Hello everyone and welcome to a brand new decade! We are officially in 2020 and with the new year’s day comes the annual tradition of me listing out the top 50 movies I’m dying to watch in the new year. I got a smidge adventurous with this list in that there’s lots of things potentially coming out but without solid release dates. What I think is most fascinating about this new decade of film is that for the first time, I don’t know if I have a clear number one movie I’m dying to see, but I am looking forward to the discoveries the year will hopefully bring. So without further ado, here are my top 50 most anticipated movies of 2020.
All Day and A Night
Dir./Writer: Joe Robert Cole
Starring: Ashton Sanders, Jeffrey Wright, Yahya Abdul-Mateen II, Regina Taylor, John Que, and Kelly Jenrette
Synopsis: A young criminal arrives in prison as he looks back on the days preceding his arrest and the circumstances of his childhood to find clues to his way forward in life and his survival.
Release Date: TBD
Ammonite
Dir/Writer: Francis Lee
Starring: Kate Winslet, Saoirse Ronan, Fiona Shaw, Alec Secăreanu, James McArdle
Synopsis: In 1800s England, acclaimed but unrecognised fossil hunter Mary Anning works alone on the rugged Southern coastline. With the days of her famed discoveries behind her, she now searches for common fossils to sell to tourists to support herself and her ailing mother. When a wealthy visitor entrusts Mary with the care of his wife Charlotte, she cannot afford to turn his offer down. Proud and relentlessly passionate about her work, Mary initially clashes with her unwelcome guest, but despite the distance between their social class and personalities, an intense bond begins to develop, compelling the two women to determine the true nature of their relationship.
Release Date: TBD
Antlers
Dir. Scott Cooper
Writer: C. Henry Chaisson, Nick Antosca, Scott Cooper
Starring: Keri Russell, Jesse Plemons, Jeremy T. Thomas, Graham Greene, Scott Haze, Rory Cochrane, and Amy Madigan
Synopsis: A small-town Oregon teacher, Julia Meadows (Keri Russell) and her sheriff brother Paul (Jesse Plemons), become entwined with a young student in her school who is harboring a dangerous secret with frightening consequences.
Release Date: April 17
BIOS
Dir: Miguel Sapochnik
Writer: Ivor Powell
Starring: Tom Hanks, Skeet Ulrich, Caleb Landry Jones, Samira Wiley
Synopsis: Tom Hanks stars in Amblin Entertainment’s BIOS as Finch, the last man on Earth. An ailing inventor facing his own mortality, Finch builds a robot to keep his beloved dog safe. As the trio embarks upon an epic cross-country journey, the scientist must teach his creation to become “human” enough to take care of its charge – and the beloved pet to accept a new master.
Release Date: October 2
Blonde
Dir/Writer: Andrew Dominick
Starring: Ana de Armas, Bobby Cannavale, Adrien Brody, Julianne Nicholson.
Synopsis: A fictionalized take on the life of Marilyn Monroe based on the novel of the same name by Joyce Carol Oates.
Release Date: TBD
The Boys in the Band
Dir. Joe Mantello
Writer: Mart Crowley
Starring: Jim Parsons, Zachary Quinto, Matt Bomer, Andrew Rannells, Charlie Carver, Robin de Jesús, Brian Hutchison, Michael Benjamin Washington, Tuc Watkins
Synopsis: A group of gay men who gather in a NYC apartment for a friend’s birthday party. After the drinks are poured and the music turned up, the evening slowly exposes the fault lines beneath their friendships and the self-inflicted heartache that threatens their solidarity.
Release Date: TBD
The Conjuring: The Devil Made Me Do It
Dir. Michael Chaves
Written by: David Leslie Johnson-McGoldrick
Starring: Patrick Wilson, Vera Farmiga, Sterling Jerins, Julian Hilliard, Sarah Catherine Hook, Charlene Amoia and Ruairi O’Connor
Synopsis: “The Conjuring: The Devil Made Me Do It” reveals a chilling story of terror, murder and unknown evil that shocked even experienced real-life paranormal investigators Ed and Lorraine Warren. One of the most sensational cases from their files, it starts with a fight for the soul of a young boy, then takes them beyond anything they’d ever seen before, to mark the first time in U.S. history that a murder suspect would claim demonic possession as a defense.
