100 films to look for­ward to in 2022 – part 1

While we’re uncer­tain what the next year holds in store for us in light of new Covid strains and the loom­ing pos­si­bil­i­ty of restric­tions lim­it­ing our cin­e­ma intake, for now we’re cast­ing doubt aside and look­ing for­ward to all the films we’ve yet to watch. Check out the sec­ond half of the list and let us know what you can’t wait to see by tweet­ing us @LWLies.

Robert Eggers sticks to his niche – one he total­ly knows how to nail – with his nar­ra­tives always ground­ed in his­tor­i­cal accu­ra­cy and haunt­ing atmos­pheres, this time trans­port­ing audi­ences to a ​“dark” and ​“unusu­al­ly vio­lent” 10^th cen­tu­ry Ice­land. The ​“creepy his­tor­i­cal ghost sto­ry guy’s” biggest film project to date is a Viking revenge epic fea­tur­ing a star-stud­ded cast that includes Björk, Nicole Kid­man, Alexan­der Skars­gård, Ethan Hawke, The Light­house star Willem Dafoe and The Witch​’s Anya Tay­lor-Joy. Mari­na Ashioti

ETA: 22 April, 2022

Adapt­ed from Joyce Car­ol Oates’ best­selling nov­el, Andrew Dominik’s Mar­i­lyn Mon­roe biopic has been in the works for over a decade now. Ana de Armas stars as the ​“blonde bomb­shell” oppo­site Bob­by Can­navale as Joe DiMag­gio, Adrien Brody as Arthur Miller, and Cas­par Phillip­son as JFK (the same role he played in Pablo Larrain’s Jack­ie). Oates, whose 700-page vol­ume was orig­i­nal­ly adapt­ed into a lit­tle-known minis­eries, has seen rough cuts of the film, call­ing it a ​“star­tling, bril­liant, very dis­turb­ing and (per­haps most sur­pris­ing­ly) an utter­ly ​‘fem­i­nist’ inter­pre­ta­tion.” MA

Patri­cia Highsmith’s ele­gant­ly sus­pense­ful works of lit­er­ary fic­tion tend to make stun­ning film adap­ta­tions (Alfred Hitchcock’s Strangers on a Train, Todd Haynes’ Car­ol, Wim Wen­ders’ The Amer­i­can Friend and Antho­ny Minghella’s The Tal­ent­ed Mr Rip­ley to name a few). With an adap­ta­tion of her less­er known nov­el Deep Water, Adri­an Lyne makes his long await­ed return to the sil­ver screen a full 20 years after the release of his 2002 film Unfaith­ful. The psy­cho­sex­u­al thriller stars Ben Affleck and Ana de Armas as spous­es stuck in a love­less mar­riage, play­ing increas­ing­ly dead­lier mind games with one anoth­er. The only ques­tion is, when will Dis­ney let this one out of the vault? MA

Edmund Goulding’s car­ni­val-set 1947 noir based on the nov­el by William Lind­say Gre­sham stars swash­buck­ling Tyrone Pow­er, mak­ing it a pret­ty tough act to fol­low. Even so, Guiller­mo del Toro saw a great oppor­tu­ni­ty to ven­ture into the hyp­not­ic realm of film noir, hon­our­ing Gresham’s curi­ous spir­it with a new­er ver­sion. The sto­ry fol­lows carny work­er Stan Carlisle (Bradley Coop­er) as he attempts to become part of a mon­ey-mak­ing scheme by learn­ing a mind-read­ing tech­nique from star attrac­tion Zeena (Toni Col­lette). Enter Cate Blanchett, Willem Dafoe, Rooney Mara, Richard Jenk­ins and Ron Perl­man, a cast so icon­ic it might be impos­si­ble for the Acad­e­my to ignore. MA

