50 films to look for­ward to in 2016 – part 2

It’s that time of year again where we start mark­ing our diary with key release dates for the months ahead. After you’ve made of note of the fol­low­ing 25 upcom­ing releas­es, but sure to check out the first part of our bumper 2016 preview.

Eta 26 February

Joel and Ethan Coen alter­nate between sur­re­al­ly bleak and sur­re­al­ly hilar­i­ous fea­ture film pre­sen­ta­tions. After the icy sor­row of Inside Llewyn Davies, they are back with more razzmatazz than ever before. Hail, Cae­sar is a movie about 1950s movies until it becomes a movie about the kid­nap of a movie star named Baird (pro­nounced ​’Bad’) Whit­lock. The trail­er is pure joy untram­melled, boast­ing dead­pan deliv­er­ies by delec­table A‑list tal­ents at the top of their games. We’re talk­ing Chan­ning Tatum, Scar­lett Johans­son, George Clooney, Ralph Fiennes, Til­da Swin­ton and Josh Brolin. If the trail­er hasn’t poached the best mate­r­i­al then Hail, Cae­sar! is going to be all the fun of the fair. Sophie Monks Kaufman

Eta 16 January

Room is anoth­er film which at one point looked like some­thing of a min­now in the awards sea­son pool and has been grow­ing in stature as the days go by. Lenny Abra­ham­son taps into a more com­mer­cial vein of film­mak­ing after his weird musi­cal road movie, Frank, with this stel­lar adap­ta­tion of Emma Donoghue’s nov­el in which a young woman (Brie Lar­son) is impris­oned in a shed as a sex slave while hav­ing to bring up her young son in a way which doesn’t pre­vent him from enjoy­ing and under­stand­ing life beyond the doors. The film’s great strength is that it isn’t a genre thriller – it is a film which pro­pos­es that revenge is not the first and only thing on the mind of a long-term cap­tive. David Jenk­ins

Eta 15 January

We’ve already seen The Revenant and, well, with­out want­i­ng to raise your hopes too high, it’s fuck­ing spec­tac­u­lar. Ale­jan­dro González Iñárritu’s epic revenge west­ern sees Leonar­do DiCaprio get down and dirty as scorned fur trap­per Hugh Glass, who’s forced to embark on a gru­elling trek through the sav­age heart of the Amer­i­can fron­tier cir­ca 1823. Bear fights, shal­low buri­als and scalp­ings are just some of the activ­i­ties on offer in what is quite sim­ply one of the most impres­sive cin­e­mat­ic endurance tests you could ever hope to expe­ri­ence. Adam Wood­ward

Eta 12 February

While watch­ing rich peo­ple on their hol­i­days might be most people’s idea of Hell on wheels, the neat twist with Luca Guadagnino’s A Big­ger Splash is that they’re singing, danc­ing, fight­ing and fuck­ing all the damn time. Into the pot goes Matthias Schoe­naerts, Til­da Swin­ton, Dako­ta John­son and Ralph Fiennes as they pot­ter around a deluxe vil­la on the Ital­ian island of Pan­tel­le­ria, throw­ing mean­ing­ful glances at one anoth­er, the odd cat­ty barb, each try­ing to divulge the hid­den moti­va­tion of the oth­er. It’s loose­ly inspired by the ​’60s French hit La Piscine by Jacques Der­ay, only this one has Swin­ton as a coke-hoover­ing rock idol who’s in a peri­od of con­va­les­cence. And Fiennes dances like a man freak to the Stones. DJ

Eta unknown

Emi­ly Dick­in­son is the poet who wrote the shiv­er­some line, ​‘I would not stop for death so he kind­ly stopped for me.’ Ter­ence Davies’ forth­com­ing biopic about her life is mak­ing us so excit­ed we can hard­ly breathe. The Eng­lish maestro’s lyri­cal style of film­mak­ing is des­tined to bring some­thing tran­scen­dent out of Dickinson’s life and work. Stir in the fact that he pre­pared by read­ing six biogra­phies and described A Qui­et Pas­sion in an inter­view with LWLies as, ​“my most auto­bi­o­graph­i­cal [film]. I real­ly did feel that sym­bi­ot­ic towards Emi­ly Dick­in­son.” This has the poten­tial to be one of the best films of 2016. SMK

