It might be hard to believe, but in just three weeks we’ll be back in the thick of an all-new awards season mere months after the #OscarsSoWhite controversy ignited a fire in Hollywood that’s still smouldering.
First up is the Venice film festival, where a number of potential awards contenders are poised to make their debuts, including a Jackie Kennedy biopic starring Natalie Portman and a romance featuring real-life couple Michael Fassbender and Alicia Vikander.
The Telluride and Toronto festivals follow swiftly afterwards. While Telluride is famous for not revealing its line-up until the day before the event kicks off, Toronto has already announced its line-up — and among them are promising picks, like Oliver Stone’s sure-to-be-controversial Edward Snowden thriller, and Antoine Fuqua’s all-star Magnificent Seven remake. Following that, Selma director Ava DuVernay is bound to shake up the documentary race with her explosive-sounding first non-fiction film, The 13th, about racial inequality in America, which launches the New York film festival, where Oscar winners such as The Social Network and Life of Pi were first screened.
All in all, there’s plenty of great stuff to watch over the next few months.
Billy Lynn’s Long Halftime Walk
Among filmmakers, Ang Lee is the Academy’s gold standard. The two-time Oscar winner (for Brokeback Mountain and Life of Pi) is back this autumn with this adaptation of Ben Fountain’s book. It’s being billed as Lee’s most innovative project yet, thanks to his unprecedented decision to shoot the film at 120 frames per second, up from the normal 24. Early footage previewed in Las Vegas drew rave reviews for Lee’s bold approach. As for the subject matter, the book was called the Catch-22 of the Iraq War. Told in flashbacks, it recounts a 19-year-old army private’s experience of the war as he and his squad embark on a victory tour. Newcomer Joe Alwyn heads the cast, which includes Kristen Stewart, Vin Diesel and Steve Martin.
Allied
With its release date set for an awards-friendly November, Paramount is placing its bets on the latest from Robert Zemeckis to deliver. That didn’t work last year for his tightrope-walking drama The Walk, which failed to win over critics and voters, despite nabbing the prestigious opening night slot of the New York film festival. This movie, however, seems like a surer bet by being a Second World War romantic thriller starring two Academy favourites, Marion Cotillard and Brad Pitt. Zemeckis hasn’t tackled a war scenario since 1994’s Forrest Gump, which turned out pretty well for the filmmaker.
Jackie
Natalie Portman is poised for a major awards season comeback, six years after winning her first Oscar for Black Swan, with Jackie, which sees her play Jackie Kennedy. Adding to the must-see factor is its director, Parblo Larrain, the acclaimed Chilean filmmaker behind 2013’s Oscar-nominated No, who’s making his English-language debut with the drama. Footage screened to buyers at this year’s Cannes Film Festival is rumoured to have wowed all those who saw it.
La La Land
Damien Chazelle rode his last film, Whiplash, from the Sundance Film Festival all the way to Oscar glory. His anticipated third film is poised to rocket him back into awards season, by attempting to resurrect the big-screen musical with some help from Ryan Gosling and Emma Stone. The romance, about a jazz pianist (Gosling) who woos an aspiring actor (Stone) in sun-kissed Los Angeles, boasts a swoon-inducing first trailer that hints at something truly special. Adding to the buzz is its opening night slot at the Venice film festival, which in previous years went to a number of Oscar-winners including Birdman and Gravity.
Nocturnal Animals
The last (and first) time fashion designer Tom Ford took a detour into filmmaking, he surprised his naysayers to deliver A Single Man, an emotionally rich and formally ravishing drama that earned an Oscar nomination for its lead actor, Colin Firth. He’s now back, seven years later, with his anticipated second offering, Nocturnal Animals, based on Austin Wright’s acclaimed novel Tony and Susan, about an art gallery owner haunted by her ex-husband’s novel. The cast is among the best of the year: led by Jake Gyllenhaal, it also stars Amy Adams, Michael Shannon, Isla Fisher, Laura Linney and Armie Hammer.
The Founder
Michael Keaton continues his quest for that elusive Oscar in this biopic of McDonald’s co-founder Ray Kroc. John Lee Hancock, who nabbed a surprise best picture nomination for The Blind Side in 2009, directs.
