With a new year comes a new slate of exciting movies, we have already mentioned The Entourage Movie but we thought we could add a few more to the “watchlist” for 2015. These are not films we necessarily expect to be the “best” (some don’t even have a trailer yet!) these are movies that, at the time of this publication, look pretty awesome for one reason or another. 2015 looks to be a sensational year for movie releases.
MAD MAX: FURY ROAD
Release Date: May 15, 2015
Starring Tom Hardy, Charlize Theron and directed by George Miller who in 2006 won the Academy Award for Best Animated Feature for Happy Feet although he is best known for his Mad Max franchise.
Excited? have you seen the trailer? That’s how a trailer for an action movie should you make you feel. It looks as though everything will be blown up, crashed, smashed, and destroyed. We can’t wait.
THE REVENANT
Release Date: December 25, 2015
The Revenant follows the story of a man left for dead in the woods after a bear attack. He survives and comes back for revenge. Director Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu’s latest project has another top-tier cast including Leonardo DiCaprio and Tom Hardy and a fascinating plot is very good news.
STRAIGHT OUTTA COMPTON’
Release date: August 14, 2015
F. Gary Gray’s N.W.A. biopic stars Ice Cube’s 23-year-old son O’Shea Jackson Jr. as his father, Jason Mitchell as Eazy-E and Corey Hawkins as Dr. Dre. The long-delayed project, set in mid-1980s Compton, chronicles how five young men translated their experiences growing up in the hood into brutally honest music that rebelled against abusive authority, gave an explosive voice to a silenced generation, and revolutionized music and pop culture forever while igniting a cultural war.
HATEFUL EIGHT
Release Date: November 13, 2015
Director: Quentin Tarantino
The latest from Tarantino has a cast including Channing Tatum, Samuel L. Jackson, Kurt Russell, Walton Goggins, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Tim Roth, Zoë Bell, Bruce Dern and Demian Bichir.
Tarantino is seemingly incapable of making bad movies, and despite a script leak making the writer-director cancel this project temporarily, The Hateful Eight is back on track and already in production. The Hateful Eight is another Western by Tarantino that follows a group of bounty hunters a few years after the Civil War attempting to survive a nasty storm, as betrayals quickly turn to violence in typical Tarantino fashion.
FANTASTIC FOUR
Release Date: August 7, 2015
Directed by Josh Trank and starring Michael B. Jordan, Kate Mara, Jamie Bell, Miles Teller.
It’s safe to say the first attempts at a Fantastic Four franchise didn’t exactly pan out, even if Johnny Storm did go on to become Captain America. This one will reunite director Josh Trank and Michael B. Jordan after Chronicle, which was surprisingly amazing.
FIFTY SHADE OF GREY
Release date: February 13, 2015
Sam Taylor-Johnson’s hotly anticipated adaptation of E.L. James’ erotic drama, about a relationship between a college student and a businessman, hits the big screen in time for Valentine’s Day with Jamie Dornan, Dakota Johnson, Eloise Mumford, Rita Ora, Marcia Gay Harden and Andrew Airlie.
BLACK MASS
Release Date: September 18, 2015
With a cast that’s second to none that includes Johnny Depp, Benedict Cumberbatch, Joel Edgerton, Sienna Miller, Kevin Bacon, Juno Temple, Dakota Johnson, Corey Stoll, Adam Scott and Peter Sarsgaard.
There’s something about seeing Depp as the balding criminal Whitey Bulger in the ’80s and sharing the screen with Benedict Cumberbatch and Joel Edgerton that has us hopeful. Black Mass is based on the 2001 book Black Mass: The True Story of an Unholy Alliance Between the FBI and the Irish Mob by Dick Lehr and Gerard O’Neill.
INSIDE OUT
Release Date: June 19, 2015
Directors: Pete Docter, Ronaldo Del Carmen
Voices of Diane Lane, Amy Poehler, Bill Hader, Mindy Kaling, Kyle MacLachlan, Phyllis Smith, Lori Alan, Lewis Black and directed by Pete Docter and Ronaldo Del Carmen.
What if your emotions were actually controlled by little individuals inside your brain, and what if they were in conflict? Insert a hilarious screenplay by Toy Story 3′s Michael Arndt and animations from Pixar and we’ll soon found out in Inside Out, a story about a girl named Riley who must deal with the emotions of moving to a new home in a new city and going to a new school.
STAR WARS: EPISODE VII – THE FORCE AWAKENS
Release Date: December 18, 2015
Directed by J.J. Abrams
As soon as Episode VII was announced all those terrible memories from the prequels vanished. George Lucas isn’t at the helm for this trilogy, and that may not be a bad thing at all. If J.J. Abrams can do for Star Wars what he did for Star Trek, this will be the trilogy to end all trilogies.
Since Disney acquired Lucasfilm and announced they would continue the saga back in late 2012 it wasn’t even up for debate; Star Wars 7 is the most anticipated film of 2015. With directors already attached for Episodes 8 & 9, along with a pair of spinoffs, Episode VII is only the beginning.
THE AVENGERS: AGE OF ULTRON
Release Date: May 1, 2015
Robert Downey Jr., Chris Evans, Scarlett Johansson, Mark Ruffalo and Australia’s own Chris Hemsworth take to the big screen in the follow-up to the third all-time highest grossing movie of all time. Earth’s Mightiest Heroes re-team to kickoff 2015 and add a few new characters to their roster to help battle the greatest threat to the Marvel Cinematic Universe yet – Ultron. The other good news is that all the key elements, including director Joss Whedon, are back, so there’s a good chance it could actually live up to the hype.
