HE SAID HE’D BE BACK
Terminator Genisys is one of this summer’s big films.
Critics like to bemoan that there’s nothing new under the sun, but that’s only partly true. Sure, the summer of 2015 features a slew of remakes (Mad Max: Fury Road), sequels (Magic Mike XXL — is that some kind of Roman numeral? Did they make 30 of these?), reboots (a Jason Statham-less Transporter Refueled) and reimaginings so old they’re new again, like the 50thanniversary take on The Man from U.N.C.L.E.
But there’s always something fresh lurking in the corners of the multiplex, whether it’s Disney’s Tomorrowland, the new Canadian comedy Preggoland or San Andreas, an earthquake disaster movie that could be called Shakyland. Here are some of the summer’s new movies (release dates subject to change):
SUPERHEROES
Avengers: Age of Ultron: The latest Marvel release also kicks off the summer movie season,
as the Avengers battle a peacekeeping program that forgot to be peaceful. (May 1)
Minions: Superheroes need their villains, and villains need their minions. If they’re kidfriendly animated yellow beans that speak in gibberish, so much the better. (July 10)
Ant-Man: Paul Rudd may seem an unlikely superhero, but if Chris Pratt can save the galaxy, then Rudd can save the world, one extremely small step at a time. (July 17)
Pixels: Adam Sandler leads a gang of video-game champs who must save Earth from space invaders. (July 24)
Fantastic Four: Who remembers 10-year-old movies anyways? A reboot has the odd quartet (invisible, fiery, stretchy and rocky) facing off against a villain named Doom. (Aug. 7)
THE PAST
Jurassic World: It’s been more than 30 years since Steven Spielberg unleashed dinosaurs in
Jurassic Park. That’s nothing in geological time, but several eons for Hollywood. Time for a reboot starring Chris Pratt. (June 12) Far From the Madding Crowd: For a quieter take on the past, see the latest adaptation of Thomas Hardy’s oft-mispronounced 1874 novel. It’s not “maddening.” That would be the crowd lining up for Jurassic World. (May 1)
Also: Phoenix (May 8), about a woman looking for her husband in postwar Berlin; Testament
of Youth (June 19), based on the First World War memoirs of Vera Brittain; Jimmy’s Hall (July 17), the story of Ireland’s James Gralton, deported without trial in the 1930s.
THE FUTURE
Tomorrowland: Not sure if this counts as future or past, given Disney’s retro-futurist visions of tomorrow, but this scifi mystery starring George Clooney and Britt Robertson (The Longest Ride) looks original. (May 22) Terminator Genisys: Again, future or past? With its new-timeline shtick, it seems to want it both ways. And if it can eclipse the memory of 2009’s Schwarzenegger-less Terminator Salvation, it can have whatever it wants. (July 1)
Mad Max: Fury Road: This is definitely the future, although of course it also hearkens back to the post-apocalyptic original from 1979, when gas was a quarter a litre. Tom Hardy steps into Mel Gibson’s boots. (May 15)