25 Movies to be Excited About in 2016
It only took 352 days before 2015’s most anticipated movie hit theaters. Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens was the biggest movie of the year and we almost had to wait the entire year before enjoying it. The December release of the latest Star Wars installment also marked the first time in the history of the franchise that the release date was not in May, the same month George Lucas was born. Maybe it was a marketing trick to build up the suspense for an entire year. Or maybe it was simply because J.J. Abrams and Disney decided it would be best to release the new ones closer to Christmas. Regardless of their reasons, it worked.
What does that mean for 2016? For starters, Episode VIII will not come out until 2017 but there will still be a Star Wars movie. Star Wars: Rogue One will come out around this same time later into 2016. But enough with Star Wars, what about everything else about to hit the theaters next year?
Let’s take a look at some of the movies set to break box office records and some that will simply be amazing in 2016. Enjoy.
Honorable Mention: The Hateful Eight
Release Date: January 1st
Director: Quentin Tarantino
Starring: Samuel L. Jackson, Kurt Russell, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Tim Roth, Michael Madsen, Channing Tatum
Details: The Hateful Eight makes the honorable mention because it comes out the very first day of 2016 giving us literally no time to anticipate it next year. From the trailer, Quentin Tarantino’s 8th film looks to be one of his better ones as he finally has allowed Samuel L. Jackson the chance to be the main character.
25. Inferno
Release Date: October 14th
Director: Ron Howard
Starring: Tom Hanks, Felicity Jones, Omar Sy, Ben Foster
Opening Weekend (Projected): $38 Million
Details: Tom Hanks returns for the third time to reprise his role as Robert Langdon, the Harvard University Professor of religious iconography and symbology. If the movie is even half as good as the novel by Dan Brown, this movie could surpass the $100 million mark.
24. The Founder
Release Date: November 25th
Director: John Lee Hancock
Starring: Michael Keaton, Laura Dern, Nick Offerman
Opening Weekend (Projected): $26 Million
Details: Michael Keaton got his first Academy Award nomination in 2014 for his role in Birdman at the age of 63. From the early information we got about The Founder, he just might be on pace for another nomination, this time as McDonald’s CEO Ray Kroc.
23. La La Land
Release Date: July 15th
Director: Damien Chazelle
Starring: Ryan Gosling, Emma Stone, J.K. Simmons, John Legend, Rosemarie DeWitt
Opening Weekend (Projected): $14 Million
Details: The magical on-screen romance between Ryan Gosling and Emma Stone continues for a third time in the musical comedy-drama La La Land coming out this summer.
22. Warcraft
Release Date: June 10th
Director: Duncan Jones
Starring: Travis Fimmel, Paula Patton, Ben Foster, Dominic Cooper, Ben Schnetzer, Toby Kebbell
Opening Weekend (Projected): $47 Million
Details: Is it too little too late for the Warcraft movie? According to the millions of fans out there, it is never too late for a new addition to the Warcraft World.
21. Whiskey Tango Foxtrot
Release Date: March 4th
Director: Glenn Ficarra and John Requa
Starring: Tina Fey, Martin Freeman, Margot Robbie, Billy Bob Thornton, Alfred Molina
Opening Weekend (Projected): $41 Million
Details: Tina Fey plays Kim Barker, a real American journalist that covered Pakistian and Afghanistan during Operation Enduring Freedom. This movie is an adaptation of the book Kim wrote about her personal experiences while on overseas and the people she met along the way. Whiskey Tango Foxtrot is starting to look like one of the year’s best movies, already.
20. Ghostbusters
Release Date: July 15th
Director: Paul Feig
Starring: Kristen Wiig, Melissa McCarthy, Kate McKinnon, Leslie Jones, Chris Hemsworth
Opening Weekend (Projected): $78 Million
Details: There seems to be a lot of people that are not happy with the cast of the upcoming Ghostbusters film, the 3rd in the series. But we think it is brilliant because they will not be able to replicate what Dan Aykroyd, Bill Murray, and Harold Ramis brought to the series. Paul Feig, whom also directed the super successful Bridesmaids, looks to have used the same idea and applied it to Ghostbusters. This just looks like it will be a great new fresh look at the story that fans have been needing.
