60 films to look for­ward to in 2018 – part 2

Excit­ed to find out what movie delights await in the year ahead? You should be… Here are 30 more upcom­ing fea­tures to mark in your diary, includ­ing brand new works by Clio Barnard, Marielle Heller and Chris Mor­ris. When you’ve fin­ished, look back over the first part of our 2018 preview.

20 April

Juli­ette Binoche saun­ters through Paris in search of love after grow­ing tired of life as a divorcee artist, in the process encoun­ter­ing a slew of men who all, in one way or anoth­er, come up comed­ical­ly short of her expec­ta­tions. Let The Sun Shine In looks to be sev­er­al shades lighter than her most recent work Bas­tards, ditch­ing the sui­cide and schem­ing sib­lings for a whim­si­cal tale of the pre­car­i­ous pur­suits of Parisian passions.

Eta TBA

Saoirse Ronan stars as the epony­mous Mary in her attempts to over­throw her cousin Eliz­a­beth and the even­tu­al impris­on­ment she endured as a result of her fail­ure. David Ten­nant and Guy Pearce fea­ture, while Mar­got Rob­bie fills the role of the red-maned monarch Eliz­a­beth. With Rourke com­ing from a more the­atri­cal­ly-ori­ent­ed back­ground, this could go the way of the overt­ly wig­gy-stagey fare that befouls many such pro­duc­tion, or may thrive on the myr­i­ad tal­ents of its cast.

Eta 25 May

Eleven-year-old Par­vana lives under the rule of the Tal­iban in 2001-era Afghanistan. After the arrest of her father, she dis­guis­es her­self as a boy in order to tra­verse the coun­try unhin­dered and pro­vide for her fam­i­ly in her father’s absence. Com­ing from the team behind recent ani­mat­ed clas­sic Song of the Sea and the direc­tor of the sim­i­lar­ly bril­liant The Secret of Kells, The Bread­win­ner has a way to go in rivalling the pre­vi­ous works of its cre­ators. That said, if the charm­ing trail­er is enough to go by, it looks set to rise to the occasion.

Eta 30 March

The Iron Giant is here. So is Dead­pool. With Harley Quinn. And Fred­dy Krueger makes an appear­ance. Duke Nukem too. That might be the truck from Twist­ed Met­al. And that’s def­i­nite­ly the Delore­an from Back To The Future. Rac­ing the Light Cycle from Tron. In an MMO called The Oasis. That plays host to Tye Sheridan’s Wade Watts’ bat­tle against evil cor­po­rate forces. And it’s only one of the films on Spielberg’s 2018 sched­ule after his look at the release of the Pen­ta­gon Papers in the Tom Hanks/​Meryl Streep polit­i­cal thriller The Post.

Eta TBC

There’s no two ways about it: Har­mo­ny Korine’s Spring Break­ers is one of the great Amer­i­can satires of the new mil­len­ni­um. It’s with white-hot excite­ment, then, that we await the writer/director’s fol­low-up, The Beach Bum – espe­cial­ly as it stars Matthew McConaugh­ey as a shore­line-resid­ing ston­er who, accord­ing to the offi­cial syn­op­sis, ​“plays by his own rules”. The cast list also fea­tures Isla Fish­er, Snoop Dog, The Flori­da Project​’s Bria Vinaite and Jim­my Buf­fett (as him­self). Oh yes.

Eta 9 March

Lynne Ram­say returns with this vis­cer­al offer­ing that fol­lows enforcer Joe (Joaquin Phoenix) on his mis­sion to res­cue the miss­ing Nina (Eka­te­ri­na Sam­sonov) in an adap­ta­tion of Jonathan Ames’ nov­el, her first film since 2011’s stun­ning We Need To Talk About Kevin. Ramsay’s abil­i­ty to draw out an uncom­fort­able silence to break­ing point, and the allure of watch­ing Joaquin go to town on kid­nap­pers with a ham­mer, keeps this firm­ly on our 2018 radar.

Eta TBA

Adam McKay’s new one stars Chris­t­ian Bale as Dick Cheney in a film that looks to the influ­ence and scope of the Vice President’s poli­cies and the way they mould­ed the polit­i­cal land­scape. Along­side Bale, Sam Rock­well, Steve Carell and Amy Adams star as George W Bush, Don­ald Rums­feld and Lynne Cheney respec­tive­ly. McKay’s sor­tie into polit­i­cal film­mak­ing has proven fas­ci­nat­ing so far, and that upward trend looks set to con­tin­ue here.