ETA: 21 Jan­u­ary, 2022

Come­di­an-turned-hor­ror supre­mo Jor­dan Peele has estab­lished him­self as a cin­e­mat­ic force to be reck­oned with. Fol­low­ing the suc­cess of Us, Get Out, and Nia DaCosta’s Can­dy­man which he co-wrote and pro­duced, Peele reunites with Daniel Kalu­uya who stars along­side Keke Palmer and Steven Yeun. Yep, that’s a lot of star pow­er. While Nope’s plot details remain under wraps, it’s con­firmed that Hoyte van Hoytema is behind the cam­era. With a cin­e­matog­ra­ph­er known for his knock­out aer­i­al shots (as seen in Dunkirk and Inter­stel­lar), and an omi­nous UFO-shaped cloud on the poster, we’re think­ing aliens. MA

ETA: 22 July, 2022

Sched­uled for an autumn release (and there­fore like­ly to be seen on the fes­ti­val cir­cuit before­hand) Olivia Wilde’s sec­ond out­ing as a direc­tor has been mak­ing head­lines ever since it went into pro­duc­tion. First it was because of lead actor Har­ry Styles, and then because of Wilde’s bold state­ment that the film will make view­ers realise ​“how rarely they see female plea­sure” on screen. Hmm. Any­way, inspired by Fatal Attrac­tion and Inde­cent Pro­pos­al, Styles stars along­side Flo­rence Pugh, Chris Pine, KiKi Layne, Gem­ma Chan, Nick Kroll and Wilde her­self. Intrigu­ing. Han­nah Strong

ETA: 26 Sep­tem­ber, 2022

Gina Prince-Blythewood’s The Old Guard was a refresh­ing entry into the crowd­ed super­hero field, so we’re excit­ed to see her take on the true sto­ry of The King­dom of Dahomey, one of Africa’s most pow­er­ful states through­out the 18^th and 19^th cen­turies. Vio­la Davis, Lashana Lynch, John Boye­ga and Thu­so Mbedu star, and giv­en that the film is being billed as ​“a his­tor­i­cal epic”, we’re expect­ing some­thing pret­ty spe­cial. HS

Had enough of the webbed wun­derkind? Well tough, you’re get­ting more. Joaquim Dos San­tos, Kemp Pow­ers, and Justin K Thomp­son take on the man­tle of direct­ing this fol­low-up to the Acad­e­my Award-win­ning Spi­der-Man: Into the Spi­der-Verse with this two-part entry (the sec­ond half will debut in 2023). Shameik Moore, Jake John­son, Hailee Ste­in­feld and Oscar Isaac will all be repris­ing their roles from the first film, while Issa Rae joins the cast as Jes­si­ca Drew/Spi­der-Woman. But you can be sure we’ll hear about a lot more cast­ing clos­er to release. HS

ETA: Octo­ber 2022

After the slight mis­step of First Man, the Damien Chazelle audi­ences know and love – the star­ry-eyed kid in thrall of the pas­sion of music and the glitz of show­biz – has soft­shoed back onto the scene. In this glossy new dra­ma, he’ll whisk audi­ences away to Tin­sel­town cir­ca the Gold­en Age’s tail end, just as those new-fan­gled talkies were mint­ing stars and putting old ones out of busi­ness. Ini­tial­ly Emma Stone was to lead as Clara Bow, pro­to-A-lis­ter and insa­tiable sex­u­al dynamo, but she has now dropped out, replaced by Mar­got Rob­bie, and Brad Pitt will por­tray a fic­ti­tious fig­ure rumoured by some to be based on silent screen star John Gilbert. Charles Bramesco

Pushed from a sum­mer 2021 release date to an autumn 2021 release date to a spring 2022 release date, Matt Reeves’ take on the Caped Cru­sad­er has been a long time com­ing, and teas­es have kept com­ing from Warner’s camp. With a star stud­ded cast and rumours of a Jok­er ori­gin sto­ry, we’re intrigued to see if Reeves and RPattz can breathe some new life into a fran­chise that nev­er stays dead for long. HS

ETA: 4 March, 2022

Scott Beck and Bryan Woods are best known as the co-writ­ers of A Qui­et Place; oth­er than that they’ve main­ly worked on low-bud­get hor­ror flicks, so we expect their lat­est direc­to­r­i­al project to have some scares in store. A sci-fi thriller star­ring Adam Dri­ver, 65 depicts an astro­naut who crash-lands on a mys­te­ri­ous plan­et, only to dis­cov­er he’s not alone. Dri­ver usu­al­ly has quite good taste when it comes to pick­ing parts, so we’ll trust his instincts here. HS

