Time for a summer escape The film industry has its own calendar, and that means May kicks off its hottest season of the year By: Randall King Posted: 7:00 PM CDT Friday, May. 10, 2019

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 09/05/2019 (2013 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

It’s spring, we know.

But because of a certain mega-Marvel movie release, coupled with a ice/slush-free conditions outside, it means it’s time for a summer movie preview.

That’s just how it works, people. What were once considered summer-friendly film components — action, fantasy, rude comedy — are in evidence in most of the movies year-round. Still, the idea of movie escapism comes to the fore in the summer months, even when favourable weather conditions and and abundance of holiday time diminish the reasons we need an escape.

So let’s go, date-by-date and weekend-by-weekend for a look at what’s in store at the local multiplex.

 

May 17

The shot-in-Manitoba A Dog’s Journey is a sequel to the successful 2017 shaggy dog story A Dog’s Purpose. The concept of the first movie — a single dog keeps reincarnating into other dogs over time — continues as the dog formerly known as Bailey makes a pact with Dennis Quaid’s farmer Ethan to protect his step-granddaughter.

Keanu Reeves returns to the action franchise John Wick Chapter 3: Parabellum as an assassin who finds himself the object of a $14-million contract upon being ejected from a worldwide guild of killers.

The Sun Is Also a Star is a romance between Natasha, a grounded young woman whose family is facing deportation who falls hard for Daniel, a young man who has hitherto devoted his life to pleasing his parents.

 

May 24

Disney continues on its mission to do live-action remakes of its animated hits with Aladdin, with Will Smith (inheriting the role once voiced by Robin Williams) taking on the role of the genie who aids young “street rat” Aladdin (Mena Massoud) in his dream to become a prince.

Directed by Olivia Wilde, Booksmart is a rare raunchy teen comedy from the girls perspective about two high-achieving best friends who decide to cram four years worth of bad behaviour into a single night, on the eve of their high school graduation.

Note that James Gunn — the Guardians of the Galaxy director who examined the dark side of superhero mythology in Super — is a producer on Brightburn, a horror movie that proceeds from the same starting point as Superman: an infant child from another world is adopted by a woman (Elizabeth Banks) who raises him as her own. Unfortunately, the lad has super-abilities, and he’s not shy about using them for evil purposes.

 

May 31

Godzilla: King of the Monsters is the newest chapter of Warner’s behemoth franchise wherein Godzilla (the good monster) is obliged to do battle with Mothra, Rodan, and the three-headed King Ghidorah (the bad monsters). Millie Bobby Brown and Vera Farmiga also appear as endangered humans.

Oscar-winner Octavia Spencer reunites with The Help director Tate Taylor for the horror movie Ma, in which Spencer plays a creepy woman who generously lets the local high school kids party in her basement, until the kids realize she is profoundly unbalanced.

Dexter Fletcher, who took over directing the hit Bohemian Rhapsody from ousted director Bryan Singer, goes it alone with the Elton John biopic Rocketman, starring Taron Egerton as Elton, Bryce Dallas Howard as Elton’s mom and Jamie Bell as lyricist Bernie Taupin.

 

June 7

In what looks like essentially a Wolverine-free remake of X-Men: The Last Stand, Dark Phoenix stars Game of Thrones’ Sophie Turner as Jean Grey, a mutant taken under the wing of Prof. Xavier’s academy. Her powers increase exponentially when she gives in to her darker nature.

In Late Night, Mindy Kaling plays a young woman who realizes her dream of becoming a talk show comedy writer, only to try to reverse the fortunes of the sinking ship on which she finds herself, hosted by downward-trending Katherine Newberry (Emma Thompson).

 

June 14

Men in Black: International leaves the American safe haven for a more worldly/otherworldly setting focusing on European agents H (Chris Hemsworth) and M (Tessa Thompson).

With the exact same title as its predecessors from 2000 and 1971, Shaft focuses on the youngest John Shaft (Jessie T. Usher), an FBI analyst who recruits his estranged, same-named father (Samuel L. Jackson) and grand-uncle (Richard Roundtree) to find a murderer in Harlem.

