Movie mania
By Terry Lawson
Knight Ridder News Service
If you're wondering what will be coming to movie theaters in the weeks and months to come, this is it: the Big List.
Here are the quick-hit descriptions of the major movies scheduled for spring and summer release, along with insider information. As always, the release dates are subject to change.
Today
• "Van Helsing": See review.
• "New York Minute": See review.
May 14
• "Troy": The revival of the star-studded historical epic continues with Wolfgang Petersen's adaptation of Homer's account of the Trojan War. Ignited when Paris (Orlando Bloom) steals away Helen (gorgeous newcomer Diane Kruger), the wife of Sparta's king, the Greek warrior Achilles (Brad Pitt) launches a decade-long assault on Troy.
A scene from "Troy," to be released May 14.
The skinny: Those who have read the script say the battle scenes and romance have been well integrated into a compelling story that should have across-the-board appeal.
• "Breakin' All the Rules": Jamie Foxx turns the awful experience of being dumped by fiancée Gabrielle Union into a best-selling book about how to rebound from a break-up.
The skinny: The only studio film that dares challenge "Troy" is betting that a lot of what the marketers call the "urban audience" will have little truck with togas and sandals.
May 19
• "Shrek 2": The sequel to 2001's fractured fairy tale about an ogre (voiced by Mike Myers) who falls for the formerly beautiful princess he was ordered to rescue begins where that film ended, with the couple and the talking Donkey (Eddie Murphy) on their way to the Kingdom of Far, Far Away to celebrate their marriage with Fiona's parents (Julie Andrews and John Cleese). It appears, however, that Prince Charming isn't finished with them yet.
The skinny: DreamWorks is taking no chances, spending millions to promote it and assembling a virtual mob of fairy-tale villains to provide Shrek and Co. with comic conflict.
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| From left: Orlando Bloom in "Troy," Josie Maran in "Van Helsing," Ashley Olsen with Reinaldo the dog in "New York Minute," and Gabrielle Union in "Breakin' All the Rules." |
May 28
• "Raising Helen": Kate Hudson is Helen, a New York modeling agency assistant whose older sister and brother-in-law are killed in an accident, leaving her to raise their children — a teenage girl, a 10-year-old boy and a kindergartner played by Abigail Breslin, the little girl from "Signs."
The skinny: Director Garry Marshall has shown he can handle sentimental with "The Other Sister," romance with "Runaway Bride," and chick flicks with "The Princess Diaries" and its impending sequel. This apparently mixes them all together for audience-friendly entertainment.
• "The Day After Tomorrow": Dennis Quaid plays a paleoclimatologist, whose knowledge of weather patterns comes in pretty handy when global warming turns out to be more than a liberal-politician scare tactic and every disaster-movie threat, from hurricanes to earthquakes, come at us all at once.
The skinny: 20th Century Fox has a lot riding on this — $150 million minimum, by most guesstimates.
• "Soul Plane": Kevin Hart parlays a $1 million settlement he receives when his dog dies from airline neglect into his own business, a small airline catering to black customers. The airline is called NWA and Snoop Dogg is a pilot, leaving us to believe some farce may be involved.
The skinny: Any film in which the token white guy is Tom Arnold should be checked thoroughly on the runway.
• "Saved!": The latest in the recent spate of films about just how mean high school girls can be to each other — and everybody else — boasts an interesting twist. It's set in an evangelical Christian school where the queen bee, played by Mandy Moore, turns on former best friend Jena Malone when Malone gets pregnant during an act of charity — attempting to convince her boyfriend he's not really gay.
The skinny: Those who saw this at its Sundance premiere were divided on whether it was anti-Christian right, anti-teenage girl or just anti-funny.
June 4
• "Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban": The third installment of the series based on the books that got young America reading again. The story begins the summer before Harry's third year at Hogwarts, in which he makes the unhappy discovery that his powers can't always be controlled, and that the escaped wizard of the title (Gary Oldman) is out to get him.
The skinny: Though director Alphonso Cuaron has said that his take on the material will be different and perhaps darker, he thinks kids will still be wild about Harry and reminds us that the audience is growing up with the books and these movies.