ETA: April 2022

Leitch’s fil­mog­ra­phy is spot­ty: On the one hand, he helped bring us John Wick; on the oth­er, he was respon­si­ble for Dead­pool 2. So maybe a lit­tle cau­tion is due here, but the prospect of his upcom­ing action­er is cer­tain­ly appeal­ing. Adapt­ed from Kōtarō Isaka’s nov­el ​‘Marie Bee­tle’, five assas­sins find them­selves on a Japan­ese bul­let train and realise their tar­gets are inter­con­nect­ed. Brad Pitt, Joey King, Bri­an Tyree Hen­ry, Zazie Beetz and Michael Shan­non star, which is an entic­ing line-up. HS

Delayed from its ini­tial Octo­ber 2021 release, we can’t wait to be back at it again with John­ny Knoxville and co. Most of the orig­i­nal cast are return­ing (bar Ryan Dunne who sad­ly passed away in 2011 and Bam Marg­era due to ongo­ing dis­putes with his col­leagues) and they’ve brought some new friends with them includ­ing Eric André, Tyler the Cre­ator and Shaquille O’Neal. Expect blood, poop, vom­it, and a whole lot of laughs. HS

ETA: Feb­ru­ary 2022

The third and final film in his Oslo tril­o­gy, Joachim Trier’s The Worst Per­son in the World was the toast of Cannes, and with good rea­son. Renate Reinsve’s per­for­mance as the direc­tion­less but charis­mat­ic Julie is one of the finest of the year, and this deeply fun­ny, keen­ly-observed por­trait of mod­ern romance is like­ly to res­onate with any­one who’s nav­i­gat­ed the treach­er­ous ter­ri­to­ry of try­ing to bal­ance life and love while still fig­ur­ing out who you are. You’ll laugh, you’ll cry, you’ll maybe argue with your part­ner – but you’ll fall in love with Trier’s film too. HS

ETA: March 2022

Fol­low­ing up Aus­tralia, Moulin Rouge and The Great Gats­by, Baz Luhrmann attempts to cap­ture the mys­tique of an Amer­i­can pop cul­ture icon. Austin But­ler stars in the tit­u­lar role as the Old Hol­ly­wood heart­throb along­side Tom Han­ks as Colonel Tom Park­er, Olivia DeJonge as Priscil­la and a most­ly Antipodean cast includ­ing Kodi Smit-McPhee, Xavier Samuel and Dacre Mont­gomery. Fin­gers crossed that Luhrmann’s unique­ly fre­net­ic style match­es Elvis’ mag­net­ic pull. The ques­tion that remains is, will this biopic on the hip-swiv­el­ling glob­al super­star rise above hagiog­ra­phy to shine a light on his icky infat­u­a­tion with under­age girls? MA

ETA: June 2022

It feels like the sev­enth instal­ment in the Mis­sion: Impos­si­ble fran­chise has been shoot­ing for­ev­er, thanks to pan­dem­ic com­pli­ca­tions and a hefty amount of media cov­er­age (remem­ber when some­one record­ed Tom Cruise going on a rant about staff need­ing to fol­low Covid pro­to­cols?) but the film’s gaffer con­firmed that prin­ci­ple pho­tog­ra­phy had fin­ished in Sep­tem­ber 2021. Simon Pegg, Ving Rhames, Rebec­ca Fer­gu­son and Vanes­sa Kir­by reprise their roles, while Hay­ley Atwell and Esai Morales join as the film’s antag­o­nists. HS

It was report­ed that Mar­tin Scors­ese, Leonar­do DiCaprio and Robert DeNiro were inter­est­ed in adapt­ing David Grann’s nov­el of the same name back in 2016, and they’ve been work­ing on the project ever since Scors­ese wrapped on The Irish­man. Based on a true sto­ry, Jesse Ple­mons plays a FBI inves­ti­ga­tor look­ing into the sus­pi­cious mur­der of mem­bers of the Osage tribe dur­ing the 1920s, soon after oil deposits were found on their land. De Niro plays the pri­ma­ry antag­o­nist, cat­tle­man William Hale, while DiCaprio plays his nephew, and Lily Glad­stone, Bren­dan Fras­er and John Lith­gow co-star. Film­ing fin­ished in the autumn, so we’re hope­ful a late-2022 release is on the cards. HS

