Going to movies during the holiday season is an atypical tradition that many people have taken up. Maybe there’s only so much of your bickering parents that you can take. Maybe the dinner bird has been eaten but your brother still acts like a huge turkey. Maybe… well, maybe there’s a million reasons to get out of the house and sit in a dark room with a bunch of strangers.
Trust me, I understand.
And so, a bit of a primer on what’s out in theatres for the next two weeks might be immeasurably helpful before you run out of the house, barely grabbing your boots in the process. I’ll skip over the new Star Wars movie. If you haven’t seen it already, much has been said about it and you all probably know my thoughts on it too. There are probably other films that are better worth your attention. Most of them are serious Oscar contenders too but there’s still a few frivolous and fun ones out there if you’re really looking to veg out.
Start with The Big Short, just out on Wednesday. It’s a well-cast take on the credit and housing collapse that happened only in the last decade. Four smart but otherwise powerless people in the industry (played by Ryan Gosling, Christian Bale, Steve Carell, and Brad Pitt) take on the banks by betting against the market at just the right time of the collapse. If the story doesn’t compel you then perhaps the pretty people will.
The rest of the titles on this list were just released yesterday.
Joy is another sure winner from the team of director David O. Russell and Jennifer Lawrence. They did Silver Linings Playbook and American Hustle. This biographical movie is the making of an American legend as we follow one woman named Joy Mangano (Lawrence) who becomes the matriarch of her family and the business that she founded. Also starring are fellow Russell devotees Bradley Cooper and Robert De Niro, along with a stellar supporting cast with Diane Lane, Isabella Rossellini and Virginia Madsen. If you’re looking for peace on earth then Joy should be good for the soul.
Concussion is another one of Will Smith’s attempts to be taken seriously as an actor. It’s a true story about pathologist Dr. Bennet Omalu who first discovers that professional athletes’ brains were being treated poorly on the fields of play, all thanks to repeated knocks. His attempts to bring the information to the public’s attention were thwarted by the National Football League. I haven’t seen the movie but I think he eventually succeeded. I still don’t think that Smith will ever get a golden boy for his troubles though.
Point Break is the remake of the 1991 Patrick Swayze and Keanu Reeves actioner. While the story remains the same, the action will be somewhat different. A young FBI agent goes undercover to infiltrate and expose a gang of thieves, who also happen to be extreme sports enthusiasts. There will be scenes of snowboarding, wingsuit flying, free rock climbing, high-speed motocross, and surfing 70-foot waves. Amid the action, there might also be scenes of acting. Time will tell.
Daddy’s Home marks the return of Mark Wahlberg and Will Ferrell after their 2010 hit The Other Guys. Mark my words that this odd couple surely won’t stop with this flick. A child’s mild stepfather named Brad tries to establish himself in the new order once the father named Dusty (who’s a tough guy) shows up. You can guess who plays what character. I’m sure that Wahlberg will talk fast and Ferrell will scream hilariously and all will end well somehow.
After all that, we can all look forward to The Revenant, the new Alejandro González Ińárritu film starring Leonardo DiCaprio, Tom Hardy and Domhnall Gleeson. Partially filmed in Alberta, it tells of a frontiersman who seeks vengeance against those who left him for dead after a bear attack in the middle of a brutal winter. It opens in Edmonton on Jan. 8.
Also opening that day is Quentin Tarantino’s new western The Hateful Eight. Filmed in glorious 70 mm, it’s a tale of survival in post-Civil War Wyoming as bounty hunters hole up at a stagecoach stop during a winter storm but end up in a battle of wits and bullets that surely would have pleased and appalled Agatha Christie. It stars Kurt Russell, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Tim Roth, ZoĂ« Bell, Michael Madsen, Channing Tatum, Bruce Dern and Samuel L. Jackson.