A United Kingdom
In the wake of #OscarsSoWhite, the latest drama from Belle film-maker Amma Asante seems ideally poised to stake a mark this season. The romance stars David Oyelowo as Seretse Khama, who in 1925 became king of Bechuanaland (then a British protectorate, now the republic of Botswana) aged four, and Rosamund Pike as Ruth Williams, the Londoner who married him despite considerable controversy at the highest political levels, both in apartheid South Africa and in the UK.
Arrival
The Academy isn’t known for typically rewarding films about aliens — but if anyone can reverse that trend, it’s Denis Villeneuve, who’s overdue for a gong following Prisoners and Sicario. Helping his chances are Amy Adams and Jeremy Renner, who both star in this present-based thriller about a linguist expert (Adams) recruited by the military to determine whether aliens that have recently landed on Earth come in peace or are a threat. The film is said to be more cerebral than your average extraterrestrial blockbuster.
American Pastoral
Ewan McGregor makes a bold leap into filmmaking with this adaptation of Philip Roth’s universally acclaimed 1997 novel about the disintegrating life of an apparently successful family man. Based on early buzz, he appears to have succeeded at Roth’s dense source material — and the trailer harks back the suburban dread that characterised American Beauty, a best picture winner.
20th Century Women
Annette Bening looks to once again be in the running for her lead turn in the new film from Beginners writer/director Mike Mills. The four-time nominee — who has yet to win — leads a cast including Greta Gerwig and Elle Fanning. Bening plays a single mother raising her teenage son in a sprawling bohemian house during the 70s. Mills has a way with actors: Beginners netted a supporting actor Oscar for Christopher Plummer in 2010.
Silence
While the latest film from Martin Scorsese is unlikely to reach the commercial heights attained by The Wolf of Wall Street, the biggest hit of his career, it’s bound to win over the Academy. Scorsese’s epic adaptation of Shusaku Endo’s novel about two Jesuit Portuguese Catholic priests (Andrew Garfield and Adam Driver) facing persecution on a trip to Japan to find a priest (Liam Neeson) who has lost his faith, ranks as the most challenging project of the filmmaker’s storied career. He’s been trying to complete his passion project for a rumoured 23 years — and its road to the screen has been shadowed by tragedy: a construction worker was killed after scaffolding collapsed on set.
The 13th
DuVernay shot to the top of the documentary race as soon as the New York film festival revealed her first documentary, The 13th, as its opening night film, marking the first time a non-fiction film has been chosen to kick off the prestigious event. Former openers include The Social Network and Gone Girl. Her timely film tackles racial inequality in the US — making it sure to draw attention.
The Mercy
After seeing his Stephen Hawking biopic, The Theory of Everything, go on to Oscar glory, James Marsh is back in familiar territory with this true tale about Donald Crowhurt, a businessman whose attempt to sail around the world by himself ended in tragedy. To help Marsh’s chances at landing back in the race, he’s cast Oscar winners Colin Firth and Rachel Weisz.
Fences
Few films this year boast more prestige than Denzel Washington’s third outing behind the camera. Adapted from August Wilson’s Pulitzer-winning play, Fences reunites Washington and Viola Davis together, after the pair won Tony awards for their performances in the Broadway production of the drama. While the source material is undoubtedly strong, it remains to be seen if Washington, whose last directorial efforts (The Great Debaters and Antwone Fisher) were just decent, can deliver a film worthy of the play.
Snowden
Laura Poitras won the best documentary Oscar this year for Citizenfour, her profile of Edward Snowden, the former CIA employee who leaked classified documents from the National Security Agency to newspapers including this one. Now, she’s one of the real-life figures played by actors in Snowden, Oliver Stone’s drama based on the books The Snowden Files by Luke Harding and Time of the Octopus by Anatoly Kucherena. Joseph Gordon-Levitt stars, with Shailene Woodley as his girlfriend, and Zachary Quinto and Tom Wilkinson as Guardian journalists Glenn Greenwald and Ewen MacAskill. Stone’s past few movies were tepidly received; the source material and subject matter should hopefully up his game here.