Eta unknown

Eye­brows were under­stand­ably raised in 2013 when French direc­tor Olivi­er Assayas announced that he had cast Kris­ten Stew­art in his next project. The result­ing film, Clouds of Sils Maria – for which Stew­art won the César award for Best Sup­port­ing Actress – turned out to be one of 2014’s best, so it’s with gid­dy excite­ment that we await the pair’s next col­lab­o­ra­tion. At the time of writ­ing not much has been revealed about Per­son­al Shop­per, but we do know it’s a Paris-set Eng­lish-lan­guage ghost sto­ry that takes place in the fash­ion world. The film is cur­rent­ly list­ed as being in post-pro­duc­tion, so expect to see it at a major fes­ti­val in the New Year. AW

Eta 22 January

Though released ear­ly next year, Hou Hsiao-Hsien’s The Assas­sin will like­ly go down as one of the best films of 2015, as it has been putting in a seri­ous shift on the fes­ti­val cir­cuit. This is the director’s first film since 2007’s won­der­ful Paris-set The Flight of the Red Bal­loon, and the sure-hand­ed gor­geous­ness of the first two min­utes alone shows that he took his good sweet time over this one. The film tells the tale of a female assas­sin (Shu Qi) who’s giv­en a task which she feels moral­ly unable to ful­fil. YetH­siao-Hsien doesn’t just offer view­ers a sim­ple human dra­ma, instead enfold­ing this bat­tle of nerves into the immac­u­late­ly ren­dered court life of 9^th cen­tu­ry Chi­na. DJ

Eta unknown

When we spoke to Adam Dri­ver back in March for our While We’re Young issue, he was tak­ing a break from shoot­ing Mar­tin Scorsese’s Japan­ese his­tor­i­cal dra­ma, Silence. Since then pro­duc­tion has wrapped, but aside from an ear­ly pub­lic­i­ty still of Liam Nee­son as a dirt-smudged Jesuit Por­tuguese priest, exact details about the plot has remained fit­ting­ly hush-hush. The film has been in ges­ta­tion since 2009, and for rea­sons too com­pli­cat­ed and dull to go into here, Scors­ese end­ed up putting it on the back­burn­er in favour of Shut­ter Island, Hugo and The Wolf of Wall Street suc­ces­sive­ly. It’s fair to say, then, that this is a real pas­sion project of Marty’s, which makes it a very excit­ing prospect indeed. AW

Eta 15 April

Jeff Nichols is our kin­da guy. His movies (Shot­gun Sto­ries, Mud, Take Shel­ter) toy with con­ven­tion­al gen­res, but usu­al­ly add an invig­o­rat­ing exis­ten­tial twist to the mix. Plus, he enjoys cast­ing Michael Shan­non, and has done in his lat­est, a so-called sci-fi movie called Mid­night Spe­cial, which we under­stand has lit­tle in com­mon with the Cre­dence Clear­wa­ter Revival song of the same name. Per an ear­ly trail­er, the film looks to be about a young sage with some kind of strange super­pow­er who needs to be tak­en across the south­ern states of Amer­i­ca for some oblique goal or rit­u­al. This is going to be one of those movies where the less we know, the more excit­ing it’ll be. DJ

