Anticipating the Movies of 2018

The movie season always seems to hit the doldrums in August, and this year is no exception, despite some good titles in  the mix.  So let's take a quick look at some of the movies that are coming up next year.  As I noted in last year's installment, I'm writing this post now because this is roughly the point where you can make pretty good assumptions about which projects are actually going to become next year's films, even if many of them don't have release dates. If a movie hasn't started filming by now, it's not very likely that it's going to be ready for audiences by next December.

Due to the lack of details, the titles below are mostly in list format with a few notes here and there.  Several of these are probably going to be delayed until 2019, especially the indie and foreign titles.  There are a couple from last year's post that are still MIA, and I've repeated one entry here.  So think of this as my little list of the titles that I'm keeping a close eye on.  They're the ones that we know are coming down the pipeline, with the best chances of actually becoming movies in 2018.

So what's on the slate for next year that I'm getting excited about?

Let's start with the bigger budget, studio films that already have distribution, and in most cases even release dates:  

 

• Ralph Breaks the Internet: Wreck-It Ralph 2 - dir. Rich Moore
• A Wrinkle in Time - dir. Ava DuVernay
• Ready Player One - dir. Steven Spielberg
• Oceans 8 - dir. Gary Ross - With Sandra Bullock
• Han Solo - dir. Ron Howard
• Avengers: Infinity War - dir. Joe and Anthony Russo
• The Incredibles 2 - dir. Brad Bird
• Alita: Battle Angel - dir. Robert Rodriguez - Still being produced by James Cameron.
• Mary Poppins Returns - dir. Rob Marshall - With Emily Blunt and Lin Manuel Miranda
• Scarface  - No announced director since Antoine Fuqua and David Ayers parted ways with the project, but guess who's taking the latest whack at the screenplay?  Joel and Ethan Coen.  

And the movies that are probably going to start out as limited releases, assuming that they come out in 2018 at all:

• Annihilation - dir. Alex Garland - With Natalie Portman
• Isle of Dogs - dir. Wes Anderson - Anderson's second stop-motion animated film after "Fantastic Mr. Fox."
• The Irishman - dir. Martin Scorsese - With DeNiro, Pacino, Pesci, and Keitel so far.  But with Netflix producing, will this actually be treated like a theatrical feature?
• The House That Jack Built - dir. Lars von Trier - With Matt Dillon and Uma Thurman
• Annette - dir. Leos Carax
• The Nightingale - dir. Jennifer Kent
• Widows - dir. Steve McQueen - With Viola Davis and Daniel Kaluuya
• Suspiria - dir. Luca Gugadino - With Chloe Moretz and Dakota Johnson
• Insects - dir. Jan Svankmajer - Announced as his final film.
• Freakshift - dir. Ben Wheatley - With Alicia Vikander and Armie Hammer.
• Peterloo - dir. Mike Leigh
• Last Flag Flying - dir. Richard Linklater - With Bryan Cranston and Steve Carell.  This is a sequel to Hal Ashby's 1973 film "The Last Detail."
• Enzo Ferrari - dr. Michael Mann - With Hugh Jackman and Noomi Rapace.
• Three Christs - dir. John Avnet - With Richard Gere
• Bel Canto - Paul Weitz - With Julianne Moore

And I may be tempting fate by even listing this one, but:

• The Man Who Killed Don Quixote - dir. Terry Gilliam - With Jonathan Pryce and Adam Driver.  Fingers crossed!

I'll update on these films and others in my 2018 Top Ten Anticipated Films posts next year, once we know more.  Remember that none of these productions are out of the woods yet, and there's always the possibility of them getting tripped up or delayed.  The J.C. Chandor feature "Triple Frontier,"for instance, fell apart at the last minute back in April, despite having Channing Tatum and Tom Hardy  ready to star.

I also want to note quickly that there are a several higher profile features being helmed by female directors this year, including "A Wrinkle in Time,"  which is very good to see.  And a couple like Kay Cannon ("Pitch Perfect") and Jennifer Yuh Nelson (the "Kung Fu Panda" movies) are making their live-action directing debuts.  Fingers crossed that this leads to more women-led blockbusters in the future.  

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