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| From left: "Shrek 2," Kate Hudson and John Corbett in "Raising Helen," Emmy Rossum in "The Day After Tomorrow," and Snoop Dogg and Method Man in " Soul Plane." |
June 11
• "The Chronicles of Riddick": Vin Diesel, who for a minute or two looked like the next big action-movie star, regroups with a sequel to the low-budget sci-fi thriller that got him on the radar, "Pitch Black." The first of what is planned as a trilogy has escaped space convict Riddick caught up in some sort of intergalactic warlord rivalry that gets him imprisoned yet again.
The skinny: Diesel walked away from two previous action-movie franchises, but while the sequel to "XXX" is still looking for a new frontman, Diesel is apparently returning in the third "The Fast and the Furious" film, without original partner Paul Walker, so if "Riddick" hits, he could be back.
• "The Stepford Wives": Less a remake, as they like to say, than a re-imagining of the 1975 thriller about a housewife who discovers all is not what it seems in a perfect little suburb, with director Frank Oz and writer Paul Rudnick (who previously teamed on "In & Out") going for laughs instead of chills. Nicole Kidman has the role originally played by Katherine Ross, and Matthew Broderick is the husband.
The skinny: Paramount, which originally scheduled the film for last fall, is betting Kidman's first comedy since 1998's "Practical Magic" is a bona fide summer audience pleaser.
• "Garfield": CGI effects are apparently a major part of the family comedy, in which surly cat Garfield, voiced by Bill Murray, is forced to help his owner (Breckin Meyer) find that dumb dog Odie, who has disappeared.
The skinny: Internet wags named the trailer for "Garfield" the worst of the year, and the computer effects look even creepier than "Scooby-Doo's." But that shouldn't prevent one of the few G-rated films of the summer from doing a bit of business, and Murray's contribution can't hurt.
June 16
• "Around the World in 80 Days": Jackie Chan takes the role of Passepartout, the lovable thief memorably played by Cantinflas in the high-budget, high-spirited and highly disregarded 1956 movie of the Jules Verne novel. Steve Coogan, who was terrific in "24 Hour Party People," is Phineas Fogg, the Victorian dandy who bets the members of his London gentleman's club that, with the advent of air and rail travel, he can indeed circumvent the globe in 80 days.
The skinny: Independently financed and produced, this comedy was dropped by original distributor Paramount, which got cold feet over all that hot air, despite a supporting cast that includes Jim Broadbent, Luke and Owen Wilson and, as a Turkish sultan, the governor of California. Disney ultimately came to the adventure's rescue.
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| From left: Mandy Moore and Elizabeth Thai in "Saved," Emma Watson and Daniel Radcliffe in "Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban," Vin Diesel in "The Chronicles of Riddick," and the animated "Garfield" (voiced by Bill Murray). |
June 18
• "The Terminal": Steven Spielberg and pal Tom Hanks reunite for a romantic comedy apparently inspired by a true story. In this version, Hanks is a citizen of a war-torn Eastern European country that officially ceases to exist at the same time he lands in New York, making him literally a man without a country — so the airport becomes his home. Catherine Zeta-Jones co-stars as an airline attendant with whom he falls in love, and "Y Tu Mama Tambien's" Diego Luna and Stanley Tucci are also in the cast.
The skinny: If the film is as good as the trailer, currently getting an excellent reception from audiences, this should provide Hanks with a quick rebound from the disappointing "The Ladykillers" and Spielberg with his biggest summer hit since "The Lost World: Jurassic Park."
• "Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story": Vince Vaughn tries to save his neighborhood gym by competing with a ragtag team in the national dodgeball tournament in Las Vegas, ultimately going up against a corporation-backed super-squad led by Ben Stiller.
The skinny: The 11th film this year to star Stiller — OK, it's just the fourth, but it seems like many more — it is apparently not a true story, though it does co-star his wife, Christine Taylor.
June 25
• "Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow": A retro science-fiction adventure set in the 1930s, it stars Gwyneth Paltrow as a reporter looking into the disappearance of America's top scientists, a mystery that is partly solved when her old flame, dashing aviator Joe Sullivan (Jude Law), takes to the skies with his pals to do battle with the robots and never-before-seen flying machines invading the city.
The skinny: Paramount is hoping this innovative adventure, filmed with live actors working exclusively with CGI effects and backgrounds, will be the season's dark-horse hit.
• "The Notebook": James Garner and Gena Rowlands appear in the framing story of this adaptation of the Nicholas Sparks bestseller about a notebook chronicling a 1946 love triangle involving a young woman (Rachel McAdams) forced to choose between two suitors (Ryan Gosling and Kevin Connolly).