Whether you’re a fan of the action-packed mar­tial arts spec­ta­cle that The Raid movies have to offer, or the gory excess of Gareth Evans’ last pic­ture Apos­tle, you must be hyped for Hav­oc. Tom Hardy (who’s also the pro­duc­er of this grit­ty crime thriller) stars as a detec­tive fight­ing his way through the crim­i­nal under­world along­side For­est Whitak­er, Jessie Mei Li and Tim­o­thy Olyphant. The film will debut on Net­flix, as the Welsh film­mak­er signed an exclu­sive deal with the stream­ing giant to pro­duce and direct for the stu­dio for the next sev­er­al years. MA

We don’t know a whole lot about Wes Anderson’s next film, oth­er than it will be the first time he’s worked with Tom Han­ks and Mar­got Rob­bie – but don’t wor­ry, a whole host of famil­iar faces will be return­ing, too. Pro­duc­tion took place in Spain dur­ing the sum­mer and autumn of 2021, so Ander­son will be into post-pro­duc­tion now, mean­ing we could see the fin­ished film by the autumn, or – if we’re lucky – in time for Cannes. Bill Mur­ray revealed the film’s title at the UK pre­mière of The French Dis­patch, but oth­er than that, we’ve got no idea what Wes has up his sleeve. Just know we’ll be first in line. HS

Best known as the direc­tor of lack­lus­tre Zac Efron rom-com That Awk­ward Moment, Tom Gormican’s CV is a lit­tle under­whelm­ing, but the duo of Nico­las Cage and Pedro Pas­cal is enough to piqué our inter­est. Play­ing an exag­ger­at­ed ver­sion of him­self, Cage takes a gig appear­ing at the birth­day par­ty of eccen­tric bil­lion­aire Javi Gutier­rez, only to get wrapped up in a bolt involv­ing the CIA and the inter­na­tion­al drugs trade. Cage had a pret­ty good 2021; here’s hop­ing his win­ning streak con­tin­ues. HS

ETA: 22 April, 2022

There’s been a spate of recent films from direc­tors based on their own child­hoods (Roma by Alfon­so Cuarón, Belfast by Ken­neth Branagh) but we’ll always turn out for a Spiel­berg film. Co-writ­ten by Tony Kush­n­er (who also wrote Lin­coln, Munich and adapt­ed West Side Sto­ry for Spiel­berg) The Fabel­mans draws inspi­ra­tion from his younger years in Ari­zona. New­com­er Mateo Zory­na Fran­cis-Deford plays Sam­my Fabel­man, while Michelle Williams and Paul Dano play his par­ents, and Seth Rogen fills in as his (pre­sum­ably fun) uncle. But most excit­ing is the cast­ing of Once Upon a Time in Hol­ly­wood scene-steal­er Julie But­ters as Sammy’s sis­ter, Anne. Appar­ent­ly the film is already in post-pro­duc­tion, so we’re like­ly to see it in a sim­i­lar release slot to West Side Sto­ry, just in time for next Christ­mas. HS

ETA: Novem­ber 2022

Rid­ing high on the suc­cess of Mar­riage Sto­ry, Noah Baumbach’s back with anoth­er sto­ry of mat­ri­mo­ni­al woe, only this one’s adapt­ed from the clas­sic Don DeLil­lo nov­el of the same name. Adam Dri­ver and Gre­ta Ger­wig play Jack and Babette Glad­ney; a mid­dle class cou­ple who live in a mid-west­ern col­lege town with their assort­ment of chil­dren. Jack teach­es Hitler Stud­ies at the local uni­ver­si­ty; both he and his wife are ter­ri­fied of dying. A wor­ry­ing event forces them to con­front their mor­tal­i­ty; sounds like pre­dictably neu­rot­ic ter­ri­to­ry for Baum­bach. Sign us up. HS