Release Date: September 20
Covers
Dir. Nisha Ganatra
Written by: Flora Greeson
Starring: Dakota Johnson, Tracee Ellis Ross, Kelvin Harrison Jr. and Zoë Chao
Synopsis: The movie will be about an aspiring music producer (Johnson) who works as an assistant to a legendary singer. As the producer tries to juggle her demanding assistant’s job, she will also have to figure out her own career.
Release Date: May 8
Deep Water
Dir. Adrian Lyne
Written by: Zach Helm and Sam Levinson
Starring: Ben Affleck, Ana de Armas, Tracy Letts, Lil Rel Howery, and Rachel Blanchard
Synopsis: A married couple who’ve fallen out of love with each other begin playing deadly mind games against one another that begins seeing those around them dying.
Release Date: November 13
The Devil All the Time
Dir. Antonio Campos
Written by: Antonio Campos, Paulo Campos
Starring: Tom Holland, Sebastian Stan, Robert Pattinson, Mia Wasikowska, Eliza Scanlen, Bill Skarsgard, Jason Clarke, Riley Keough, Haley Bennett, Harry Meling, Douglas Hodge and Jason Collett
Synopsis: Set in post World War II in the 1960s in Ohio, the film follows a nonelinear storyline of various disturbed people who suffer from the damages of the post-war.
Release Date: TBD
Emma
Dir. Autumn de Wilde
Written by: Eleanor Catton
Starring: Anya Taylor-Joy, Johnny Flynn, Josh O’Connor and Bill Nighy
Synopsis: Following the antics of a young woman, Emma Woodhouse, who lives in Georgian- and Regency-era England and occupies herself with matchmaking – in sometimes misguided, often meddlesome fashion- in the lives of her friends and family.
Release Date: February 21
Eternals
Dir. Chloe Zhao
Written by: Matthew and Ryan Firpo
Starring: Angelina Jolie, Richard Madden, Kumail Nanjiani, Lauren Ridloff, Brian Tyree Henry, Salma Hayek, Lia McHugh, Don Lee, Barry Keoghan, Gemma Chan and Kit Harington
Synopsis: In a story spanning over 7000 years, the Eternals, an immortal alien race created by the Celestials, protect humanity from their evil counterparts, the Deviants.
Release Date: November 6
Everybody’s Talking About Jamie
Dir: Jonathan Butterell
Writer: Tom MacRae and Dan Gillespie Sells
Starring: Max Harwood, Richard E. Grant, Sharon Horgan, Sarah Lancashire and Shobna Gulati
Synopsis: The musical is inspired by the 2011 television documentary Jamie: Drag Queen at 16, directed by Jenny Popplewell. The musical follows a 16-year-old teenager as he overcomes prejudice, beats the bullies and steps out of the darkness to become a drag queen.
Release Date: October 23
Fantasy Island
Dir: Jeff Wadlow
Writer: Jeff Wadlow & Chris Roach & Jillian Jacobs
Starring: Michael Peña, Maggie Q, Lucy Hale, Austin Stowell, Portia Doubleday, Jimmy O. Yang, Ryan Hansen, Michael Rooker
Synopsis: In Blumhouse’s new spin on Fantasy Island, the enigmatic Mr. Roarke makes the secret dreams of his lucky guests come true at a luxurious but remote tropical resort. But when the fantasies turn into nightmares, the guests have to solve the island’s mystery in order to escape with their lives.
Release Date: February 14
The French Dispatch
Dir/Writer: Wes Anderson
Starring: Benicio Del Toro, Frances McDormand, Jeffrey Wright, Adrien Brody, Timothée Chalamet, Léa Seydoux, Tilda Swinton, Mathieu Amalric, Lyna Khoudri, Stephen Park, Owen Wilson and Bill Murray
Synopsis: The film has been described as “a love letter to journalists set at an outpost of an American newspaper in a fictional 20th-century French city”, centering on three storylines.
