OSCAR BAIT
HOLIDAY moviegoers – or, more likely, at-home streamers – can look forward to the usual deluge of movies released in December to qualify for 2021 awards. After a threeyear directorial hiatus, Steven Spielberg’s West Side Story (Dec. 10) leads the race. More than a half-century since the original film adaptation of the Broadway musical, Spielberg’s version stays true to the original story, which is basically Romeo and
Juliet set among rival gangs in 1950s New York City. Spielberg gives a cameo to EGOT winner Rita Moreno, 90, who won an Oscar for playing Anita in 1961, cast NYC native Ansel Elgort as Tony and plucked New Jersey’s Rachel Zegler from 30,000 hopefuls to play Maria.
Neo and Trinity are also in love, even though they’re not supposed to recognize each other, in The
Matrix Resurrections (Dec. 22). The science-fiction sequel finds Neo (Keanu Reeves) living as boring, ordinary Thomas Anderson, until his therapist suggests he pop a special blue pill. Carrie-Anne Moss and Jada Pinkett Smith reprise their roles as Trinity and Niobe, while new additions Neil Patrick Harris and Christina Ricci join the franchise’s fourth film.
Also headed to the big screen is a pair of films blessed with some distinctly Canadian magic. First up is Nightmare Alley (Dec. 17), from Mexican director Guillermo del Toro, who won an Oscar for The Shape of Water and now calls Toronto home. Based on a 1946 novel, the psychological thriller pairs Bradley Cooper as Stanton “Stat” Carlisle, an ambitious, manipulative con man, with Cate Blanchett as ice-cold psychologist Lilith Ritter, who might prove equally diabolical. The next Canadian gem (Jan. 14),
The Man from Toronto, was originally scheduled to film in NYC until COVID concerns moved production, fittingly, to the Ontario capital. An unfortunate Airbnb mishap has the world’s deadliest assassin (a.k.a. “the man from Toronto,” a.k.a. Woody Harrelson) mistaken for a not-so-savvy city dweller (a.k.a. “New York’s biggest screw-up,” a.k.a. Kevin Hart). In this action-comedy they take to the streets in elaborate car chase scenes filmed in Toronto, Hamilton and Milton, Ont.