EW. "Fall Movies Preview."

Entertainment Weekly gets the jump on just about everyone with its "Fall Movies Preview." Some of the entries on various films are mighty brief, though, so I've added a few more links where possible. For example, with the help of Girish's post at 1st Thursday, I'll point to relevant Toronto International Film Festival pages for some of these films (September 6 through 15); same goes for the New York Film Festival (September 28 through October 12), reviews from earlier festivals and so forth.

For EW's cover story, Benjamin Svetkey talks with Reese Witherspoon about Rendition, "a sober political drama about a pregnant Midwestern woman who discovers that her Egyptian husband (Omar Metwally) is being secretly held by the US government. (Jake Gyllenhaal plays the rookie CIA agent overseeing the interrogation, and Meryl Streep the official who orders the covert abduction.)" Trailer. Released October 12. Related: Ewen MacAskill in the Guardian on the season's post-9/11 movies.

Karen Valby meets Laura Linney: "In the dramedy The Savages [more; Toronto; trailer; release: December 26], she and Philip Seymour Hoffman play siblings taking care of their aging father (Philip Bosco). For the movie adaptation of the best-seller The Nanny Diaries, she stars as spoiled New York wife Mrs X. And then she goes back in time to appear as Abigail Adams in HBO's John Adams miniseries, based on David McCullough's Pulitzer Prize-winning biography." For more on The Nanny Diaries, see Melena Ryzik's interview with directors Shari Springer Berman and Robert Pulcini for the New York Times. And that one's due out this Friday.

"Emile Hirsch (Lords of Dogtown) will topline Into the Wild [more; Toronto; trailer; September 21]], which writer/director Sean Penn adapted from Jon Krakauer's 1996 book about the mysterious Alaskan adventure of wanderer Christopher McCandless," writes Chris Nashawaty. "The 22-year-old rising star phoned from Berlin - where he's shooting the Wachowski Brothers' live-action Speed Racer update - to talk about getting stuck in the snow, Penn's unorthodox casting process, and Kurt Cobain's favorite monkey." Speed Racer comes out on May 9, 2008.

Christine Spines talks with actor-turned-director Peter Berg about The Kingdom: "I was nervous it would be perceived as a jingoistic piece of propaganda, which I certainly didn't intend." Trailer. September 28. Related: Via the House Next Door, Andrew Dignan asks, "When did Peter Berg become a better filmmaker than Michael Mann?"

"It's kinda difficult to feel like you're the last man on earth when you're shooting in New York." Jeff Jensen talks with Will Smith about I Am Legend. Trailer. December 14.

Gregory Kirshling on Wes Anderson's The Darjeeling Limited. Oddly, a second page on the film has more. Trailer. NYFF. London.

Vanessa Juarez: "Jessica Alba took a break from shooting her forthcoming horror movie, The Eye [February 1, 2008], to chat with EW about her comedic chops, some of her many upcoming projects - including Good Luck Chuck (opposite Dane Cook [more; September 21]) and The Love Guru (opposite its writer/director, Mike Myers [June 20, 2008]) - and, apropos of nothing, menudo."

Steve Daley tells the story behind "a lavish, PG-rated Disney movie," Enchanted, with Amy Adams and Patrick Dempsey. Trailer. November 21.

Daniel Fierman talks with Jerry Seinfeld about The Bee Movie. More. Trailers and clips. November 2.

Then come the anonymous briefs. Let's arrange them according to EW's release calendar:

September 7

• A backgrounder on 3:10 to Yuma. And just yesterday, I pointed to the first round of reviews. Trailer.

• A few words with Will Arnett and Will Forte about The Brothers Solomon.

• Griffin Dunne directs Anton Yelchin, Diane Lane and Donald Sutherland in Fierce People. EW's bit.

• "Consider us intrigued." The Hunting Party, with Richard Gere and Terrence Howard. The trailer suggests a standard operating procedure political thriller, but I would like to know how that CIA twist turns out.

• A bit on In the Shadow of the Moon. The trailer's exhilarating. Earlier: the Sundance reviews.

• "It's the most heightened, ridiculous movie violence," Clive Owen says of Shoot 'Em Up. Trailer's at the site, and Clive Owen is right.

• Not blurbed by EW: Jeff Garlin's I Want Someone to Eat Cheese With and Eytan Fox's The Bubble.

September 14

• "Almost no director has final cut anymore." Julie Taymor on Across the Universe. Trailer. Toronto.

• Very briefly indeed, The Brave One. Variety's Anne Thompson has a much longer conversation with Jodie Foster about Neil Jordan's revenge drama. Trailer's at the site.

• A word with Daniel Radcliffe about the 2005 Australian drama, December Boys. Trailer.