Release Date: TBD
The Gentlemen
Dir: Guy Ritchie
Writer: Guy Ritchie, Ivan Atkinson, Marn Davies
Starring: Matthew McConaughey, Charlie Hunnam, Henry Golding, Michelle Dockery, Jeremy Strong, Eddie Marsan, Colin Farrell and Hugh Grant
Synopsis: The film follows American expat Mickey Pearson who has created a highly profitable marijuana empire in London. When word gets out that he is looking to cash out his business, it triggers plots, schemes, bribery and blackmail in an attempt to steal his domain out from under him.
Release Date: January 24
Hillbilly Elegy
Dir: Ron Howard
Writer: Vanessa Taylor
Starring: Amy Adams, Glenn Close, Gabriel Basso, Haley Bennett, Freida Pinto
Synopsis: The movie is “about the Appalachian values of a Kentucky family and their relation to the social problems of his hometown of Middletown, Ohio, where his mother’s parents moved when they were young.”
Release Date: TBD
The Humans
Dir/Writer: Stephen Karam
Starring: Jayne Houdyshell, Richard Jenkins, Beanie Feldstein, Amy Schumer, Steven Yeun and June Squibb
Synopsis: At Thanksgiving, the Blake family gathers at the run-down Manhattan apartment in Chinatown of Brigid Blake and her boyfriend Richard. Brigid’s parents, Erik Blake and Deirdre Blake, arrive from their home in Scranton, Pennsylvania, to have dinner with Brigid, Richard and Aimee, their other adult daughter. Brigid is a musician and Aimee is a lawyer living in Philadelphia. Aimee has recently broken up with her girlfriend and has developed an intestinal ailment. Also present is Erik’s mother Fiona “Momo”, who has Alzheimer’s disease. The parents are unhappy that their daughters have left home and have abandoned their religion. The family members must deal with “aging, illness, and a changing economy”
Release Date: TBD
In the Heights
Dir: Jon M. Chu
Writer: Quiara Alegría Hudes
Starring: Anthony Ramos, Corey Hawkins, Leslie Grace, Melissa Barrera, Olga Merediz, Daphne Rubin-Vega, Gregory Diaz IV, Stephanie Beatriz, Dascha Polanco, and Jimmy Smits
Synopsis: Lights up on Washington Heights…The scent of a cafecito caliente hangs in the air just outside of the 181st Street subway stop, where a kaleidoscope of dreams rallies this vibrant and tight-knit community. At the intersection of it all is the likeable, magnetic bodega owner Usnavi (Anthony Ramos), who saves every penny from his daily grind as he hopes, imagines and sings about a better life.
Release Date: June 26
The Invisible Man
Dir/Writer: Leigh Whannell
Starring: Elisabeth Moss, Oliver Jackson-Cohen, Aldis Hodge, Storm Reid and Harriet Dyer
Synopsis: Trapped in a violent, controlling relationship with a wealthy and brilliant scientist, Cecilia Kass (Elisabeth Moss) escapes in the dead of night and disappears into hiding, aided by her sister (Harriet Dyer), their childhood friend (Aldis Hodge) and his teenage daughter (Storm Reid). But when Cecilia’s abusive ex-boyfriend (Oliver Jackson-Cohen) commits suicide and leaves her a generous portion of his vast fortune, Cecilia suspects his death was a hoax. As a series of eerie coincidences turns lethal, threatening the lives of those she loves, Cecilia’s sanity begins to unravel as she desperately tries to prove that she is being hunted by someone nobody can see.
Release: February 28
Jesus Was My Homeboy
Dir: Shaka King
Writer: Will Berson, Shaka King, The Lucas Bros
Starring: Daniel Kaluuya, Lakeith Stanfield, Jesse Plemons, Dominique Fishback, Ashton Sanders, and Algee Smith
Synopsis: The life story of Black Panther Party member Fred Hampton.
Release Date: August 21
Jungle Cruise
Dir: Jaume Collet-Serra
Writer: Michael Green, Glenn Ficarra, John Requa, J. D. Payne, Patrick McKay
Starring: Dwayne Johnson, Emily Blunt, Edgar Ramirez, Jack Whitehall, Jesse Plemons, Paul Giamatti
Synopsis: Set during the early 20th century, a riverboat captain named Frank takes a scientist and her brother on a mission into a jungle to find the Tree of Life which is believed to possess healing powers. All the while, the trio must fight against dangerous wild animals and a competing German expedition.