The Light Between Oceans
The buzz around the first film featuring real-life couple Vikander and Fassbender has dampened somewhat, since it was first rumoured that The Light Between Oceans would factor into last year’s awards race. Despite the hold-up, Derek Cianfrance’s follow-up to The Place Beyond the Pines looks solid, with the pair in strong form as a couple torn apart after rescuing a baby and adopting the child as their own.
Lion
Starring Oscar heavyweights Nicole Kidman and Rooney Mara, Lion has the makings of a potential awards contender — bolstered by its inspirational and fact-based story about a young man adopted as a child who used Good Maps to track down the family he left in India. Dev Patel heads the cast, in his highest-profile role since Slumdog Millionaire. The question mark is its director, Garth Davis, who’s making his debut with the uplifting drama.
Deepwater Horizon
Peter Berg reunites with his Lone Survivor star Mark Wahlberg for this disaster film, based around the BP oil spill, considered of the largest accidental marine oil spills to date — and the worst man-made disaster in human history. Lone Survivor, while a hit with audiences, was ravaged by some critics who found it bone-crunching violence near-pornographic. Probably for the same reason, it failed to resonate with voters. Perhaps this eco-conscious thriller could do the trick?
Hacksaw Ridge
This war drama — about Desmond T Doss, a real-life medic who served in the battle of Okinawa despite refusing to carry a weapon because of his Seventh-day Adventist beliefs, becoming the first conscientious objector to receive the medal of honour — screams Oscar. Potentially spoiling its chances at glory is the involvement of director Mel Gibson, who’s still one of Hollywood’s most controversial figures.
The Girl on the Train
Like the novel by Paula Hawkins on which it’s based, The Girl on the Train has been drawing comparisons to Gone Girl for its twisty, sex-laced plot, and shady heroine, portrayed by Emily Blunt. Director Tate Taylor (The Help), however, is no David Fincher. It’s unlikely this thriller can reach the heights set by Fincher’s scorcher, which made a star out of Rosamund Pike.
The Lost City of Z
Writer/director James Gray is a favourite among critics, but so far his films have failed to convince Academy members of his talent behind the lens. The Lost City of Z, which recently nabbed the closing night slot at the New York film festival, appears to be his biggest and most mainstream effort to date, by telling a true story about British military man (Charlie Hunnam) who embarks on a decades-long search for a lost city deep in the Amazon during the 1920s. But knowing Gray, his epic is probably anything but conventional.
Rules Don’t Apply
Warren Beatty hasn’t directed a film since 1998’s political comedy Bulworth — and judging by the first trailer for Rules Don’t Apply, a period comedy set in Hollywood, he seems to have gotten a bit rusty. Whether the film, about a small town aspiring starlet (Lily Collins) who arrives in Hollywood under contract to star in a film for an eccentric billionaire (Beatty), is as messy as its scattershot preview is still up for debate. Beatty’s involvement, plus that of that new Han Solo, Alden Ehrenreich, lends hope that it’s better than it seems.
Queen of Katwe
Disney’s Uganda-set fact-based drama about a young girl who trains to become a world chess champion seems more Million Dollar Arm than Oscar player, but we’d be overjoyed for director Mira Nair (Monsoon Wedding) to prove us wrong. Lupita Nyong’o stars as the prodigy’s mother in a rare live action role for the actor (we were only allowed to hear her in Star Wars: The Force Awakens and The Jungle Book).
The Magnificent Seven
Antoine Fuqua’s remake is by no mean standard awards fodder — its trailer pitches it as a robustly commercial Hollywood shoot ‘em up, starring everyone’s favourite heart-throb Chris Pratt. But the film’s upcoming festival appearances are telling: on top of being selected to open the Toronto international film festival, it’s also closing Venice. Perhaps there’s more to it than meets the eye.
Sully
Clint Eastwood enjoyed great awards success with his last flag-waving drama, American Sniper, but his recent comments defending Donald Trump could result in his follow-up from even entering the arena. Shame, because it sounds right up the Academy’s alley: Tom Hanks plays Chelsey Sullenberger, the aeroplane captain responsible for the Miracle on the Hudson, who endured an ensuing investigation that threatened to destroy his reputation.