Eta 22 July

‘From the imag­i­na­tion of Roald Dahl’ are the words that kick­start the trail­er for Steven Spielberg’s adap­ta­tion of one of the author’s best-loved children’s sto­ries. Dahl’s imag­i­na­tion was spec­tac­u­lar and didn’t shy away from dark and twist­ed cor­ners (just read his adult sto­ries). The BFG is about a lit­tle girl called Sophie who is kid­napped by a big friend­ly giant and tak­en away to the land of the giants. The tone of the trail­er is mag­i­cal, con­jur­ing the awe of a child’s eye-view of a fan­tas­tic uni­verse pow­ered by an ever-epic John Williams score. Although we only see his shad­ow and then a mas­sive hand, Mark Rylance is a swell cast­ing choice for The BFG while new­com­er Ruby Barn­hill embod­ies a short-haired ver­sion of Quentin Blake’s illus­tra­tions of the minia­ture hero­ine. SMK

Eta 15 July

Damien Chazelle announced him­self as a major new tal­ent with his Oscar-scoop­ing 2014 debut fea­ture, Whiplash, and next year the writer/​director will be hop­ing to repeat the trick with La La Land. This Los Ange­les-set roman­tic musi­cal con­cerns a whirl­wind love affair between a jazz pianist and an aspir­ing actress and reunites Crazy, Stu­pid, Love. stars Ryan Gosling and Emma Stone. See­ing as how we’re suck­ers for a good rom-com, this sounds just the tick­et. AW

Eta 29 July

Hav­ing scored one of their biggest ever suc­cess­es with the neu­ro-sci­ence themed com­e­dy, Inside Out, you sus­pect that the Pixar crew are kick­ing them­selves that their forth­com­ing slate is stacked high with sequels. Aside from fur­ther Toy Sto­ry and The Incred­i­bles antics, the most intrigu­ing – let’s call them what they are – fran­chise exten­sion is Find­ing Dory, a ​‘what if?’ adjunct to 2003’s marine-based retool­ing of The Searchers, Find­ing Nemo. The new focus is on Dory (voiced by Ellen DeGeneres), the lov­able but men­tal­ly defec­tive fish who gen­er­ates the desire to recon­nect with her long-estranged fam­i­ly. Oth­er voice cast include Willem Dafoe, Diane Keaton, and reunit­ed The Wire alum­ni Idris Elba and Dominic West. DJ

Eta 5 February

Six­ties singer Janis Joplin made sounds like a soul sawn by sand-paper. The gut­tur­al voice that sung famous lines, ​‘freedom’s just anoth­er word for noth­ing less to lose’ and ​‘take anoth­er lit­tle piece of my heart now, baby!’ is detached – just anoth­er cul­tur­al meme hang­ing in the ether. Amy Berg’s emo­tion­al­ly and cul­tur­al­ly astute doc­u­men­tary reat­tach­es the voice to a woman with touch­ing and detailed results. The por­trait of Janis that emerges is gen­tle, ambi­tious and ide­al­is­ti­cal­ly desirous of mean­ing­ful com­mu­ni­ca­tion. Her death from hero­in at 27 is trag­ic but the val­ues that she lived by are too true to die. SMK

Eta 29 July

Let’s set aside that under­whelm­ing 2012 Jere­my Ren­ner vehi­cle and rejoice in the news that Matt Damon is back where he belongs – in a Bourne movie direct­ed by Paul Green­grass. This sequel will see Damon spy­ing it up for a fourth time as the epony­mous CIA stooge, with Vin­cent Cas­sel play­ing a rival assas­sin and Ali­cia Vikan­der – who report­ed­ly turned down a role in Assassin’s Creed for this – also mak­ing an appear­ance as an as-yet unnamed char­ac­ter. AW

Eta 15 July

We don’t know if you guys have heard but Paul Feig is direct­ing a female-dom­i­nat­ed reboot of Ivan Reitman’s beloved Ghost­busters. Haters gonna hate but ghost exter­mi­na­tors got­ta exter­mi­nate. Kris­ten Wiig, Melis­sa McCarthy, Kate McK­in­non and Leslie Jones are on main ghos­bust­ing detail while Sigour­ney Weaver, Chris Hemsworth and Eliz­a­beth Perkins lurk promis­ing­ly in the sup­port cast. Dan Aykroyd who was part of the orig­i­nal line-up has a writ­ing and act­ing cred­it so expect wink-nudge ref­er­ences. Lit­tle is known about the plot but – to set aside sacred his­tor­i­cal bag­gage – this is the team that brought us Brides­maids, The Heat and Spy. Qual­i­ty comedic goods are in the off­ing. SMK

