Action-packed summer movies are upon us. Our Telegraph movie reviewer, Reed Ripley, provides a few recommendations for your viewing pleasure.
May 24 – Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga
- Directed by: George Miller
- Action/Adventure | R | 2 hr 28 min
- Starring: Anya Taylor-Joy, Chris Hemsworth
The summer season starts off with Furiosa, a promised spectacle of grinding gears and pyrotechnics. Furiosa is the sixth film in George Miller’s Mad Max saga and a prequel to 2015’s Mad Max: Fury Road, one of the most successful and critically acclaimed sci-fi films of the past two decades. The Mad Max films consistently push filmmaking’s technical limits with a strong emphasis on practical effects, stunning vehicular set pieces, and fireballs galore, and Furiosa by all accounts continues that tradition. Unlike its predecessor, a streamlined road film where the characters went from point A to point B over a short period, Furiosa is an epic spanning the 15-year rise of its titular character. That runs a risk of losing the plot when there’s so much going on action-wise, but when Chris Hemsworth is riding a chariot made of motorcycles, who cares?
June 14 – Inside Out 2
- Directed by: Kelsey Mann
- Animation/Adventure | PG | 1 hr 40 min
- Starring: Amy Poehler, Phyllis Smith, Lewis Black, Tony Hale, Maya Hawke, Ayo Edebiri
As you might notice, we’re getting a theme here—follow-ups to beloved films, this time a sequel to Pixar’s Inside Out, a film starring the anthropomorphic emotions of a young girl, also from 2015. Inside Out is arguably the best example of the more overtly philosophical Pixar films, explaining to both young children and their parents how to engage with and understand their emotions. Inside Out 2 will attempt to do the same through the broader emotional palette of a teenage girl. That adds a layer of complexity (with an expanded cast of characters, too), and the film’s big task is to give space to that broader scope without washing out the product.
June 28 – Horizon: An American Saga – Chapter 1
- Directed by: Kevin Costner
- Action/Adventure | R | 3 hr 1 min
- Starring: Kevin Costner, Sienna Miller, Tom Payne
Kevin Costner is no stranger to the summer blockbuster, but this time, he’s taking the literal reins in his own hands with Horizon: An American Saga, a wide-ranging tale of How the West Was Won. Horizon is the first part of a planned four-part story of American westward expansion in and around the Civil War, with Chapter 2 actually coming out later this summer on August 16. Costner financed Horizon himself, and post-Yellowstone, he’s throwing all his chips in on audiences’ appetite to see more of Costner in a cowboy hat, this time on the big screen. Horizon has just as much of a chance to be the next Waterworld as it does the next Dances with Wolves, but it’ll be interesting either way.
July 19 – Twisters
- Directed by: Lee Isaac Chung
- Action/Thriller | PG-13 (projected) | TBD
- Starring: Daisy Edgar-Jones, Glen Powell, Anthony Ramos
This one hits home for me personally, as I wore out the VHS tape of 1996’s Twister many years before I typed a single word about movies. Universal Studios is betting big that there’s plenty of people like me out there eager to see more, but honestly, that’s not what’s going to drive this film’s success. That rests on the shoulders of its two stars, Daisy Edgar-Jones and Glen Powell, both of whom have recently established themselves as major box office draws. That’s exactly what the original had with Bill Paxton and Helen Hunt (with an outstanding supporting cast)—throw that in with tornadoes, incredibly cinematic natural disasters, and you’ve got yourself a recipe for a hit.
July 26 – Deadpool & Wolverine
- Directed by: Shawn Levy
- Action/Comedy | R | 2 hr 7 min
- Starring: Ryan Reynolds, Hugh Jackman
Finally, Deadpool & Wolverine, likely the summer’s biggest film. Marvel desperately needs this to hit in a major way, as audiences are fast losing interest and looking elsewhere. There’s a great chance Deadpool & Wolverine hits that mark, thanks largely to its two extremely charismatic stars returning to roles they were born to play. Throwing them together in Deadpool’s hard-R environment is an absolute no-brainer, but that’s also the reason this film’s likely success doesn’t really have any bearing on the future of Marvel films. It may save the summer box office, but it won’t save the flailing franchise.
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