SUMMER MOVIE PREVIEW
From ‘Wonder Woman’ to ‘Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2,’ 10 must-see films
Here come superheroes, sequels, blockbuster action and A-list stars aplenty. This year’s slate of summer movies is upon us, and it’s a busy one: Another spaceship crew falls prey to Ridley Scott’s deadly extraterrestrials in the sci-fi sequel Alien: Covenant (in theaters May 19), Scarlett Johansson leads a crazy bachelorette week- end in the comedy Rough Night (June 16), Charlize Theron is one seriously deadly woman in spy thriller Atomic Blonde (July 28), and it’s Matthew McConaughey vs. Idris Elba in Western fantasy
The Dark Tower, based on the Stephen King epic (Aug. 4).
It’s a sea of heavy hitters and huge names, but we know it’s hard to see everything. So here are the 10 films you absolutely, positively must see this summer, from cosmic misfits to a sublime haunted-house tale.
(JUNE 9)
STARS: Tom Cruise, Sofia Boutella, Russell Crowe DIRECTOR: Alex Kurtzman
THE SKINNY: Kurtzman fell in love with Universal monsters such as Dracula and Frankenstein as a kid because of “the deep humanity I felt like these monsters were actually reflecting,” the filmmaker says. “They say something about who we are.” And that’s what he wants to bring to this kickoff of a new cinematic universe: In the film, Cruise’s antihero Nick Morton accidentally unearths the Mummy (Boutella) and gets entangled in a situation 5,000 years old. Crowe’s Dr. Jekyll (and alter ego Mr. Hyde) is an entry point for Nick to “a much larger world of gods and monsters he wasn’t aware of,” and the Mummy herself is inspired by Boris Karloff ’s original 1932 take, with abilities “organized around the ideas of romance and entrancement,” Kurtzman says. “She has control over and power to get into your mind, and creepy crawlies tend to like her when she’s around.”