• "All of my movies have dealt with crime in the sense of transgression," says David Cronenberg. "In the last two, it's been more traditional. But creatively, there's a real continuity amongst the films." Much more from Liam Lacey in the Globe and Mail and via Movie City News: "With Eastern Promises, [David] Cronenberg has delivered what appears to be a second almost-conventional thriller in a row. Not only will it play the Toronto International Film Festival in September, but it will open two other major international film festivals, The Times BFI 51st London Film Festival and the 55th annual San Sebastian Film Festival in Spain." The conversation also turns to the films he's not making. Trailer.

• A few words with Charlize Theron and Paul Haggis about In the Valley of Elah. Trailer. Toronto. Jeffrey Wells is standing by this one.

• "'Charlie's flat-out nuts,' says [Michael] Douglas." Briefly, King of California. And the trailer's right there, too. Related: Variety's John Anderson caught this at Sundance.

• "Why do we suspect this doesn't have a happy ending?" Silk. Trailer.

• Not blurbed by EW: Ira and Abby, Dragon Wars and Moving McAllister.

September 21

• A backgrounder on The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford, "three years, 34 different cuts, and five test screenings" in the making. Trailer's at the site. Toronto.

• A bit on The Jane Austen Book Club. Trailer.

• Marco Kreuzpaintner tells EW, "I want people to get angry." Trade. Trailer.

September 28

• Allison Burnett adapts Charles Baxter's novel, Feast of Love; Robert Benton directs; Morgan Freeman, Greg Kinnear and Alexa Davalos. The blurb and the trailer.

• Briefly, The Game Plan. Trailer.

• A tad on Lust, Caution: "'You do the best you can and still take risks. I didn't play it safe because,' [Ang] Lee says, laughing, 'there's no safe ground after Brokeback anyway!'" Trailer.

October 3

• Ever so briefly, Tony Kaye's Lake of Fire. Earlier: Tom Hall and David Poland.

October 5

• A few words with Gwyneth and Jake Paltrow about The Good Night. Earlier: the Sundance reviews.

• A snippet of a chat with John Cusack about Grace Is Gone. Earlier: the Sundance reviews.

• A little on Ben Stiller and the Farrelly brothers' return to R-rated territory, The Heartbreak Kid. Yes, it's a remake of Elaine May's 1972 comedy. Trailer.

• Quick quotes from writer-director Tony Gilroy, George Clooney and Tom Wilkinson about Michael Clayton. Trailer. Related: The Book Covers blog.

• Not blurbed by EW: My Kid Could Paint That and Finishing the Game.

October 12

• The trailer's schmaltzy, but Steve Carell's rarely seemed so appealing. Dan in Real Life. The paragraph.

• "Roles like these, that require someone of your capability and daring, don't come along that often." Geoffrey Rush pitches Elizabeth: The Golden Age to Cate Blanchett. Steve Daly has more. Trailer.

• With Hitman, Timothy Olyphant hopes to become John Woo. No, really. Trailer.

• A glimpse at Lars and the Real Girl.

• It's back - and so is Michael Caine: Sleuth. Trailer.

• A line from James Gray on We Own the Night. Earlier: the Cannes reviews. Trailer's at the site (with French subtitles).

October 19

• "Can vampire movies really rise from the dead? 30 Days of Night, an adaptation of the spine-chilling 2002 graphic novel by Steve Niles and Ben Templesmith attempts to resurrect the worn-out genre with something sorely missing after years of campy spoofs and stylized suckfests: realism." Trailer's at the site.

• Ben Affleck's directorial debut, Gone Baby Gone. Trailer.

• A few words on Reservation Road. Trailer.

  Not blurbed by EW: Wristcutters: A Love Story and Darfur Now.

October 26

• Martian Child is mentioned. Trailer.

• A few words with first-time director Alison Eastwood (yes, she's his daughter) about Rails & Ties, with Marcia Gay Harden and Kevin Bacon.

• David Schwimmer directs Simon Pegg in Run, Fatboy, Run. The bit. Trailer's at the site.

• Sigh. Saw IV.

• "Something cataclysmic happens and he's plunged into a vortex," Anthony Hopkins tells EW. Slipstream. Earlier: the Sundance reviews.

• "The first English-language film from Oscar-nominated Danish director Susanne Bier (After the Wedding), [Things We Lost in the Fire] is a drama about a woman (Halle BerryDavid Duchovny), invites his heroin-addicted best friend (Benicio Del Toro) into her home." Trailer.

• Not blurbed by EW: Funny Games, Michael Haneke's remake of his own film, this time with Naomi Watts, Tim Roth and Michael Pitt.

November 2

• The story of how Ridley Scott revived American Gangster after it'd been left for dead for two years. Trailer.

• "Afghanistan in the 70s was a beautiful country." Marc Forster, briefly, on The Kite Runner.

November 9

• Not so between the lines: no one will bother with Fred Claus. Trailer.

• "The first release from the new, Tom Cruise-run United Artists is a rumination on war, education, and politics from one of our most socially minded actor-filmmakers: Robert Redford, whose liberal college-professor character provides the film's title." Which is, of course, Lions for Lambs. Trailer.

• Too brief: No Country For Old Men. Trailer. NYFF. Earlier: the Cannes reviews.