Eta TBA

Set in 18^th cen­tu­ry Eng­land dur­ing the reign of Olivia Coleman’s Queen Anne, The Favourite fol­lows the fluc­tu­at­ing court stand­ings of Rachel Weisz’s Sarah after her younger cousin Abi­gail (played by Yor­gos Lan­thi­mos new­bie Emma Stone) arrives to vie for the Queen’s affec­tions. The film has been labelled as an acer­bic tale of envy and polit­i­cal intrigue, and if the director’s past work is any­thing to go by it should all come bun­dled up with a hearty help­ing of weird.

Eta TBA

Travis Wilk­er­son​’s time­ly doc­u­men­tary charts his expli­ca­tion of famil­ial secrets with­in a wider frame­work of America’s pre­oc­cu­pa­tion with race as he explores the mur­der of Bill Spann by his KKK-affil­i­at­ed great-grand­fa­ther. Against the con­tem­po­rary back­drop of bur­geon­ing fanat­i­cal nation­al­ism, Wilkerson’s grilling of the progress made since the 1946 crime seems all the more vital.

Eta TBA

It’s been nine years since Four Lions. That’s an awful­ly long time since we last heard word out of camp Mor­ris regard­ing any­thing save a few direc­to­r­i­al out­ings on Veep and his work with Stew­art Lee on his Com­e­dy Vehi­cle. And, save the news that he’s been film­ing in the Domini­can Repub­lic with Danielle Brooks and Anna Kendrick, it looks like we’re going to have to wait a lit­tle longer for any defin­i­tive word on the project. All we know is that it’s com­ing, and that it should be drop­ping some time in 2018.

9 March

Anya Tay­lor-Joy and Olivia Cooke star in Cory Finley’s direc­to­r­i­al debut about a pair of upper-class child­hood friends who set out to ​‘solve their prob­lems’ with lit­tle mind payed to the con­se­quences. The trail­er sits it some­where between The Bling Ring and The Neon Demon, whilst it fea­tures one of the final per­for­mances of the late Anton Yelchin. Keep the cal­en­dar free for this one.

Eta 3 August

The Preda­tor series has nev­er quite man­aged to recap­ture the claus­tro­pho­bic inten­si­ty or hyper-macho ham of Schwarzenegger’s 1987 romp, the lat­est attempt at a retelling being lit­tle more than a shame­less cash-grab hop­ing to leech off the charm of the orig­i­nal. That said, with The Nice Guys direc­tor Shane Black demon­strat­ed he’s got the abra­sive rap­port of belit­tling whim­sy down to a T; if any­one can come close to recap­tur­ing the mag­ic of John McTieran’s jun­gle jaunt, it’s Black.

Eta TBA

To call the pro­duc­tion of The Man Who Killed Don Quixote trou­bled would be a gross under­state­ment. Ter­ry Gilliam’s rein­ter­pre­ta­tion of the clas­sic Miguel de Cer­vantes nov­el fea­tures a businessman’s fluc­tu­a­tions between the 21^st and 17^th cen­turies, and his con­fu­sion with Don Quixote’s squire San­cho Pan­za. With a strong cast includ­ing Jonathan Pryce, Stel­lan Skars­gård and Adam Dri­ver, all that’s left it to hope that after 20 years of bug­gery the film hasn’t suf­fered. If any­one can pull it off, it’s Gilliam.

Eta 6 April

Robin Campillo’s sto­ry of young men and women fight­ing against the slack­ened gov­ern­men­tal response to AIDS in 1990’s Paris has had quite the year already. Gar­ner­ing both the Grand Prix gong at Cannes and the French nom­i­na­tion for the Acad­e­my Awards, in addi­tion to a slew of oth­er praise, the momen­tum it has accrued through fes­ti­val sea­son looks set to car­ry it yet fur­ther fol­low­ing its ear­ly 2018 release. If the buzz is to be believed and the whol­ly un-mawk­ish tone of the trail­er car­ries through into the film, this is cer­tain­ly no bad thing.