Delia Owens’ wild­ly suc­cess­ful his­tor­i­cal nov­el about a head­strong young woman grow­ing up in pover­ty in rur­al North Car­oli­na gets a cin­e­mat­ic adap­ta­tion care of Olivia New­man and screen­writer Lucy Alibar (who co-wrote Beasts of the South­ern Wild with Benh Zeitlin). Nor­mal Peo­ple break­out Daisy Edgar Jones takes on the cov­et­ed cen­tral role, and is joined by Tay­lor John Smith and Har­ris Dick­in­son as the young men com­pet­ing for her affec­tion. This one could go over very well with the awards crowd. HS

After receiv­ing crit­i­cal acclaim for direct­ing HBO minis­eries Cher­nobyl, Johan Renck returns to fea­ture films with an adap­ta­tion of Jaroslav Kalfař’s nov­el Space­man of Bohemia. Con­tin­u­ing his return to high­brow cin­e­ma kicked off with Uncut Gems, Adam San­dler plays Jakub Procház­ka, an astro­naut who embarks on a solo mis­sion to inves­ti­gate a large cloud of inter­galac­tic dust. Carey Mul­li­gan co-stars as his wife, and giv­en that a key plot point in the nov­el is Jakub form­ing a friend­ship with a giant spi­der, we can’t wait to see how Renck tack­les this one. HS

After the suc­cess of The Father, adapt­ed from his play of the same name, Flo­ri­an Zeller has turned his atten­tion to the sec­ond in his fam­i­ly tril­o­gy. Zen McGrath plays Nico­las, a teenage boy who goes through a dif­fi­cult peri­od fol­low­ing his par­ents’ divorce (played by Hugh Jack­man and Lau­ren Dern). Vanes­sa Kir­by and Antho­ny Hop­kins are also on board, and giv­en how emo­tion­al­ly dev­as­tat­ing The Father was, we rec­om­mend tak­ing some tis­sues to the cin­e­ma for this one. HS

Sto­ries told from the fringes that explore the Amer­i­can under­bel­ly are a crit­i­cal com­po­nent of Sean Baker’s oeu­vre, and Red Rock­et marks an auda­cious entry to this col­lec­tion. Simon Rex lies at the heart of this char­ac­ter study about a washed-up porn star who returns to his home­town of Texas City, even though no one real­ly wants him to. Shot in grainy 16mm, the tone is much lighter than in Tan­ger­ine and The Flori­da Project, but that didn’t stop the dark com­e­dy from receiv­ing a five minute stand­ing ova­tion at Cannes that even got jury pres­i­dent Spike Lee on his feet. MA

ETA: March 2022

It’s been far too long since Sarah Pol­ley made a fea­ture film. For her next one, she’s lined up an excit­ing cast of Frances McDor­mand, Rooney Mara, Claire Foy, Jessie Buck­ley and Ben Whishaw. Adapt­ed from Miri­am Toews’ nov­el of the same name, Women Talk­ing cen­tres on a group of Men­non­ite women from an iso­lat­ed com­mu­ni­ty who hold a meet­ing in secret to dis­cuss a har­row­ing expe­ri­ence they have been under­go­ing for the past two years. HS

McDow­ell directs his wife Lily Collins in a new thriller, also star­ring Jason Segal and Jesse Ple­mons, about a cou­ple who arrive at their vaca­tion home only to dis­cov­er it is being robbed. Net­flix snapped up dis­tri­b­u­tion rights after the film fin­ished pro­duc­tion in the sum­mer, so this one could be hit­ting the fes­ti­val cir­cuit next year. Still to come: Gild­ed Rage, McDowell’s take on the mur­der of invest­ment banker Thomas Gilbert Sr. HS

Dev Patel makes his direc­to­r­i­al debut with this action film, which he co-wrote with Paul Angu­nawela and John Collee and will also star in. Described as ​“John Wick in Mum­bai”, Net­flix snapped up the dis­tri­b­u­tion rights last spring. We nev­er tire of watch­ing Patel do his thing – could this be his offi­cial James Bond audi­tion? HS

