THE STARS ARE OUT FOR THE FALL INTO HOLIDAY SEASON IN FILMS THAT BRING ACTION, COMEDY, MYSTERY, HISTORY, AND ORIGINALITY TO THE BIG SCREEN
BY LAURA D.C. KOLNOSKI
SHE CAME TO ME
SEPTEMBER (UNRATED)
Emmy and Golden Globe Award winner Peter Dinklage is modern-day opera composer Steven Lauddem, struggling with a creative block instead of finishing his latest work. While his therapist wife (Anne Hathaway) is distracted by her own professional strife, Steven meets a Brooklyn tugboat captain (Marisa Tomei), who becomes his unlikely muse. The comedy/drama is written and directed by Rebecca Miller, daughter of playwright Arthur Miller, inspired by her aspiring composer son.
THE HOLDOVERS
OCTOBER (RATED R)
Paul Giamatti and director Alexander Payne (Sideways) reunite for a poignant fi lm about a bitter professor, a lonely student, and the school’s cook that coalesce under di‑ cult circumstances and eventually turn lumps of coal into Christmas pudding. All three are left to spend the holidays at their private New England boarding school. Once the trio finds their groove, comic misadventures ensue. Newcomer Dominic Sessa delivers as a gifted, troubled student, while Da’Vine Joy Randolph (Only Murders in the Building) plays the cook.
DUMB MONEY
OCTOBER (RATED R)
Readers may recall this stranger than fiction story from the news. Some of the notoriety comes from A-list actors playing real-life CEOs Ken Griffin (Nick Offerman), Vlad Tenev (Sebastian Stan), and Gabe Plotkin (Seth Rogan), and hedge-funder Steve Cohen (Vincent D’Onofrio). Paul Dano and Pete Davidson are the Gill brothers, who turned the failing Game Stop video store franchise into a moneymaker when Dano’s Keith invests heavily in its stock and posts about it on social media.
A HAUNTING IN VENICE
SEPTEMBER (UNRATED)
Agatha Christie’s beloved whodunits have been retold by Hollywood repeatedly, but the Christie tome this latest iteration is based on, 1969’s Hallowe’en Party, has never been made into a movie before. This is actor/director Kenneth Branagh’s third Christie adaptation after 2017’s Murder on the Orient Express and 2022’s Death on the Nile, and his third turn as idiosyncratic detective Hercule Poirot. The cast features Tina Fey, Jamie Dornan, and Oscar-winner Michelle Yeoh. The story is set after World War II on All Hallow’s Eve after a séance ends in a death, and Poirot must come out of retirement to solve it.
NAPOLEON
NOVEMBER (RATED R)
French legend Napoleon Bonaparte gets the sweeping epic treatment, complete with legions of CGI mounted troops and elaborate period costumes and sets. We’re expecting another blockbuster from Ridley Scott, director of Blade Runner, The Martian, Gladiator, Thelma & Louise, and more. The legendary rise and fall of the French military hero turned ruthless emperor has Joaquin Phoenix in the title role, and Vanessa Kirby (The Crown), as his Empress Joséphine. Scott recently released an extended cut of the fi lm clocking in at over four hours with more of Joséphine’s backstory.
MUZZLE
SEPTEMBER (UNRATED)
Justice bites back when Aaron Eckhart, as LAPD K-9 officer Jake Rosser, forms a rapport with a problematic police dog and they team to discover who murdered Rosser’s partner in front of his eyes. Billed as an “intense and compelling actioner full of twists and turns,” the conspiracy thriller’s trailer depicts Rosser as “muzzled” by his superiors just as the biting “Socks” is, before they take oon their own to seek the truth. Stephen Lang (Avatar) and Penelope Mitchell (Star Trek: Picard) co-star.
THE INVENTOR
SEPTEMBER (RATED PG)
The life and legacy of Italian Renaissance giant Leonardo da Vinci, considered the world’s greatest inventor, is explored in a delightfully entertaining animated tale rendered in a stop motion style reminiscent of Rudolf the Red Nosed Reindeer. “Imagination takes flight” as scientist da Vinci (voiced by Stephen Fry), invents flying contraptions, studies cadavers to understand the human body, studies astronomy, paints the Mona Lisa, and ponders the meaning of life. From the writer of Ratatouille and featuring the voices of Daisy Ridley and Marion Cotillard.