decades. So again, you do yourself a great disservice when you don’t get the facts straight.
stop defending a rapist
I don’t know, Kingsman: The Golden Circle seems much more exciting than the rest of these movies (at least to me), but I forgot that it’s a shitty racist, sexist, and homophobic movie that nobody should like.
Confessions of a Dangerous Mind is good!