14. Elysium (8/9)
Neill Blomkamp's
District 9 is one of the best sci-fi movies of the last decade. Given that film's commercial and critical success, the filmmaker is stepping into science fiction once again with
Elysium, a futuristic tale of class warfare. In the year 2159, there are only two classes of people: those living on an overpopulated and decimated Earth, and the elite ruling class who live on an orbital colony known as Elysium. Max (Matt Damon) is an ex-con who is forced into playing coyote for a group of Earth dwellers struggling to immigrate to Elysium, but Secretary Rhodes (Jodie Foster) is a staunch supporter of anti-immigration and will stop at nothing to protect the sanctity of Elysium. Since social commentary and science fiction often go hand-in-hand, it's no wonder that Blomkamp is determined to make his movies mean something, while still delivering on great action and good writing. If it's at all as much a masterpiece as D
istrict 9 was,
Elysium could very well be one of the best movies of the year.
13. You're Next (9/23)
While it made it's debut almost two years ago, regular viewers haven't had the opportunity to see this home-invasion thriller. The premise sounds pretty basic: family event gets crashed by a pack of mysteriously masked killers. The twist apparently is that one of the captives has a secret talent for fighting back, and that's where the story really comes into play. I've stayed purposefully in the dark on this one since all the responses I've read about it have been almost glowingly positive. It sounds like a brutal little film, and anything that mixes in horror with a little action is always good in my book. Plus, that's a pretty effective poster.
12. The Tomb (9/27)
Prison escape films almost always end up being a fun time. You throw Sylvester Stallone and Arnold Schwarzenegger into the mix, and you can consider my interest piqued. Stallone plays a structural engineer who gets framed for a crime. He's thrown into a prison he himself designed, and uses all his knowledge to help orchestrate his escape. He finds an ally in a fellow prisoner (Schwarzenegger), and has to match wits with the prison's ruthless warden (Jim Caviezel). Like I said, prison films have this strange ability to always end up watchable. Considering the people involved in the movie, you can expect a good lot of action and witty one-liners. And I'm sorry, but seeing these two guys in something a little less "wink-wink" than
The Expendables gives me hope.
11. Insidious Chapter 2 (9/30)
Insidious ended up being a surprisingly effective horror film, while feeling both classical and fresh. Creators Leigh Whannell and James Wan want to repeat that by continuing the story in
Insidious Chapter 2. Not much is known about where the next film will go, but we do know that the entire cast will be returning for a second go-around. How exactly that will be accomplished considering the ending of the first film is a mystery to me, but it's a mystery I can't wait to explore. It's nice to see horror moving away from the torture porn and grittiness that took over for almost a decade after 9/11, and another
Insidious film could be a step in the direction of making horror about atmosphere and eeriness again.
10. Sin City: A Dame to Kill For (10/4)
Robert Rodriguez's amazingly faithful adaptation of Frank Miller's Sin City comics is probably only on par with Zack Snyder's
Watchmen when it comes to fidelity to the source material. It didn't hurt that
Sin City was a pretty good film either. Now, eight years later, we're getting the sequel we've been asking for. This film will be based on the comic run of the same name, but also feature brand new stories by creator Frank Miller. Mickey Rourke will be back as the juggernaut Marv, and so will Clive Owen's mysterious Dwight, along with lots of other familiar faces. It will be exciting to see how eight years has helped the technology Rodriguez invented to adapt the Sin City look to film. Plus, who couldn't use a little hard-boiled action at the beginning of October?