The skinny: Sparks wrote the novels that spawned the similarly sentimental films "Message in a Bottle" and "A Walk to Remember," both of which were minor hits; New Line is betting this one has summer juice.
• "White Chicks": Marlon and Shawn Wayans co-star as FBI agents who attempt to redeem themselves after a foul-up by protecting the hard-partying hotel heiresses the Wilton sisters (get it?) from a kidnapping scheme. To pull it off, they have to masquerade as, yep, rich, white chicks.
The skinny: If you've seen the trailer, you'll know that the makeup is both impressive and a little unsettling, and that the gags are not exactly "Tootsie"-style.
• "De-Lovely": No one can dispute the casting in this Cole Porter biography, which has Kevin Kline playing the songwriter looking back on his life as one mad musical about a gay songwriter who is nevertheless madly in love with his wife, played by Ashley Judd.
The skinny: Martin Scorsese toyed for a long time with the idea of making this movie, but the job has been left to his sometime producer, Irwin Winkler.
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| From left: Jude Law and Gwyneth Paltrow in "Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow," Tom Hanks in "The Terminal," Ben Stiller in "Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story," and Rachel McAdams and Ryan Gosling in "The Notebook." |
June 30
• "Spider-Man 2": Peter Parker is now a college student and part-time shutterbug for the Daily Bugle — when he's not using his powers to battle super-freaks like Dr. Octopus (Alfred Molina), that is.
The skinny: The first two scripts were rejected as unsuitable, and comic-loving novelist Michael Chabon was brought in to spin the tale, only to have that re-written by Alvin Sargent. But Sam Raimi is still at the helm, and Bruce Campbell has a cameo as a snooty usher, so how wrong could this really go?
July 2
• "The Clearing": Robert Redford is a businessman whose very good life goes very bad when he is kidnapped by a former employee and held for ransom in a forest. His wife, Helen Mirren, takes on the job of getting him freed.
The skinny: Though Redford may be the world's best-known champion of independent film through his Sundance Institute, this is the first time the aging movie star has ever participated in one.
July 7
• "King Arthur": The first meeting of the Round Table since 1995's "First Knight" is produced by Jerry Bruckheimer, but don't look for exploding castles and super-swords. It aims to put the legend into historic context, with Arthur attempting to reunite a British kingdom that has been divided into fiefdoms by warlords. Clive Owen, of "Croupier," is Arthur; Stephen Dillane is right-hand wizard Merlin; Keira Knightley is Guinevere; and hunky Ioan Gruffudd, TV's Horatio Hornblower, gets a shot at movie stardom as Lancelot.
The skinny: With director Antoine Fuqua ("Training Day") in charge and a script by Daniel Franzoni, who wrote "Amistad," we can assume that it's going for something like imagined realism.
July 9
• "Anchorman": Will Ferrell is a top-rated, bona fide media star in San Diego in the '70s, beloved by the public and management, chased by local ladies, king of the world, until the arrival of Christina Applegate, a real reporter who challenges his authority, news skills and ethics.
The skinny: If you don't want to see this, you
- have never seen Ferrell;
- have never seen local news; or
- don't remember how TV newsmen dressed in the '70s.
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| From left: Kevin Kline and Ashley Judd in "De-Lovely," Clive Owen in "King Arthur," Tobey Maguire in "Spider-Man 2," David Koechner, Christina Applegate, Will Ferrell, Paul Rudd and Steve Carell in "Anchorman." |
July 16
• "I, Robot": Based on science-fiction pioneer Isaac Asimov's anthology of the same name, it incorporates elements of all nine stories about a future society where robots live with humans. In what is said to be a sort of prequel to the Asimov stories, Will Smith stars as a detective investigating a murder that seems to be a result of robot rule-breaking.
The skinny: Asimov, who died in 1992, is suddenly a hot property. Though this film, originally developed at Disney, has taken five years to get to screen, writer Jeff Vintar is already at work adapting Asimov's "Foundation" series for a projected franchise.
• "A Cinderella Story": Hilary Duff, liberated from "Lizzie McGuire" after Disney, moves to Warner Bros. for a comedy about a San Fernando Valley dork who works in a diner run by a stepmother (Jennifer Coolidge) who dumps all the hard work on her. But her life takes a turn when a mysterious boy finds her lost cell phone and they begin a notes-and-e-mail courtship that will hopefully become real on the night of — no looking ahead now — the big dance.
