Film Feature: The 10 Most Anticipated Films of Fall 2011

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CHICAGO – This is usually the time of year where we bemoan the months that have just passed and talk about the quality to come in the Fall. The fact is that if the upcoming season is half-as-good as the previous three, 2011 is going to be the best year in film in ages. It’s been a VERY strong year at the cinema and there’s every indication that we ain’t seen nothing yet.

There have been many years where it has been honestly difficult to produce a list of twenty films (a top ten and ten runner-ups) for which we feel you should mark your calendar and buy tickets in advance. This year is the opposite. Even with some significant help by not including flicks we’ve already seen, it was STILL tough to narrow it down to twenty. And the fact is that we’re missing many of the films that will fill multiplexes this season (including “The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn (Part 1)” and “Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows”) simply because there are twenty more-interesting choices.

Some of these have started to unspool at various festivals or will do so this month (Venice, Telluride, Toronto, New York) and the associated buzz has forced a few flicks to drop a few notches. As mentioned, other upcoming films have already been seen, including Steven Soderbergh’s “Contagion,” Nicholas Winding Refn’s “Drive,” Gavin O’Connor’s “Warrior,” Gus Van Sant’s “Restless,” Sean Durkin’s “Martha Marcy May Marlene,” and Lars Von Trier’s “Melancholia” — the good news is that ALL SIX range from good to great and will almost certainly rank higher on year-end lists than most of the films below. 2011 continues to amaze.

There are two definite trends one could pick out from the list below. One, there are some incredible heavy hitters this season. Cameron Crowe, Steven Spielberg, and Martin Scorsese are each releasing TWO films before the calendar turns. And, if that isn’t enough, Alexander Payne & David Cronenberg return from long absences, while an amazing collection of some of our best directors will unspool new product — David Fincher, Clint Eastwood, Pedro Almodovar, Roman Polanski, and more. Relatively new names like Tomas Alfredson, Lynne Ramsay, and Brad Bird hope to further the case that they should mentioned with the widely-recognized greats. The other thing that’s remarkable is the variety of genre — action, family, 3D, drama, spy movies, thrillers, history — it’s one of the cheesiest things to write in a preview but, arguably more than ever, there does seem to be something for everyone this year. Let’s hope they all live up to their potential.

Special Note: Steve McQueen’s “Shame” would have ranked high on this list, especially after the glowing Variety rave from Venice, but it’s very unclear as to whether or not it will have a 2011 release date. This could easily be a festival product that doesn’t play in cinemas until 2012 (keep in mind that “The Hurt Locker” played Toronto a year-and-a-half before it won Best Picture). We’d hate to include it this year only to have to include it again next year. But we’re damn excited. (Same goes for Andrea Arnold’s “Wuthering Heights,” a film that will play Toronto but may not open stateside in 2011. If we knew for sure that it would, it would be on the list below. Go rent her “Fish Tank” now if you have yet to see it.)

Runner-Ups: “The Adventures of Tintin,” “The Artist,” “Carnage,” “Coriolanus,” “Moneyball,” “My Week With Marilyn,” “The Skin I Live In,” “Take Shelter,” “War Horse,” and “We Bought a Zoo”.

10. “Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol”
Release Date: December 21, 2011
Starring: Tom Cruise, Jeremy Renner, Simon Pegg, Paula Patton, Tom Wilkinson, Ving Rhames, Josh Holloway, and Lea Seydoux
Written by: Josh Appelbaum & Andre Nemec and Christopher McQuarrie
Directed by: Brad Bird
Why We’re Excited: Because the preview gets the adrenalin pumping. It’s been a year of surprisingly enjoyable franchise action films — “X-Men: First Class,” “Rise of the Planet of the Apes” — and everything about this project implies that it will join that club of movies that you have to watch every time they’re on cable. Like “X-Men,” this franchise limped in its third installment and, consequently, received a few years off as a punishment but has returned with an incredibly talented man behind the camera. Brad Bird made one of the best action movies of the ’00s. It just happened to be animated — “The Incredibles.” Imagine that kinetic, super-charged sense of pacing from the Pixar film using action stars like Tom Cruise and Jeremy Renner instead of computer animation. The potential for not just escapist entertainment but one of the best genre pics in years is definitely there. Oh, and have you seen the preview? Has anyone ever used Eminem in a more effective way?

