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The betting on the best films of 2023 is still very much open, and at this point you'd be a fool to try to call what's likely to end up on the countdown lists come December.
It's a rare year when not one, not two but three different Leo DiCaprio-Martin Scorsese collabs could drop at some point. It's an even rarer year when Ryan Gosling rollerblades around in the guise of a plastic doll, at the behest of indie darlings Greta Gerwig and Noah Baumbach.
On top of that, there's the return of Christopher Nolan and Cillian Murphy in a biopic-that's-not-a-biopic about the man who ushered in the atomic age, a new Indiana Jones film, the Dune sequel, and the tantalising prospect of Timothée Chalamet wandering around Lyme Regis enslaving tiny orange refugees to work in his chocolate factory.
Here's what to look out for this year.
Renfield (14 February)
When you think of Dracula, you think of Dracula. Rightly so. He's the big man. But in The Lego Batman Movie director Chris McKay's comedy-horror, the Count isn't the main man. It's his long-suffering assistant Renfield, played by Nicholas Hoult, who gets top billing here, and he's off around modern day New Orleans having a whale of a time. But naturally his old boss is still in the frame and out of the crypt. Dracula, by the way, is being played by Nicolas Cage.
Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania (17 February)
The Marvel Cinematic Universe is in a bit of a funny place at the start of 2023. Spider-Man: No Way Home did the business at the top of the year, and Black Panther: Wakanda Forever may do it at the end, but there's a palpable lack of pizzazz about this particular phase of things. Perhaps the eternally charming Paul Rudd can put some pep back in its step, amid rumours that de-ageing tech will see him team up with a young Michael Douglas in this one. Oh, and Bill Murray plays a villain. Wild.
Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 (5 May)
The other big MCU tank being wheeled onto the lawn is the next Guardians film, which will see Peter Quill trying to bounce back after losing poor old Gamora at the end of Endgame. The early noises are that this one's likely to be a bit heavier than previous Guardians stuff, which would chime with the slightly more drear tone of Eternals and some of the other recent Marvel outings.
Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse (2 June)
Into the Spider-Verse was a proper gamechanger for animated film, and a second trip with Miles Morales is reportedly set to focus on his tip-toeing horn for Gwen Stacy. Part of the joy of the first film, though, was the head-spinning originality and the many, many surprises it had up its sleeve, so perhaps the lack of info here is a good thing.
Asteroid City (16 June)
Wes Anderson's licked his fingers and rifled through the old Rolodex to pull together a cast for his Fifties-set rom-com which includes – but is not limited to – Tilda Swinton, Adrien Brody, Tom Hanks, Margot Robbie, Jason Schwartzman, Scarlett Johansson, Bryan Cranston, Jeff Goldblum, Jeffrey Wright, Maya Hawke, Edward Norton, Steve Carell, Willem Dafoe, Rita Wilson and Jarvis Cocker. Phew. They'll all be piling pell-mell to the titular 'city', a desert town where students (and their parents) compete in a stargazing competition. You know already whether you're going to enjoy going to a Wes Anderson movie. He does Wes Anderson things. (For what it's worth, I didn't really care for The French Dispatch.) But his time he's got Tom Hanks!!
Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny (30 June)
The first Indy film to be out of Steven Spielberg's hands got its title at the end of 2022, and there's scant detail to work with other than that Harrison Ford's back for one last crack of the whip, James Mangold is directing and Phoebe Waller-Bridge is involved in some way. Mangold feels like a smart choice: he did wonders with the autumnal, genuinely moving Logan and could well give Indy the send-off he deserves. Oh, and the other big reveal from the trailer is that 80-year-old Ford has been CGI'd back into sexy 1981 Indy's face. "I don't believe in magic," he rumbles in the tease, but then John Rhys Davis pops up as old pal Sallah and Indy's off riding a horse along Broadway during a ticker tape parade. There are rumours that the Dial of Destiny is an artefact linked to either a Nazi time travelling device or something that lets the user change their fate. Elsewhere, there's a fight on top of a train, a tuktuk chases, and a boulder rolling through a tunnel. It all feels very, very Jonesian.
Oppenheimer (23 July)
An intriguing first post-Peaky project for yer man Cillian. He's been a trusted lieutenant of time-bending tech-thriller wizard Christopher Nolan, but this is his first lead part in a Nolan film, his first biopic since The Wind That Shakes The Barley, and the first act in the rest of his career. The eponymous Oppenheimer is J Robert, the father of the atomic bomb. We don't know what part of Oppenheimer's life it'll focus on, but Cills told Esquire earlier this year the role felt "immense" and "terrifying". The rest of the cast is ridiculous too: there's Florence Pugh, Robert Downey Jr, Emily Blunt, Matt Damon, Rami Malek, Gary Oldman, Kenny Branagh and more besides.
"The difference with this one is the story is there, everybody knows what happened," Murphy told us. "But Chris is telling it in a different way, as with Chris you would expect. That’s all I can say." Intriguing.
Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One (14 July)
It feels like there should be another piece of grammatical furniture in there but seeing more than one colon feels like overkill even by the M:I universe's standards. Director Chris McQuarrie and Tom Cruise return for another sequel for the most reliably brilliant mega-franchise around. Plot details are light on the ground, but an international incident over an apparent attempt to blow up a historically important Polish train bridge for a big set piece is a pointer. The rumour is that this two-parter could wrap up the series altogether too.
Roosevelt (unknown release date)
Leo DiCaprio and Martin Scorsese films are, it turns out, like London buses. Scorsese's biopic will be about the supposedly bear-sparing Teddy Roosevelt rather than the World War Two-winning Franklin D, but there's still some doubts over whether Roosevelt will take Scorsese's attention ahead of another DiCaprio joint, The Wager, about a bunch of mutinous 1740s sailors in Brazil. Then there's another one on the go, crime thriller Flowers of the Killer Moon, which boasts both DiCaprio and Robert De Niro.
Barbie (July)
Though it's now more meme than film after those retina-burning shots from the set, it's important to remember that this is a Greta Gerwig film starring Ryan Gosling and Margot Robbie and co-scripted with Noah Baumbach. That's no guarantee it's going to work, but my god it'll be fascinating finding out.
Next Goal Wins (September)
Taika Waititi's fictionalised adaptation of one of the best documentaries we've seen in many, many a long year has been in the works for ages, but presumably he's been a bit busy taking over the MCU and marrying Rita Ora. In 2001 the American Samoan national football team got pumped 31-0 by Australia and were, by most reckonings, the worst football team in the world. Then they brought in hard-arse Dutch-American coach Thomas Rongen, and things started to change. Should be uplifting and lovely.
Dune: Part Two (November)
It's back to Arrakis for Denis Villeneuve's follow-up to the against-the-odds belter Dune, where Florence Pugh, Austin Butler, Christopher Walken, and Léa Seydoux are waiting to join Timothée Chalamet and Zendaya in the scrap over the welfare of the known universe.
Wonka (December)
It's a big Q4 for yer man Timmy. His Willy Wonka origin story is one of the most hotly anticipated movies of the year, and pictures of him in costume (in Lyme Regis, of all places) sent much of the internet into a tailspin last year. Presumably we'll see how Wonka yoked the Oompa Loompas to his choccy fiefdom. The auspices are decent: Paul King and Simon Farnaby, respectively the director and the writer of the last two Paddington films, are on board and Rowan Atkinson, Sally Hawkins and Olivia Colman will pop up too.