The skinny: Warner is positioning itself as the teen girl-friendly studio, and teen girls don't get friendlier than the popular Duff.
July 23
• "Catwoman": Warner Bros. has been trying to get this off the ground ever since Michelle Pfeiffer stole "Batman Returns" from the star and the other villains, but the result is very different from what was originally imagined. The character now is a graphic artist named Patience Philips, played by Halle Berry, who is murdered when she stumbles across some evildoing by her cosmetics company employers. A cat she once befriended is actually an immortal Egyptian, who resurrects her so she can defend the rights of felines and other animals everywhere.
The skinny: We can assume this film lays on the camp, and Halle Berry in the rubber catsuit may be hard to resist for a certain segment of the audience.
• "The Bourne Supremacy": 2002's "The Bourne Identity," starring Matt Damon as a spy with amnesia, was a mid-sized hit for Universal, so they went ahead with the plan of adapting two subsequent novels by the late Robert Ludlum featuring the character. His identity goes missing again, this time stolen by a mysterious operative who assassinates a Chinese vice premier.
The skinny: Director Doug Liman didn't re-up for the sequel; the job went to Britain's Paul Greengrass, who has even more of an art-house sensibility, having directed the little-seen but much acclaimed "Bloody Sunday."
July 30
• "The Manchurian Candidate": A remake of John Frankenheimer's Cold War paranoia thriller, set in the present and starring Denzel Washington and Liev Schreiber in the roles originally played by Frank Sinatra and Laurence Harvey. Meryl Streep co-stars as Schreiber's manipulative mother.
The skinny: Director Jonathan Demme had little luck remaking another film from the era ("Charade") but his gift for suspense ("The Silence of the Lambs") and the richness of the material offer hope.
• "The Village": M. Night Shyamalan looks to raise a few more goose bumps with his first period thriller. Set in a small Pennsylvania village in 1897, the residents never leave, fearing that the mysterious creatures who dwell in the surrounding woods and with whom their elders apparently forged a truce will hurt them. Joaquin Phoenix is a young man looking to challenge the myth by leaving and taking the daughter (Judy Greer) of the village leader (William Hurt) with him. Adrien Brody, Sigourney Weaver and Cherry Jones are also in the impressive cast.
The skinny: Though all Shyamalan's post-"Sixth Sense" films have been successful, they have suffered by comparison. Since he claims this is his last trip to the supernatural well for a while, maybe the ideas are again flowing.
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| From left: Will Smith in "I, Robot," Halle Berry in "Catwoman," Hilary Duff and Chad Michael Murray in "A Cinderella Story," and Tom Cruise in "Collateral." |
Aug. 6
• "Collateral": Tom Cruise does a John Travolta in this drama directed by Michael Mann ("Ali"), taking the villain role as a taxi passenger whose driver, played by Jamie Foxx, realizes his fare is a contract killer and that, when he finishes his rounds, he'll be the last victim.
The skinny: This project has been around for a long time, and it sounds more like a stunt than a movie.
• "Shall We Dance?": Another Americanized remake, this one of the Japanese charmer about a shy accountant who rediscovers his dormant passion when he signs up for ballroom dancing classes. It now stars Richard Gere as a man disappointed with his job, marriage and life, who takes a dance class after becoming enthralled by the teacher (Jennifer Lopez) he glimpses on his nightly ride home on the L train.
The skinny: Though this was originally retooled with Tom Hanks in mind, Gere's hoofing in "Chicago" apparently convinced director Peter Chelsom that he could take the lead.
Aug. 11
• "The Princess Diaries 2: Royal Engagement": Anne Hathaway returns as the teenager who discovered she was royalty in the 2001 hit, based on a young readers' novel. This sequel was made from an original script, in which the part-time princess of tiny Genovia moves there to prepare to wear the crown, only to discover an arranged marriage comes with the title.
The skinny: Nearly all the original supporting cast returns, including Julie Andrews as Hathaway's grandmother and tutor in all things royal, Hector Elizondo as Genovia's security chief, and Wiener Dog herself from "Welcome to the Doghouse," Heather Matarazzo, as the princess's misfit best friend. This and "Raising Helen" give director Garry Marshall two shots at a romantic summer hit.