It might be wish­ful think­ing to get anoth­er Joan­na Hogg film after we’ve been spoilt by The Sou­venir and its sub­lime sequel so recent­ly, but it doesn’t hurt to dream. Hogg reteams with her old friend Til­da Swin­ton for this ghost sto­ry about a mid­dle-aged woman and her moth­er, forced to con­front old secrets when they return to their for­mer fam­i­ly home, which has since been turned into a hotel. HS

Nick ​“Son of John” Cas­savetes is best known for direct­ing weepie romance The Note­book, but he’s also veered into thrillers before with John Q and Alpha Dog. His return to direct­ing sees him adapt Boston Tera’s nov­el, about a detec­tive whose ex-wife is mur­dered and daugh­ter is kid­napped by a satan­ic cult. After receiv­ing no answers from the police, he decides to take mat­ters into his own hands. Niko­laj Coster-Wal­dau, Jamie Foxx, Jan­u­ary Jones and Mai­ka Mon­roe star. HS

Adapt­ed from Emma Donoghue’s nov­el of the same name and with Ari Weg­n­er on cin­e­matog­ra­phy detail, we’re intrigued by Sebastián Lelio’s next project. Flo­rence Pugh, Niamh Algar, Tom Burke and Cia­ran Hinds make up just a small part of the cast in this Irish tale, which fol­lows an Eng­lish nurse who arrives in the Irish Mid­lands in 1862 to observe a young girl who seems to be able to sur­vive with­out food for months. Is it a true mir­a­cle or some­thing sin­is­ter at work? Pugh’s on the case. HS

Engulfed in wish­ful think­ing and enam­oured by A Hid­den Life, we hoped that Ter­rence Malick’s newest bib­li­cal epic would grace the sil­ver screen in 2021. Alas, the sin­gu­lar direc­tor is noto­ri­ous for tak­ing his sweet time in the edit­ing suite. His film about the sto­ry of Jesus Christ with a ​“dark genre twist” was for­mer­ly known as The Last Plan­et, and feels like a nat­ur­al next step con­sid­er­ing the auteur’s fas­ci­na­tion with faith and moral­i­ty. With Hun­gar­i­an actor Géza Röhrig as Jesus and Mark Rylance play­ing four ver­sions of Satan, we hope the wait for this one won’t be too long. MA

In June 2020 Ari Aster said he was work­ing on a four-hour ​‘night­mare com­e­dy’ with Joaquin Phoenix as the lead, and the result appears to be Dis­ap­point­ment Boule­vard. Described as ​“an inti­mate, decades-span­ning por­trait of one of the most suc­cess­ful entre­pre­neurs of all time”, we don’t have much to go on, but the cast list is long and promis­ing: Hay­ley Squires, Michael Gan­dolfi­ni, Nathan Lane, Pat­ti LuPone and Richard Kind are all attached. HS

Although the shoot isn’t sched­uled to begin until lat­er this month, Rid­ley Scott is a quick work­er, so it’s entire­ly fea­si­ble we might see his Napoleon epic before the year’s out. Anoth­er addi­tion to ​‘Scott’s Alter­na­tive His­to­ry’ canon, Joaquin Phoenix will play the diminu­tive French gen­er­al, while Jodie Com­er will play his long-time love, Josephine. The script comes from All the Mon­ey in the World scribe David Scarpa, and will report­ed­ly focus on Napoleon’s ori­gins and swift rise to pow­er in the 18^th cen­tu­ry. HS

Jonathan Glaz­er has been qui­et­ly busy, cre­at­ing a ter­ri­fy­ing short film enti­tled The Fall which aired unex­pect­ed­ly on British tele­vi­sion in 2019. His sec­ond film for the BBC debuted in July and was a col­lab­o­ra­tion with Mica Levi and Sadler’s Wells, which saw some of the world’s best dancers take inspi­ra­tion from an invol­un­tary mania which took hold of Stras­bourg in 1518. His next fea­ture film is loose­ly based on a nov­el by Mar­tin Amis, about a Nazi offi­cer who falls in love with his camp commander’s wife. The film report­ed­ly shot in Poland over the autumn, so it’s look­ing pos­si­ble we’ll see a fes­ti­val bow lat­er this year. HS

