True story: I just slept for fifteen hours and had to drag myself out of bed. No, I’m not dying—rather, I’m recovering from an amazing week in Las Vegas, where I had the pleasure of attending CinemaCon—a convention where studios show theatrical exhibitors early footage from all the movies coming up over the next year. We get to see incredible stuff no one else has access to, and for journalists it can be both thrilling and exhausting, as it’s exciting to see the new material but also tough to keep up with the sheer amount of info we’re being bombarded with.
The way it works is this: each day there are one or two presentations in the Colosseum at Caesar’s Palace dedicated to a specific studio, who takes us through their slate, usually with the stars on hand to ramp up the exhibitors. Here are the 10 movies I’m most excited to see based on the presentations.
Of all the classic horror monsters, werewolves (not “swear wolves”) are my favorite. There’s something so compelling about an otherwise good person transforming into a beast, embarking on a destructive bender they cannot control, and then having to deal with the consequences afterward. To me, the greatest werewolves are Lon Chaney Jr.’s Larry Talbot, as well as David Naughton’s David Kessler in John Landis’s An American Werewolf in London. Yet, it looks like Aaron Taylor-Johnson is about to create a new classic one in Robert Eggers’ Werwulf, for which we got to see the first trailer. It looks a lot like Nosferatu, with it dirty, grimy, violent, and exciting. Hopefully it will make up for Leigh Whannell’s Wolf Man, which to me might be the worst werewolf movie of all time.
One of the most unexpectedly sweet moments at CinemaCon this year was when Johnny Depp came out during the Paramount presentation and was warmly welcomed by exhibitors. Considering how he was unfairly cancelled for many years, it felt like he was being welcomed back into the fold. Ti West’s Ebenezer: A Christmas Carol feels like it could be one of his greatest performances, with him channeling Alastair Sim’s classic portrayal in this dark, horror-tinged but hopeful adaptation.
I dug the first Violent Night, so I was already sold on seeing David Harbour return as an ass-kicking Kris Kringle. But in this one you also have the great Jared Harris as an evil crime boss attempting to cancel Christmas, as well as an impossibly ripped Kristen Bell as Mrs. Claus, which might be the casting coup of the year.
While I was mixed on Gareth Evans’ Havoc, his follow-up, A Colt Is My Passport, looks deliriously entertaining. Sope Dirisu stars in the 1970s Detroit-set banger, playing an assassin who packs two pistols and winds up in a world of trouble. While based on the classic Japanese movie of the same name, it feels (to me) like John Woo’s The Killer is a heavy influence, and the action in this one is going to be bonkers.
While only halfway through shooting, we got to see a sizzle reel showing footage from the first half of production. For everyone hoping Henry Cavill would get a legit shot at stardom, rest assured, Chad Stahelski’s passion project reboot of the 1986 classic looks incredible. The action in this one is going to be off-the-wall, with sword-driven sequences (scored by a variety of Queen songs) having the audience drooling. It also has to be said, Russell Crowe seems like a spot-on Ramirez.
The first The Beekeeper—to me—is Jason Statham’s best-ever solo movie. My issue with him has always been how indestructible he is, but in that movie they made it kind of a wink-at-the-audience joke. This sequel ups the ante, with crazy action (at one point Statham kills someone by shoving a flamethrower in his mouth) and an even more convoluted bee-driven mythology, as the Beekeepers kidnap the president and try to start a new world order. Of course, only one man can stop them. Sign me up.
Zach Cregger’s Resident Evil ditches the mythology of the video games and instead tries to replicate the experience of playing them by zeroing in on a lone, unskilled protagonist (Austin Abrams) as he tries to survive the night with limited resources. This looks like the Fury Road of horror movies.
While the teaser has been unveiled to the public, we actually saw a ton of footage from the upcoming sequel, including the return of Rick Moranis as Lord Helmet, who doesn’t seem to have missed a beat despite having sat out movies for the last thirty years. The film also seems to be loaded with digs at premium screens, the WB/Paramount merger, streaming, and—most of all—The Last Jedi.
How could this not be number one? Well, I’ll explain why in a moment, but suffice it to say the audience went cuckoo bananas for the first Avengers: Doomsday trailer, which promises to right the Marvel ship. The return of Chris Evans as Steve Rogers brought down the house, and fans will go crazy once they finally see the footage we saw.
That said, the movie event of the year seems to be Alejandro González Iñárritu’s Digger. This is Tom Cruise’s shot at an Oscar, with him playing an elderly, pot-bellied, Texas-twang-sporting billionaire who accidentally brings the world to the brink of Armageddon. Cruise seems to be giving an energetic, swing-for-the-fences performance in a movie that feels heavily Stanley Kubrick-inspired. It might be our Dr. Strangelove.
Enough of what I thought—which one are you most excited for? Take the poll below and let us know. Check out all our CinemaCon coverage here!