Release Date: July 24
Kajillionaire
Dir/Writer: Miranda July
Starring: Evan Rachel Wood, Richard Jenkins, Da’Vine Joy Randolph , Debra Winger, Gina Rodriguez and Mark Ivanir
Synopsis: Low-stakes grifters, Old Dolio and her parents invite a chipper young woman into their insular clan, only to have their entire world turned upside down.
Release Date: Sundance Film Festival on January 25, 2020
Lair
Dir: Adam Ethan Crow
Writer: Adam Ethan Crow
Starring: Oded Fehr, John Hannah, Corey Johnson
Synopsis: A fractured LGBTQ family are forced to face their demons, metaphorically and literally, as they unwittingly become embroiled in a man’s attempt to prove the existence of the supernatural in order to overturn a friend’s murder conviction.
Release Date: TBD
Last Night in Soho
Dir: Edgar Wright
Writer: Edgar Wright, Krysty Wilson-Cairns
Starring: Thomasin McKenzie, Anya Taylor-Joy, Matt Smith, Diana Rigg, Terence Stamp
Synopsis: A London set psychological horror film said to be inspired by other British horror films Nicolas Roeg’s Don’t Look Now, and Roman Polanski’s Repulsion.
Release Date: September 25
The Last Thing He Wanted
Dir: Dee Rees
Writer: Marco Vallalobos, Dee Rees
Starring: Anne Hathaway, Ben Affleck, Willem Dafoe, Rosie Perez
Synopsis: A veteran D.C. journalist loses the thread of her own narrative when a guilt-propelled errand for her father thrusts her from byline to unwitting subject in the very story she’s trying to break. Adapted from the Joan Didion novel of the same title.
Release Date: Sundance Film Festival on January 27
Malignant
Dir: James Wan
Writer: James Wan, Ingrid Bisu, Akela Cooper, J. T. Petty
Starring: Annabelle Wallis, Jake Abel, George Young, Maddie Hasson, Michole Briana White, Jacqueline McKenzie
Synopsis: It is based on Wan’s 2011 graphic novel Malignant Man.
Release Date: August 14
Mank
Dir: David Fincher
Writer: Jack Fincher
Starring: Gary Oldman, Amanda Seyfried, Lily Collins, Tuppence Middleton, Arliss Howard, Charles Dance
Synopsis: Chronicles Herman J. Mankiewicz as he wrote Citizen Kane, and the problems that arose during it.
Release Date: TBD
Minari
Dir/Writer: Lee Isaac Chung
Starring: Steven Yeun, Han Yeri, Youn Yuh Jung, Will Patton, Alan Kim, Noel Kate Cho
Synopsis: David, a 7-year-old Korean-American boy, gets his life turned upside down when his father decides to move their family to rural Arkansas and start a farm in the mid-1980s, in this charming and unexpected take on the American Dream.
Release Date: Sundance Film Festival on January 26
Miss Fisher and the Crypt of Tears
Dir: Tony Tilse
Writer: Deb Cox
Starring: Esse Davis, Nathan Page, Hugo Johnstone-Burt, Ashleigh Cummings
Synopsis: After freeing a young Bedouin girl from her unjust imprisonment in Jerusalem, Phryne Fisher begins to unravel a decade-old mystery concerning priceless emeralds, ancient curses and the truth behind the suspicious disappearance of Shirin’s forgotten tribe.
Release Date: February 27
Monster Problems
Dir: Michael Matthews
Writer: Matthew Robinson
Starring: Dylan O’Brien, Michael Rooker, Ariana Greenblatt, Jessica Henwick
Synopsis: Monster Problems is an upcoming post-apocalyptic comedy film about a young man fighting monsters on his way to meet the girl he loves.
Release Date: April 17
The Nest
Dir/Writer: Sean Durkin
Starring: Jude Law, Carrie Coon, Charlie Shotwell, Oona Roche
Synopsis: Charismatic entrepreneur Rory relocates his family to England with dreams of profiting from booming 1980’s London. But as his wife, Allison, struggles to adapt, and the promise of a lucrative new beginning starts to unravel, the couple have to face the unwelcome truths lying beneath the surface of their marriage.