Eta TBA

Save for Andrew Garfield’s involve­ment, there’s not much to go on regard­ing David Robert Mitchell’s fol­low-up to It Fol­lows. If he man­ages to put as fresh a spin on the film’s neo-noir foun­da­tions as he did with the teen body-hor­ror of that ear­li­er film, we could be in for some­thing very special.

Eta 11 May

Aliens, punks and the streets of Croy­don play host to the John Cameron Mitchell’s expan­sion on the short sto­ry by Neil Gaiman. Elle Fan­ning dips off from her galaxy-gala­vant­i­ng group to explore the clubs and meet the peo­ple of the 1970’s punk explo­sion, cross­ing paths with Nicole Kidman’s per­ox­ide-drenched Queen Boadicea and young musi­cian Enn (Alex Sharp). So far it’s been pret­ty poor­ly received by Cannes, but that’s Cannes. It doesn’t count. Mitchell has a back­ground in strong moviemak­ing per­tain­ing to sub­cul­ture music and the lives orbit­ing it, so we’ll give this a chance. Plus, the oppor­tu­ni­ty to see Nicole Kid­man as a snarling Siouxsie Sioux alike ought to be a doozy too.

Eta TBA

Robert Red­ford is back to bank rob­bing in David Lowery’s tale of a retiree jail­bird cash­ing in his chips for one last heist. The sto­ry upon which it’s based is mad enough to enthrall, and Low­ery has been on a near-flaw­less run since 2013’s Ain’t Them Bod­ies Saints, so all signs point to this one being anoth­er shin­er. Plus, Tom Waits is in it.

Eta TBA

Melis­sa McCarthy fills in for the depart­ing Julianne Moore as Lee Israel, the pro­lif­ic author turned-fraud turned-author again. After falling foul of the fick­le fan­cies of celebri­ty scoops, Israel turns to forg­ing let­ters, pur­port­ed­ly from famous deceased celebri­ties, and sell­ing them to the media with the aid of Richard E Grant’s Jack in an effort to rein­vig­o­rate her fail­ing career. If Marielle Heller can main­tain her momen­tum from the won­der­ful The Diary of a Teenage Girl, and McCarthy goes more Spy than The Boss, we should be in good shape to for­give her for the latter.

Eta 29 June

With Ste­fano Sol­li­ma assum­ing direct­ing duties from Denis Vil­leneuve, and penned by the capa­ble hand of Tay­lor Sheri­dan, the fol­low up to Sicario traces the esca­la­tions in the fruit­less game of attri­tion that is the War on Drugs. Focussed on the stretch of land bor­der­ing the US and Mex­i­co, Sol­da­do sees the return of Josh Brolin’s Agent Graver and Beni­cio Del Toro’s mer­ci­less­ly clin­i­cal Ale­jan­dro. Del Toro’s pres­ence is rea­son enough to give this world a sec­ond visit.

Eta 21 December

Mary Pop­pins makes her return in Rob Marshall’s fol­low-up to the 1964 clas­sic, with Emi­ly Blunt fill­ing Julie Andrews’ shoes as the tit­u­lar nan­ny. With Jane and Michael Banks all grown up and with fam­i­ly of their own, the brol­lied babysit­ter makes her vis­it after the unit suf­fers a loss. With the help of Lin-Manuel Miran­da she revi­talis­es the wan­ing won­der of the way­ward sib­lings. Emi­ly Mor­timer and Ben Whishaw por­tray the agieng Banks chil­dren, whilst Dick Van Dyke repris­es his role as Mr Dawes.

Eta 23 February

Alice returns home after her father’s death to inher­it the ten­an­cy to the fam­i­ly farm she believes she is enti­tled to, though it tran­spires her broth­er Joe has his own designs on the prop­er­ty. Ruth Wil­son and Mark Stan­ley por­tray the feud­ing sib­lings in Clio Barnard’s lat­est direc­to­r­i­al offer­ing after the stun­ning The Self­ish Giant, while Sean Bean addi­tion­al­ly fea­tures as the the pair’s father in the film’s many flash­back sequences.

Eta TBA

Steve McQueen’s Wid­ows fol­lows the fates of four women whose hus­bands are killed in a botched heist, who then decide to take on the job them­selves in this reimag­in­ing of the 1983 series. Vio­la Davis, Michelle Rodriguez, Eliz­a­beth Debic­ki and Cyn­thia Eri­vo star as the epony­mous bereaved with strong sup­port from Jon Bern­thal, Robert Duvall and Daniel Kaluuya.

