Summer Film Previews

OUTLOOK: Looks like the cell-phone propaganda lobby is at it again! Just as all manner of businesses start to ban loud cell-phone conversations, those Hollywood liberals conspire to indoctrinate us with positive images of the inexpensive communication devices saving lives, damn them! Of course, any movie that cell-phone users can relate to is likely to make heaps of cash.

DIRECTOR: Michael Winterbottom (Welcome to Sarajevo, In This World)

WRITER: Frank Cottrell Boyce (24 Hour Party People)

PREMISE: A love story set in a near-future where travel is restricted to residents of cities, and even then only those who purchase a special type of insurance. Outside the cities, the world has become a desert filled with shanty towns and illegal immigrants.

OUTLOOK: Combining cautionary global politics with character-based drama is a Winterbottom trademark, but the sci-fi hook may garner him a new audience. And if that's not enough, the film's R-rating descriptive also promises "brief graphic nudity."

Collateral
STARRING: Tom Cruise, Jamie Foxx, Jada Pinkett Smith, Mark Ruffalo

DIRECTOR: Michael Mann

WRITERS: Michael Mann, Frank Darabont, Stuart Beattie (contributor to Pirates of the Caribbean)

PREMISE: Foxx plays an LA cabbie forced into service by killer Cruise.

OUTLOOK: Frankly, this sounds less like a movie than a template for a screenwriting workshop. Mann's affection for LA's mean streets (Heat, TV's Robbery Homicide Division) may score him another hit, but -- baddie or otherwise -- isn't the entire world completely sick of Tom Cruise by now?

Danny Deckchair
STARRING: Rhys Ifans, Miranda Otto, Justine Clarke, Andrew Crabbe

WRITER/DIRECTOR: Jeff Balsmeyer (veteran storyboard artist making feature debut)

PREMISE: Australian comedy about a guy who escapes his big-city blues by sailing away in a chair attached to helium balloons.

OUTLOOK: Anybody's guess, but thanks to the recent discovery of Australia, some novelty is possible. Also, lovely Miranda Otto as a blasted meter maid may represent the year's biggest emotional conflict of interests.

Exorcist: The Beginning
STARRING: Stellan Skarsgård, James D'Arcy, Isabella Scorupco

DIRECTOR: John Frankenheimer...no, wait, Paul Schrader...oops, make that Renny Harlin

WRITERS: William Wisher (The 13th Warrior), Caleb Carr (The Warlord: Battle for the Galaxy), Alexi Hawley

PREMISE: Skarsgård plays the younger version of Max von Sydow's Father Merrin character, tangling with the devil in mid-twentieth-century Africa.

OUTLOOK: Frankenheimer died before filming had started. Then Schrader directed the film as a psychological thriller. Once the studio saw his cut, they decided they wanted more of a head-turning and green-puking kind of horror flick, so they recast most of the major roles and hired Harlin (Schrader's version will still apparently come out on DVD). This level of "creative differences" usually doesn't bode well for a film's quality, not to mention the fact that no Exorcist sequel to date has exactly been an aesthetic or commercial triumph.

Gojira STARRING: A guy in a monster suit, some Japanese people

DIRECTOR: Ishiro Honda

WRITERS: Ishiro Honda, Shigeru Kayama, Takeo Murata

PREMISE: Formerly trimmed, dubbed and Raymond Burr-ed as Godzilla on these shores, the original Japanese "big critter stomping on Tokyo" flick finally hits U.S. theaters uncut, with 40 minutes of footage previously unseen stateside and a Japanese language track.

OUTLOOK: To quote Harry Knowles of AintItCoolNews.com: MAN IN SUIT! MAN IN SUIT! MAN IN SUIT! A geek-stravaganza if ever there was one.

Hero (Ying xiong)
STARRING: Jet Li, Daming Chen, Tony Leung Chiu Wai, Maggie Cheung

DIRECTOR: Zhang Yimou (Shanghai Triad)

WRITERS: Feng Li, Bin Wang, Yimou Zhang

PREMISE: Prior to China's Imperial history, a brilliant warrior tells a threatened king of his prowess.

OUTLOOK: Its budget ($17 million) probably equals the catering costs on a Scooby-Doo movie, but this is China's most expensive film yet and a big hit in its homeland. A flashback-heavy narrative should provoke intrigue while Jet Li's martial arts gifts wow the action enthusiasts.

A Home at the End of the World
STARRING: Colin Farrell, Robin Wright Penn, Sissy Spacek, Matt Frewer

DIRECTOR: Michael Mayer (debut)

WRITERS: Keith Bunin, Michael Cunningham (novel) PREMISE: Farrell plays a straight Clevelander in 1980s "New York" (Toronto) who moves in with gay Cleveland friend (Dallas Roberts) and falls for female roommate (Wright Penn), whom gay friend -- oops! -- was planning to impregnate. Then they all go visit Sissy Spacek in the country.

OUTLOOK: The Hours novel was also written by Cunningham, and frankly it wasn't "deep" or "moving" -- it was tedious. If that's your cup of tea, have another lukewarm swig, courtesy of Warners' new "independent" wing.

I'll Sleep When I'm Dead
STARRING: Clive Owen, Jonathan Rhys-Meyers, Charlotte Rampling, Malcolm McDowell

DIRECTOR: Mike Hodges

WRITER: Trevor Preston

PREMISE: Gangster tries to go bucolic while solving the murder of his brother.