Eta 18 November

The time to dis­cov­er how far the pop­u­lar­i­ty of author JK Rowl­ing extends as she teams as screen­writer with direc­tor David Yates (helmer of the last few Har­ry Pot­ter movies) to offer a spin-off saga which explores the eccen­tric world of mag­ic some 70 years before the antics of the famous boy wiz­ard takes place. John­ny Oscars him­self, Eddie Red­mayne, is play­ing New­ton ​“Newt” Sca­man­der, a famed a famed Mag­i­zo­ol­o­gist and author of the tome on which this film is based. Cur­rent­ly slot­ted in for a Novem­ber release, this looks like it’ll be the pre-Yule­tide fam­i­ly pick to beat. DJ

Eta unknown

Not famous friend of the inter­net, Shia LaBeouf, has made a film with one of the UK’s best direc­tors, Andrea Arnold. It’s called Amer­i­can Hon­ey and fol­lows new­com­er Sasha Lane as Star, a teenage girl who falls in with a bunch of mis­fits while on a jour­ney of self-dis­cov­ery across America’s Mid­west. It also stars Shia LaBeouf in a lead role, which means it could go either way. That said, with Arnold’s track record (Wuther­ing Heights, Fish Tank, Red Road), this is def­i­nite­ly one to keep a close eye on. AW

Eta 8 April

Chilean-Amer­i­can direc­tor, writer and actor Sebastián Sil­va deliv­ers an enter­tain­ing con­tem­po­rary rom­com about a gay cou­ple try­ing for a baby with help from Kris­ten Wiig. Sil­va and his on-screen beau, Tunde Ade­bimpe drum up dynam­ic chem­istry while nes­tled in the colour­ful heart of boho New York. Dra­ma seems to come from every­day strug­gles, includ­ing Silva’s plan to act as a baby in an art instal­la­tion. Then sud­den­ly dra­ma comes from some­where else and the genre of the film switch­es. Expec­ta­tion and attach­ments to char­ac­ters are sub­vert­ed and seri­ous social ques­tions fly. If that’s not enough, both Alia Shawkat (Arrest­ed Devel­op­ment) and Silva’s real, adorable cat are in the sup­port cast. SMK

Eta 12 February

The mag­ic of the movies is that any­thing goes. One way to use this free­dom is to take a clas­sic Jane Austen nov­el and mix in zom­bies. Noth­ing puts the harsh judge­ments of the Vic­to­ri­an upper class­es into per­spec­tive like an army of the undead. Amer­i­can writer, direc­tor and one-time actor Burr Steers has Igby Goes Down on his cred­its which means lay­ered com­ic ten­sion is with­in his reach. The cast is a thor­ough­ly British affair with Lily James as Lizzie Ben­nett, Sam Riley as Mr Dar­cy, Sal­ly Phillips as Mrs Ben­nett and Charles Dance as Mr Ben­nett. Matt Smith, Dou­glas Booth and Lena Head­ey are also muck­ing in on anti-zom­bie duty. SMK

Eta unknown

Ben Wheat­ley has been a very busy boy of late. While his High-Rise is set for release on 18 March, his next film, Free Fire, is already in post-pro­duc­tion. The ter­rif­ic Brie Lar­son stars along­side Armie Ham­mer and Cil­lian Mur­phy in this late-’70s set Boston crime-dra­ma about rival gangs duk­ing it out in an aban­doned ware­house. If it’s start­ing to sound like Wheatley’s most con­ven­tion­al film to date, we’re ful­ly expect­ing it to be any­thing but. AW