Release Date: Sundance Film Festival in January
The New Mutants
Dir: Josh Boone
Writer: Josh Boone, Knate Lee
Starring: Anya Taylor-Joy, Maisie Williams, Charlie Heaton, Henry Zaga, Blu Hunt, and Alice Braga
Synopsis: Magik, Wolfsbane and other teenage mutants try to come to grips with their superpowers while staying at a secret facility.
Release Date: April 3 (Allegedly)
No Time to Die
Dir: Cary Joji Fukunaga
Writer: Cary Joji Fukunaga, Neal Purvis and Robert Wade, and Phoebe Waller-Bridge
Starring: Daniel Craig, Ralph Fiennes, Naomie Harris, Ben Whishaw, Rory Kinnear, Jeffrey Wright, Léa Seydoux, Christoph Waltz, Rami Malek, Ana de Armas, and Lashana Lynch
Synopsis: Five years after the capture of Ernst Stavro Blofeld,James Bond has left active service. He is approached by Felix Leiter, his friend and a CIA officer, who enlists his help in the search for a missing scientist. When it becomes apparent that the scientist was abducted, Bond must confront a danger the likes of which the world has never seen before.
Release Date: April 8
Passing
Dir/Writer: Rebecca Hall
Starring: Tessa Thompson, Ruth Negga, André Holland, Alexander Skarsgård
Synopsis: Childhood friends reunite in adulthood and become obsessed with one another’s lives.
Release Date: TBD
The Photograph
Dir/Writer: Stella Meghie
Starring: Issa Rae, Lakeith Stanfield, Chelsea Peretti, Lil Rel Howery, Courtney B. Vance
Synopsis: When famed photographer Christina Eames dies unexpectedly, she leaves her estranged daughter, Mae, hurt, angry and full of questions. When Mae finds a photograph tucked away in a safe-deposit box, she soon finds herself delving into her mother’s early life — an investigation that leads to an unexpected romance with a rising journalist.
Release Date: February 14
Promising Young Woman
Dir/Writer: Emerald Fennell
Starring: Carey Mulligan, Bo Burnham, Alison Brie, Clancy Brown, Jennifer Coolidge, Connie Britton and Laverne Cox
Synopsis: Everyone said Cassie (Carey Mulligan) was a promising young woman… until a mysterious event abruptly derailed her future. But nothing in Cassie’s life is what it appears to be: she’s wickedly smart, tantalizingly cunning, and she’s living a secret double life by night. Now, an unexpected encounter is about to give Cassie a chance to right the wrongs of the past in this thrilling and wildly entertaining story.
Release Date: April 17
A Quiet Place 2
Dir/Writer: John Krasinski
Starring: Emily Blunt, Cillian Murphy, Millicent Simmonds, Noah Jupe, Djimon Hounsou
Synopsis: Following the deadly events at home, the Abbott family (Emily Blunt, Millicent Simmonds, Noah Jupe) must now face the terrors of the outside world as they continue their fight survival in silence. Forced to venture into the unknown, they quickly realize that the creatures that hunt by sound are not the only threats that lurk beyond the sand path.
Release Date: March 20
Raya and the Last Dragon
Dir: Paul Briggs, Dean Wellins
Writer: Adele Lim
Starring: Cassie Steele and Awkwafina
Synopsis: In a mysterious realm called Kumandra, a warrior named Raya searches for the last dragon in the world.
Release Date: November 25
Rebecca
Dir: Ben Wheatley
Writer: Jane Goldman
Starring: Lily James, Armie Hammer, Kristin Scott Thomas, Keeley Hawes, Sam Riley
Synopsis: The new wife of a widowed man feels his former wife’s shadow upon her after moving in with him in his English country home.
Release Date: TBD
Saint Maud
Dir/Writer: Rose Glass
Starring: Jennifer Ehle, Morfydd Clark, Lily Frazer
Synopsis: Follows a pious nurse who becomes dangerously obsessed with saving the soul of her dying patient.