Asa But­ter­field and Gwen­dolyn Christie top the bill for Peter Strickland’s next project, which is sure to be as weird and won­der­ful as his pre­vi­ous work. Per the log­line: ​“Set at an insti­tute devot­ed to culi­nary and ali­men­ta­ry per­for­mance, a col­lec­tive finds them­selves embroiled in pow­er strug­gles, artis­tic vendet­tas and gas­troin­testi­nal dis­or­ders.” Dare we envi­sion some sort of Mr Cre­osote sit­u­a­tion? HS

Domee Shi makes her direc­to­r­i­al fea­ture debut with Turn­ing Red, about a 13-year-old Chi­nese-Cana­di­an girl who turns into a giant red pan­da when­ev­er she gets too excit­ed or stressed. Shi was the first woman to direct a Pixar short in 2018 with Bao, which also won her the Acad­e­my Award for Best Ani­mat­ed Short Film, so we can’t wait to see what she’s come up with. San­dra Oh co-stars along­side new­com­er Ros­alie Chi­ang. HS

Giv­en that this project was only announced in Octo­ber, maybe it’s wish­ful think­ing that we’ll get to see it at any point this year, but hey, opti­mism is key. For his first for­ay into fic­tion, Joshua Oppen­heimer is cre­at­ing an apoc­a­lyp­tic musi­cal star­ring Til­da Swin­ton, Stephen Gra­ham and George McK­ay, about ​“the last human fam­i­ly”. Giv­en the emo­tion­al impact of The Act of Killing and The Look of Silence, our expec­ta­tions are high for this one. HS

Hypo­thet­i­cal­ly speak­ing, we might end up with three Cro­nen­berg films in 2022, if David and the kids (Bran­don and Caitlin) all get their forth­com­ing projects off the ground. What a time to be alive! For his first fea­ture since 2014, Cro­nen­berg Sr has recruit­ed Kris­ten Stew­art and Léa Sey­doux along­side old pal Vig­go Mortensen for a remark of his 1970 film of the same name that takes place in a ​“not-so-dis­tant future in which humankind is learn­ing to adapt to its syn­thet­ic sur­round­ings. This evo­lu­tion moves humans beyond their nat­ur­al state and into a meta­mor­pho­sis, which alters their bio­log­i­cal make­up.” Sounds cheery! HS

It feels like a life­time since The Favourite came out (okay, it’s only been four years, but still…), so we’re keen to see what our favourite Greek mis­ery mer­chant has been up to. Based on the nov­el of the same name by Alas­dair Gray, Poor Things cen­tres on a woman who, unable to leave her abu­sive rela­tion­ship, decides to have her brain replaced with that of her unborn child in a surgery per­formed by her father. Yep, sounds very Lan­thi­mos. Emma Stone reunites with Yor­gos, while Willem Dafoe plays her father. Round­ing out the eclec­tic cast are Ramy Youssef, Mark Ruf­fa­lo, Jer­rod Carmichael, Christo­pher Abbott, Mar­garet Qual­ley and Kathryn Hunter. HS

Hen­ry Sel­l­ick hasn’t made a film since 2009’s Cora­line, so antic­i­pa­tion is high for his stop-motion Net­flix project which is cur­rent­ly in post-pro­duc­tion. Com­e­dy duo Kee­gan Michael Key and Jor­dan Peele play the tit­u­lar char­ac­ters, schem­ing demon broth­ers who must face their arch-neme­sis, a demon-dust­ing nun, and her goth teen lack­eys. Cora­line com­pos­er Bruno Coulais returns too, and we can’t wait to see the result. HS

While Anvari’s sec­ond film, Wounds, didn’t quite hit the mark, we’re always keen to see what he’s up to, and with George McK­ay, Hugh Bon­neville and Kel­ly McDon­ald on board, this could be some­thing very spe­cial. Details are thin on the ground for this thriller, but report­ed­ly McK­ay will be play­ing a graf­fi­ti artist who dis­cov­ers a shock­ing secret which threat­ens to put him­self and his loved ones in dan­ger. HS