Eta 27 May

Wip­ing the hor­rif­ic mem­o­ry of Tim Burton’s Alice in Won­der­land from the slate for just one moment, an inkling of hope is offered by the fact that James Bobin – the guy behind the recent Mup­pets revival – is tak­ing care of busi­ness. Mia Wasikows­ka and John­ny Depp return for Alice/​Mad Hat­ter detail respec­tive­ly, and Hele­na Bon­ham-Carter will go all giant head­ed once more as the Queen of Hearts. Per Lewis Carroll’s nov­el, the action takes place six months after the orig­i­nal film and com­pris­es of Alice’s adven­tures when she pass­es through a mag­ic mir­ror. Slat­ed for an May 27 release date, this seems tee’d up for a world pre­mière at the Cannes Film Fes­ti­val. DJ

Eta 16 December

Just as the dust of mass hys­te­ria will have set­tled fol­low­ing the release of The Force Awak­ens, it’s time to get hyped once more as the first Star Wars spin-off movie drops exact­ly one year (minus a day) down the line. The good news is that it’s being direct­ed by Brit Gareth Edwards, who gave us one of the great block­busters in recent times with Godzil­la. Of what’s been dropped down the pub­lic­i­ty chute thus far, we can see that this new tale looks at the lives of an eth­ni­cal­ly diverse cadre of fight­er pilots who are set the task of nab­bing plans for the Death Star, a plot which almost recalls a mono­logue in Clerks. The stel­lar cast includes Mads Mikkelsen, Don­nie Yen, Felic­i­ty Jones and Ben Mendel­sohn. DJ

Eta 3 June

Iron Man 3 direc­tor Shane Black has recruit­ed noto­ri­ous hard man Rus­sell Crowe and seri­ous heart­throb Ryan Gosling for his knock­about bud­dy com­e­dy, which fol­lows a hap­less pri­vate eye (Gosling) and a no-non­sense enforcer (Crowe) as they attempt to crack a miss­ing per­sons case in ​’70s Los Ange­les. The funky peri­od clob­ber has already sold us, but if The Nice Guys turns out to be any­thing like as out­ra­geous as the red band trail­er that dropped ear­li­er this month, it could be one of 2016’s sur­prise pack­ages. AW

Eta 26 December

Hav­ing suc­cess­ful­ly tack­led The Scot­tish Play with Michael Fass­ben­der and Mar­i­on Cotil­lard by his side, Justin Kurzel leaps from the Bard to Playsta­tion as his next fea­ture will be a screen adap­ta­tion of the insane­ly pop­u­lar com­put­er game, Assassin’s Creed. When we inter­viewed Kurzel about Mac­beth when it played in Cannes, he told us that he was excit­ed about the prospect of scal­ing up in such a way, and that before pro­duc­tion of the film he played and com­plet­ed the game. So that’s a good start. Even though gam­ing movies have gained a jus­ti­fi­ably poor rep­u­ta­tion (thanks Pix­els!), this real­ly could be the that ris­es to the peak of that cul­tur­al garbage heap. And one of our favourite actors, Ari­ane Labed, is involved. Count us in. DJ

Eta unknown

Paul Ver­ho­even is a direc­tor with such well-honed instincts for trashy enter­tain­ment that we can’t help but main­tain a lev­el of curios­i­ty about his films. Sure, the hour­glass has lost a lot of sand since his glo­ry days in the late ​’80s and ​’90s (Robo­Cop, Total Recall, Basic Instinct, Show­girls, Star­ship Troop­ers) but you nev­er know! Elle is based on the nov­el ​‘Oh…’ by Phillippe Dijan and stars Isabelle Hup­pert as a career woman called Michelle who is attacked in her own home. Ver­ho­even has described the film as a rape mys­tery and told Vari­ety, ​“I had a strong feel­ing with this one that I was doing some­thing that I’d nev­er done before, which applied when I made Robo­Cop.” SMK

Catch up with part 1 of our 2016 pre­view and let us know which upcom­ing releas­es you’re most excit­ed to see @LWLies