Release Date: March 27
Sergio
Dir: Greg Barker
Writer: Craig Borten
Starring: Wagner Moura, Ana de Armas, Garret Dillahunt, Brían F. O’Byrne, Will Dalton, Clemens Schick and Bradley Whitford
Synopsis: A sweeping drama set in the chaotic aftermath of the US invasion of Iraq, where the life of top UN diplomat Sergio Vieira de Mello hangs in the balance during the most treacherous mission of his career.
Release Date: Sundance Film Festival on January 28, 2020
Shirley
Dir: Josephine Decker
Writer: Sarah Gubbins
Starring: Elisabeth Moss, Michael Stuhlbarg, Logan Lerman, Odessa Young
Synopsis: Shirley follows “a young couple that moves in with Jackson and her Bennington College professor-husband, Stanley Hyman, in the hopes of starting a new life. Instead, they find themselves fodder for a psycho-drama that inspires Jackson’s next major novel.”
Release Date: Sundance Film Festival on January 25, 2020
Soul
Dir: Pete Docter
Written by: Pete Docter, Mike Jones, Kemp Powers, Tina Fey
Starring: Jamie Foxx, Tina Fey, Questlove, Phylicia Rashad and Daveed Diggs
Synopsis: Joe Gardner, a middle school music teacher, has long dreamed of performing jazz music onstage, and finally gets a chance after impressing other jazz musicians during an opening act at the Half Note Club. However, an accident causes Gardner’s soul to be separated from his body and transported to the “You Seminar”, a center in which souls develop and gain passions before being transported to a newborn child, and Gardner must work with souls in training, such as 22, a soul with a dim view on life after being trapped for years at the You Seminar, in order to return to Earth before it’s too late.
Release Date: June 19
Superintelligence
Dir. Ben Falcone
Writer: Steve Mallory
Starring: Melissa McCarthy, Bobby Cannavale, Brian Tyree Henry, Jean Smart, James Corden
Synopsis: Carol Peters’ life is turned upside down when she is selected for observation by the world’s first superintelligence – a form of artificial intelligence that may or may not take over the world.
Release Date: December 20
Supernova
Dir./Written: Harry Macqueen
Starring: Colin Firth, Stanley Tucci, James Dreyfus
Synopsis: Sam and Tusker partners of 20 years, who are traveling across England in their old RV visiting friends, family and places from their past. Since Tusker was diagnosed with early-onset dementia two years ago, their time together is the most important thing they have.
Release: TBD
Tenet
Dir./Writer: Christopher Nolan
Starring: John David Washington, Robert Pattinson, Elizabeth Debicki, Dimple Kapadia, Aaron Taylor-Johnson, Clémence Poésy, Michael Caine, and Kenneth Branagh
Synopsis: An action epic evolving from the world of international espionage.
Release: July 17
The Trial of the Chicago 7
Dir./Writer: Aaron Sorkin
Starring: Sacha Baron Cohen, Eddie Redmayne, Yahya Abdul-Mateen II, Jeremy Strong, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Alex Sharp, Thomas Middleditch, Frank Langella, William Hurt, Michael Keaton, and Mark Rylance
Synopsis: Based on the story of the Chicago Seven, a group of seven defendants charged by the federal government with conspiracy, inciting to riot, and other charges related to anti-Vietnam War and countercultural protests that took place in Chicago, Illinois, on the occasion of the 1968 Democratic National Convention.
Release: Sept 25
Tigertail
Dir./Writer: Alan Yang
Starring: Christine Ko, Fiona Fu, Tzi Ma, Hayden Szeto
Synopsis: A multi-generational tale of one family from 1950’s Taiwan to present-day New York.
Release: TBD
To All the Boys: P.S. I Still Love You
Dir. Michael Fimognari
Writer: Sofia Alvarez, J. Mills Goodloe
Starring: Lana Condor, Noah Centineo, Janel Parrish, Anna Cathcart, Trezzo Mahoro, Madeleine Arthur, Emilija Baranac, Kelcey Mawema, Jordan Fisher, Ross Butler, Holland Taylor, Sarayu Blue, and John Corbett
Synopsis: John’s arrival will force Lara Jean to figure whether her feelings for him are only a thing of the past.
Release: February 12