While her next Eng­lish lan­guage project The Stars at Noon is in pro­duc­tion, Claire Denis man­aged to shoot a new film dur­ing the pan­dem­ic star­ring two actors she’s worked with before: Vin­cent Lin­don and Juli­ette Binoche. The lat­ter plays a woman caught between her lover and his best friend, who also hap­pens to be her ex-boyfriend. Rumour has it the film might have its pre­mière at the Berlin Film Fes­ti­val. HS

All aboard Christi­na O! Aris­to­tle Onas­sis and Jack­ie Kennedy’s yacht is manned by cap­tain Woody Har­rel­son in Ruben Östlund’s fol­low-up to 2017 Palme d’Or win­ner The Square. Östlund, who’s gar­nered tremen­dous crit­i­cal acclaim for his sharp and satir­i­cal por­traits, orches­trates a ship­wreck that pits rich and poor char­ac­ters against each oth­er. He adds that the film is ​“inspired by Marx­ist the­o­ries” and is a com­men­tary on beau­ty as cur­ren­cy. This is his first Eng­lish-lan­guage film and fea­tures a multi­na­tion­al cast includ­ing Charl­bi Dean, Har­ris Dick­in­son and Zlatko Burić, which will hope­ful­ly ensure broad­er inter­na­tion­al box office appeal. MA

The mas­ter of gial­lo returns with a new hor­ror film scored by Daft Punk. After a young woman is blind­ed by a ser­i­al killer in an attempt­ed mur­der, she encoun­ters her attack­er years lat­er, and must work with a young accom­plice to con­front him once and for all. Although Dario Argen­to has a fair few duds in his back cat­a­logue, it’s a decade since he direct­ed a film, so we’re hop­ing for some­thing more on a par with Sus­piria than Drac­u­la 3D. HS

While Bergman Island is head­ed to UK cin­e­mas in the spring, we might get anoth­er Mia Hansen-Løve film lat­er in the year too. Léa Sey­doux leads her next project, about a woman liv­ing with her eight-year-old daugh­ter in Paris, whose father is suf­fer­ing from a neu­rode­gen­er­a­tive dis­ease. While attempt­ing secure prop­er care for him, she runs into an old friend and embarks on a pas­sion­ate affair. HS

Shot in moody black-and-white against the Parisian arrondisse­ment with its dis­tinc­tive Bru­tal­ist tow­ers, Paris, 13^th Dis­trict marks Jacques Audiard’s first film to be set in the city of love since his Palme d’Or-winning Dheep­an. A trio of sto­ries by US graph­ic nov­el­ist Adri­an Tomine became source mate­r­i­al for the Cannes favourite’s ninth fea­ture, which he co-wrote with Céline Sci­amma and Léa Mysius. The lives of Camille (Maki­ta Sam­ba), Émi­lie (Lucie Zhang), Nora (Noémie Mer­lant) and Amber (Jehn­ny Beth) con­verge into a mosa­ic about mod­ern-day erot­ic entan­gle­ments. MA 

ETA: 4 March, 2022

McDon­agh reunites with his In Bruges stars Col­in Far­rell and Bren­dan Glee­son for anoth­er pitch-black dram­e­dy, con­cern­ing two old friends who find them­selves at an awk­ward cross­roads on a remote Irish island when one of them decides he wants to break off the rela­tion­ship. Ker­ry Con­don will play the sis­ter of Farrell’s char­ac­ter, while Bar­ry Keoghan is cast in an undis­closed role. The shoot wrapped in Octo­ber, so expect this one to appear on the fes­ti­val cir­cuit at some point in 2022. HS

When Chad­wick Bose­man passed away from can­cer in 2020, the world mourned a tal­ent­ed actor whose career was going from strength to strength. It will be undoubt­ed­ly emo­tion­al return­ing to cin­e­mas for the sequel to 2018’s Black Pan­ther, which Bose­man was meant to star in, but we can be sure Ryan Coogler will hon­our his mem­o­ry. While we don’t know much about the plot of the film yet, we do know that Lupi­ta Nyong’o, Danai Guri­ra, Mar­tin Free­man, Leti­tia Wright, Win­ston Duke and Angela Bas­set are repris­ing their roles, and that Dominique Thorne and Michaela Coel join the cast. HS

ETA: Novem­ber 2022