• Not blurbed by EW: Richard Kelly's long-awaited curiosity Southland Tales and Amy Heckerling's I Could Never Be Your Woman.

November 16

• "We fickin' love it." Beowulf, written by Neil Gaiman and Roger Avary, directed by Robert Zemeckis. Trailer.

• Mike Newell directs an adaptation of Gabriel GarcÃ?a Márquez's Love in the Time of Cholera. MySpace.

• Words with Jennifer Jason Leigh, re: Noah Baumbach's Margot at the Wedding. Trailer. Toronto. NYFF.

• An introduction to Mr Magorium's Wonder Emporium, with Dustin Hoffman and Natalie Portman. Trailer's at the site.

November 21

• Kirsten Sheridan (yes, she's his daughter) directs Jonathan Rhys Meyers and Keri Russell in August Rush. The bit.

• "I wanted to explore Bob Dylan's almost violent need to reject the thing that everybody expected him to be," Todd Haynes tells EW. I'm Not There. I am, though. Clip. Toronto. NYFF.

• A soundbite from Frank Darabont about Stephen King's The Mist.

• A few words with This Christmas writer-director Preston A Whitmore II.

November 30

• A hint from Hayley Atwell regarding Woody Allen's Cassandra's Dream. At AICN, Moriarty points to a trailer. Toronto.

• Not blurbed by EW: The Christmas Cottage and Pathology. Now there's a double bill.

December 7

• Atonement. We turn immediately to... "After enchanting the world with his first feature film, a masterful and refreshing adaptation of the Austen literary classic Pride & Prejudice, the 35-year-old British directorial prodigy Joe Wright again teams up with his star actress Keira Knightley for another accomplished adaptation of a British literary work: Ian McEwan's Atonement," writes Boyd van Hoeij in an early review at european-films.net. "Closely following the novel (adapted for the screen by playwright Christopher Hampton), Atonement is a fully formed pleasure of a film that only really stumbles in its editing and its closing moments, compressing McEwan's haunting epilogue into too small a sequence to allow especially those unfamiliar with the novel the time to fully absorb its devastating meaning." Toronto.

• "If you thought Harry Potter was blasphemous, wait till you get a look at the His Dark Materials trilogy." As you've heard, the first film'll be The Golden Compass. Trailer.

• "[George] Clooney, who earned an Oscar nod for his last directorial effort (Good Night, and Good Luck), led a four-month shoot in the Carolinas that emphasized efficiency." Leatherheads.

• A quote from Paul Schrader on The Walker. Trailer. Earlier: Berlinale reviews. Currently playing in the UK: Xan Brooks in the Guardian and Philip French in the Observer.

December 14

• A quick, quick talk with Francis Ford Coppola. Youth Without Youth. Earlier: Peter Nellhaus on Coppola's appearance in Miami in May.

• Not blurbed by EW: Jason Reitman's Juno.

December 19

• A remark from Julian Schnabel regarding The Diving Bell and the Butterfly. Trailer at the site (in French). NYFF. Earlier: the Cannes reviews.

December 21

• "She was like a kid, I tell you. A kid!" Jon Voight can't get over Helen Mirren's enthusiasm in her "first-ever action-adventure film," National Treasure: Book of Secrets. Trailer.

• It's Hilary Swank in PS I Love You.

• "The look is fantastic." But of course, Helena Bonham Carter would say that about a Tim Burton movie, wouldn't she. And she won't hear any objections from me. Sweeney Todd. And EW reruns Whitney Pastorek's chat with Burton about the 3D version of A Nightmare Before Christmas since it'll be back in theaters in the fall.

• John C Reilly "has recorded more than 30 songs in character - which the team hopes to collect onto a CD set titled, naturally, A Box of Cox." Walk Hard. Trailer.

• The Bucket List is "Rob Reiner's Christmas dramedy," starring Jack Nicholson and Morgan Freeman.

• "Mike Nichols decided to steer clear of political allegory." Charlie Wilson's War stars Tom Hanks, Julia Roberts and Philip Seymour Hoffman.

• Denzel Washington appears, however reluctantly, in his own second directorial feature, The Great Debators.

• A short talk with Marjane Satrapi about Persepolis. Trailer's at the site. NYFF. Earlier: the Cannes reviews.

• The Loch Ness Monster gets cute. The Water Horse: Legend of the Deep. Trailer.

December 26

• A chat with Paul Thomas Anderson about There Will Be Blood. Trailer.

December 28

• A bit on The Orphanage. Trailer. NYFF. Earlier: the Cannes raves.

Release dates are subject to change, of course, and here's one without one at all yet: "Immigration is the key issue in the latest from The Cooler director Wayne Kramer." Crossing Over stars Sean Penn, Harrison Ford, Alice Braga and Ray Liotta.

More seasonal anticipation: QTA, Nathaniel R and Gabriel Shanks.

Posted by dwhudson at August 19, 2007 3:01 PM