Director:
David Fincher
Stars: Brad Pitt, Cate Blanchett, Tilda Swinton
Studio: Paramount Pictures

The Plot: Benjamin Button (Pitt) was born under unusual circumstances. As everyone around him grew older, he aged backwards, making the challenges of life such as creating friendships, finding a job and falling in love all the more difficult and heartbreaking.

Now that Ben B’s release date has come, the question on our minds will soon be answered: Will this F. Scott Fitzgerald adaptation become the film of the year, or yet another holiday gift that fails to connect with mainstream audiences? We’re of course hoping that the former case wins out, and given the advanced word-of-mouth the film has enjoyed, we don’t predict that crowds will feel alienated by David Fincher’s latest collaboration with Brad Pitt. Put another way: Any movie that plots to pair you with Cate Blanchett toward the end of your life is A-OK with me.

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Director:
Ari Folman
Stars: Ari Folman, Ron Ben-Yishai, Ronny Dayag

Studio: Sony Pictures Classics

The Plot: By meeting and interviewing old friends from around the world, Ari, a former member of the Israeli Army, retraces his spotty personal history to a life-changing incident that occurred during his country’s 1982 invasion of Lebanon.

Uh-oh, the Academy has another Persepolis situation on their hands… Turns out Ari Folman’s surrealist animated war drama never had its mandatory one-week run in New York City this year (something that had to be in place by the end of last August), so it’s no kudos for Bashir, easily one of the best-received documentaries on the international film-festival circuit. Personally, while I think the rule is so old fashioned, I find it odd that the doc’s NYC-based distributor, Sony Pictures Classics, missed the bus here. The Joe Sacco set is up in arms! Will they be rewarded with a Golden Globe win?

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Director:
Joel Hopkins
Stars: Dustin Hoffman, Emma Thompson, Kathy Baker

Studio: Overture Films

The Plot: During a weekend in which Harvey Shine (Hoffman) travels to London for his daughter’s wedding, her first learns that he’s lost his job back in New York, then he discovers he won’t be the man giving away the bride at the ceremony. The one good thing that happens — his meeting Kate (Thompson), a prickly but nevertheless enchanting Londoner — might be the beginning of some much-needed change in Harvey’s life.

Writer-director Joel Hopkins explored romantic complications in his debut, Jump Tomorrow, which was embraced by indie circles on both sides of the Atlantic. Now he steps up to the majors with a potential awards contender (now that The Road and The Soloist have been pushed to 2009, Oscar buzz has trickled down to smaller films such as Harvey). I wouldn’t be surprised if Hoffman and Thompson are positioned for nominations, and considering the story’s Before Sunrise tones (albeit for the generation ahead of Ethan Hawke and Julie Delpy), a Best Original Screenplay nomination is not out of the question. Unlikely? Yes. But not impossible.

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Director:
David Frankel
Stars: Owen Wilson, Jennifer Aniston

Studio: Twentieth Century-Fox Film Corporation

The Plot: An impossibly cute, but impossible-to-live-with yellow Labrador retriever named Marley teaches his newlywed owners a thing or two about patience and parenthood.

There must be some kind of rule in Hollywood about when a big-time star decides to make a dog movie. We’re guessing for Aniston and Wilson, it’s when they’re done working with Ben Stiller.

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Director:
Bryan Singer
Stars: Tom Cruise, Bill Nighy, Carice van Houten
Studio: United Artists

The Plot: Near the end of WWII, Claus von Stauffenberg (Cruise) leads to group of fellow German army colonels in an attempt to assassinate Adolf Hitler; the event would later be called the July 20 Plot of 1944.

With each release-date change, our interest in Valkyrie only increases. Will it become known as the title that topples the dissolved United Artists partnership between Tom Cruise and longtime producing partner Paula Wagner, or will it mark the successful reunion of director Bryan Singer and Usual Suspects writer Christopher McQuarrie, who haven’t worked together since they made one another famous? With the movie’s action/thriller angle slickly ratcheted up, we expect it to combat everything working against its potential success: myriad production woes (including a late-stage shooting delay that caused the release date to be pushed back from the July 4th holiday); the public’s disinterest in T.C.; said public’s recent indifference to war movies; holiday competition. Still, the look is right, insiders seem to want it to succeed, and T.C. is enjoying an Oscar push for his Tropic Thunder cameo; if the creative team here reaches its zenith, this is exactly the sort of fare that will get adults into the multiplex during the holidays.

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Director:
Sam Mendes
Stars: Leonardo DiCaprio, Kate Winslet

Studio: DreamWorks Distribution

The Plot: A young couple raising a family in a Connecticut suburb during the mid-1950s look to break free from their frustratingly mediocre lives.

Avoiding the whole Kate and Leo back together again thing is like trying to steer clear of a giant iceberg. So, we’ll just get all the OMGs out of our system now and crown Mendes the new “King of the World” for this brilliant (and nepotistic) casting move. I hope this film has the same quiet fire as Little Children …

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Director:
Frank Miller
Stars: Gabriel Macht, Samuel L. Jackson, Scarlett Johansson

Studio: Lionsgate

The Plot: A rookie cop (Macht) returns from the dead to fight crime from the shadows of Central City. His main opposition is a former lab technician who has reinvented himself as The Octopus (Jackson), an elusive criminal mastermind who knows the secrets behind his nemesis.  

 While we still don’t know if those Sin City sequels will ever get made, The Spirit’s projected box-office failure will either speed up or slow down development on the project(s), depending on Frank Miller’s perceived bankability in a few months. We fear Miller isn’t quite ready to sit alone behind the director’s chair, as early reviews and misc. word-of-mouth echo what I originally thought about the Spirit footage I saw at Comic-Con last July: While the movie’s aesthetics earns top marks, the writing and performer direction oversteps the fine line between homage and, well, fromage. Brave the sharky reviewer waters and you’ll find a dearth of positive reviews for this one.

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Director:
Adam Shankman
Stars: Adam Sandler, Keri Russell, Courteney Cox

Studio: Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures

The Plot: Somehow, someway, the lavish bedtime stories that a hotel handyman (Sandler) tells his niece and nephew start to magically come true.  

 Softly doth Adam Sandler step into family-friendly territory under the chopless direction of Adam Shankman. Do you think Disney knew ahead of time what they were getting into when they cast Russell Brand (AKA the UK’s Tom Green) (who somehow got a part in Julie Taymor’s new project) as a room-service waiter? Do you think that Jim Carrey and Will Smith will be really PO’ed on Christmas Day when Adam Sandler literally and figuratively out-grosses them both?

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