Eta 26 January

Aard­man mae­stro Nick Park’s first direc­to­r­i­al out­ing since 2005 sees Eddie Red­mayne as Dug, a cave­man con­tend­ing with the encroach­ment of the Bronze Age on his Stone Age tribe. Tom Hid­dle­ston pro­vides the vil­lain­ous tones of Lord Nooth while the capa­ble ensem­ble of Richard Ayoade, Tim­o­thy Spall and Maisie Williams ensures the Aard­man charm is like­ly to be in full swing through­out this cave­man caper.

Eta 9 February

After uncov­er­ing a ter­ror­ist plot on a Parisian train, three Amer­i­cans are forced to sub­due their attack­ers. Clint East­wood has been on some­thing of a lull for the last ten years, and The 15:17 To Paris cer­tain­ly has the air of jin­go­is­tic pornog­ra­phy around it, but if East­wood can sub­due his patri­ot­ic incli­na­tions this could be a thrilling return to form.

Eta 25 May

Set before the first (note: first) Star Wars film, Solo: A Star Wars Sto­ry fea­tures a young Han and Chew­bac­ca rol­lick­ing around the galaxy get­ting up to shenani­gans with Daen­erys Tar­garyen and Child­ish Gam­bi­no. It’s had a trou­bled pro­duc­tion, but the film still looks set to make its May 25^th debut. The tri­als and tribu­la­tions of reshoots gave us arguably the best ever Star Wars film in Rogue One, and Alden Ehren­re­ich is an inspired choice for young Han; all being well, Solo will live up to the astro­nom­i­cal expec­ta­tions levied against it.

Eta 16 February

A new Guiller­mo del Toro film is always cause for cel­e­bra­tion, and in his lat­est – a love let­ter to the 1954 hor­ror clas­sic – he posits the ques­tion at the fore of the hor­ror zeit­geist; what if the Crea­ture from the Lagoon began tryst­ing with the hero­ine? Sal­ly Hawkins and Doug Jones play the unlike­ly lovers beset by Michael Shannon’s cal­lous Agent Strick­land in a film that promis­es to main­tain the com­pas­sion­ate eye del Toro has cul­ti­vat­ed for the uncon­ven­tion­al Oth­er over his illus­tri­ous career.

Eta 12 February

Return­ing to the tech­no­log­i­cal­ly advanced African nation Wakan­da fol­low­ing the death of his father, Chad­wick Boseman’s T’Challa looks set to suc­ceed as its king. Before he can do so, ene­mies old and new hatch a plan to bring down both the king­dom and the world. Team­ing up with CIA-Bil­bo and Danai Gurira’s Okoye, T’Challa sets out to pre­vent his king­dom falling into dis­re­pair in this lat­est Mar­vel vehi­cle, direct­ed by Rocky-revi­tal­ist Ryan Coogler.

Eta TBA

Apart from the involve­ment of Robert Pat­tin­son and Mia Wasikows­ka, not much is known about the Zell­ner Brother’s tale of a businessman’s West­ward ven­ture to his dis­tant fiancée. Their last film Kumiko, the Trea­sure Hunter was fan­tas­tic, and Pat­tin­son describes the film as hav­ing some­thing of a slap­stick com­e­dy feel to it which is only good news if the qual­i­ty of the humour in the pair’s past work man­ages to work its way into this lat­est offering.

Eta 9 November

Whether or not Bad Boys For Life ends up mate­ri­al­is­ing in 2018 remains to be seen. Giv­en the tumul­tuous pro­duc­tion the film has endured so far, it would come as lit­tle sur­prise if the third instal­ment of the Will Smith/​Martin Lawrence com­e­dy series gets pushed back yet again. The plot is being kept under wraps for now, and with Joe Carnahan’s depar­ture in 2017 so is word of a replace­ment direc­tor. We’re opt­ing to keep a sun­ny out­look though.

Eta TBA

It’s about a ser­i­al killer. It tracks the course of his mur­ders over the course of twelve years span­ning the 1970s through the 1980s. He’s played by Matt Dil­lon in a get­up that falls some­where between Jef­frey Dah­mer and Dwight Schrute. Von Tri­er claims it’s a cel­e­bra­tion of the idea that life is evil and inher­ent­ly soul­less. Pen­cil this one in. Take the kids.