 

June 21

With Anna, director Luc Besson mines his own past, particularly La Femme Nikita (1990) for this action thriller about a gorgeous woman who happens to be a crack assassin.

While Chucky creator Don Mancini was content to keep adding to his horror franchise with Manitoba-lensed movies, the studio decreed Child’s Play would go the reboot route, with Aubrey Plaza in the role of a terrorized mom and Mark Hamill providing the voice of homicidal plaything Chucky.

More benign toys are available in Toy Story 4, wherein Woody (Tom Hanks) and Buzz Lightyear (Tim Allen) take extreme measures to rescue a spork that has magically been gifted with sentient toy status. Keanu Reeves provides the voice of Canadian toy Duke Caboom.

 

June 28

From the Conjuring universe comes the third movie about a non-Chucky evil doll. Annabelle Comes Home details what happens when creepy Annabelle breaks free from the storage restraints placed on her by married demonologists Ed and Lorraine Warren (Patrick Wilson and Vera Farmiga).

After suffering a head injury, a struggling musician realizes he’s the only person in the world who knows the music of the Beatles in Danny Boyle’s fannciful musical comedy Yesterday.

 

July 2

Peter Parker lives! (See Avengers: Endgame.) He joins his friends on a European adventure that turns apocalyptic in Spider-Man: Far from Home, co-starring Jake Gyllenhaal as Mysterio.

 

July 3

A pooch named Max (voiced by Patton Oswalt taking over from Louis CK) faces more changes to his household when his owner gets married in The Secret Life of Pets 2.

 

July 12

Black Panther’s Chadwick Boseman plays a detective who takes extreme measures to track a pair of cop killers in New York in the thriller 21 Bridges.

With Crawl, horror specialist Alexandre Aja engages in a sustained exercise in suspense when a young woman (Kaya Scodelario) braves a Category 5 hurricane to rescue her father (Barry Pepper) only to confront the unexpected challenge of live, hungry crocodiles in the flooded house.

Michael Dowse, who winningly combined violence and comedy with Goon, directs the action-comedy Stuber, which pairs and innocent Uber driver (Kumail Nanjiani) with a violent, carless cop (Dave Bautista) on a mission to catch some dangerous bad guys.

 

July 19

The Disney remakes experiment continues with The Lion King, trading in the classic cel animation for photo-realistic CGI.

 

July 26

Quentin Tarantino’s Once Upon a Time in Hollywood plops us into 1969 L.A. where a fading TV star (Leonardo Di Caprio) and his stuntman buddy (Brad Pitt) stumble into misadventures involving, among other things, the Manson family.

 

Aug. 2

While Jason Statham played a flat-out psychotic bad buy in one of the latter Fast & Furious films, he transmogrifies into a good guy when partnered with Dwayne Johnson’s government agent, taking on a cyber-superman (Idris Elba) in Hobbs & Shaw.

 

Aug. 9

The cartoon character Dora the Explorer gets an Indiana Jones makeover in the live-action adventure Dora and the Lost City of Gold starring Isabela Moner (Sicario: Day of the Soldado).

In Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark, a book of terrifying tales take on real-world repercussions in this adaptation of the popular children’s book series. Produced by Guillermo del Toro.

Richard Linklater directs Where’d You Go Bernadette?, an adaptation of the comic novel of the same name, starring Cate Blanchett as an agoraphobic mom who goes missing just before a family trip to Antarctica.

 

Aug. 14

The first movie was critically reviled, but was a hit nevertheless. Hence: The Angry Birds Movie 2 starring the voices of Jason Sudeikis, Danny McBride and Bill Hader.

 

Aug. 16

Good Boys is an R-rated comedy starring three kids as grade six students who become entangled in adult situations, including sex and drugs. Produced by Seth Rogen and starring Jacob Tremblay.

 

Aug. 23

Angel Has Fallen is the third in an action franchise starring Gerard Butler as a secret service agent, this time forced to go underground when falsely accused of an attempted assassination.

A horror thriller from Disney, Ready or Not sees a new bride discovering that her husband’s family expects her to participate in a traditional game that forces its participants to fight for survival.

randall.king@freepress.mb.ca

Twitter: @FreepKing