9. “The Ides of March”
Release Date: October 7, 2011
Starring: George Clooney, Ryan Gosling, Evan Rachel Wood, Marisa Tomei, Paul Giamatti, Philip Seymour Hoffman, and Jeffrey Wright
Written by: George Clooney & Grant Heslov and Beau Willimon
Directed by: George Clooney
Why We’re Excited: Because the cast could be the best of the season. Look at that ensemble above. It’s insane. The “good-not-great” response to come out of Venice has dropped this film a few notches in the various drafts of this feature (it was top five before the lukewarm reviews) but it still holds an incredible amount of promise (and, to be fair, none of the reviews were bad…just not glowing). Regular readers will know that we think Ryan Gosling was the most-snubbed actor for his work in “Blue Valentine” last year and we’re about to praise him again in “Drive” next week. He’s quite possibly the best actor working today. Add his contributions to Clooney, Giamatti, Hoffman, Tomei, Wood, and Wright? Holy crap. There’s reason to be concerned that the politics of the piece could overshadow the drama and the characters but there’s SO much potential in that ensemble that it’s hard to grasp how this could possibly be that bad.

8. “A Dangerous Method”
Release Date: November 23, 2011
Starring: Viggo Mortensen, Keira Knightley, Michael Fassbender, and Vincent Cassel
Written by: Christopher Hampton
Directed by: David Cronenberg
Why We’re Excited: Because it’s been too damn long since “Eastern Promises.” This is another drama that ranked higher before a bit of bad buzz after its Venice festival debut. But the involvement of one of the best directors of all time with one of our favorite rising stars (Fassbender) and said director’s recent creative muse (Mortensen) forces us to consider that maybe the Italian crowd had some bad Ziti the night of the premiere. It should also be noted that writer Christopher Hampton penned the best performance to date by Knightley in the highly-underrated “Atonement.” Interesting subject matter, talented cast, and the continuously-amazing Cronenberg make any mediocre buzz easy to ignore.

7. “Hugo (and George Harrison: Living in the Material World)”
Release Date: November 23, 2011
Starring: Asa Butterfield, Chloe Moretz, Jude Law, Emily Mortimer, Sacha Baron Cohen, Michael Pitt, Ben Kingsley, Ray Winstone, and Christopher Lee
Written by: John Logan
Directed by: Martin Scorsese
Why We’re Excited: Because EVERY time Scorsese makes a movie, it will be on one of these lists. Every. Single. Time. Some have bemoaned the fact that Scorsese has made a 3D kids movie to which we say, “He can do whatever he wants.” The man rarely falters in any way at all and if there’s any director on the face of the Earth who has earned the benefit of the doubt more than Marty, we can’t think of who it would be. Like Cameron Crowe, he too has two films playing this fall — one fictional, one documentary — and we can’t wait for either. “Hugo” looks like it could be a delightful fantasy that plays for both kids and adults and the children at its center include one of the best young actresses alive, the amazing Chloe Moretz. Even the writer (John Logan of “Rango,” “The Aviator,” “Gladiator”) allows for optimism. Everything about this, except the fact that it’s in 3D, makes it sound stellar. Which Oscar winner will have the more accomplished kids movie — Scorsese’s “Hugo” or Spielberg’s “Tintin”? All current signs point to the former.

6. “We Need to Talk About Kevin”
Release Date: December 2, 2011
Starring: Tilda Swinton, John C. Reilly, Ezra Miller, and Siobhan Fallon
Written by: Lynne Ramsay & Rory Kinnear
Directed by: Lynne Ramsay
Why We’re Excited: Because Tilda continues to make the case that she’s our best working actress. This drama about a woman coming to terms with the fact that her son is a total lunatic has been building buzz for months and seems likely to be another notch in the critical post for the amazing Ms. Swinton. The question is whether or not this latest acting masterpiece will be as woefully-underseen as her work in “Julia” or “I Am Love,” two of the best performances of the last several years and a pair of turns that both would rank above Tilda’s Oscar-winning work in “Michael Clayton.” With Oscar buzz building already, one hopes that this has more potential for breakthrough and could turn the always-interesting Lynne Ramsay into part of the year-end critical conversation as well.