19. Moana
Release Date: November 23rd
Director: Ron Clements and John Musker
Starring: Auli’i Cravalho, Dwayne Johnson, Alan Tudyk
Opening Weekend (Projected): $82 Million
Details: How can the next Disney animated film not be great? The directors, Ron Clements and John Musker, also directed Disney classics like The Little Mermaid, Aladdin, Hercules, and The Princess and the Frog.
18. The Nice Guys
Release Date: May 20th
Director: Shane Black
Starring: Ryan Gosling, Russell Crowe, Kim Basinger
Opening Weekend (Projected): $26 Million
Details: Russell Crowe and Ryan Gosling get together for the first time on the big screen in this action comedy created by the same man that gave us Lethal Weapon, As Good As It Gets, and Iron Man 3. The first trailer gives us no doubt this is going to be one of the surprises of the year.
17. The Magnificent Seven
Release Date: September 23rd
Director: Antoine Fuqua
Starring: Denzel Washington, Chris Pratt, Ethan Hawke, Vincent D’Onofrio, Lee Byung-hun, Luke Grimes, Peter Sarsgaard
Opening Weekend (Projected): $33 Million
Details: This movie has dealt with its’ fair share of rumors about who was going to be part of the Seven. We think the final cast makes it worth seeing in 2016.
16. The Jungle Book
Release Date: April 15th
Director: Jon Favreau
Starring: Neel Sethi, Bill Murray, Ben Kingsley, Idris Elba, Scarlett Johansson, Christopher Walken
Opening Weekend (Projected): $68 Million
Details: This is one of the movies that will quietly become one of the bigger films in 2016 due to its’ take on the classic story of The Jungle Book using live-animation.
15. Star Trek Beyond
Release Date: July 22nd
Director: Justin Lin
Starring: Chris Pine, Zachary Quinto, Zoe Saldana, Simon Pegg
Opening Weekend (Projected): $70 Million
Details: Star Trek Beyond is the 13th film of the Star Trek series and third installment of the current reboot movies. Everyone is back and the story continues for Captain Kirk and the rest of his crew.
14. TMNT : Out of the Shadows
Release Date: June 3rd
Director: Dave Green
Starring: Megan Fox, Will Arnett, William Fletcher, Brian Tee, Tyler Perry, Laura Linney, Stephen Arnell
Opening Weekend (Projected): $89 Million
Details: Bebop and Rocksteady? Casey Jones? The TMNT Party Wagon shooting sewer covers? Yes please. Is there anything else we could add to the list of reasons this movie is going to be huge for turtles fans? Megan Fox returns as April O’Neil. Boom.
13. The Secret Life of Pets
Release Date: July 8th
Director: Chris Renaud and Yarrow Cheney
Starring: Louis C.K., Lake Bell, Eric Stonestreet, Kevin Hart, Ellie Kemper, Steve Coogan, Dana Carvey, Jenny Slate
Opening Weekend (Projected): $75 Million
Details: Toy Story showed us what happened to your toys when the owner’s left the house, now it is time to see what our pets really do when we are not home.
12. Alice Through the Looking Glass
Release Date: May 27th
Director: James Bobin
Starring: Johnny Depp, Mia Wasikowska, Anne Hathaway, Helena Bonham Carter, Sacha Baron Cohen
Opening Weekend (Projected): $68 Million
Details: When Tim Burton signed on to direct the first Alice in Wonderland, we were psyched. He returned as the producer this time but is still a huge part in the movie’s creative process making this potentially the best Alice movie yet.
11. Rogue One: A Star Wars Story
Release Date: December 16th
Director: Gareth Edwards
Starring: Felicity Jones, Diego Luna, Riz Ahmed, Donnie Yen, Peter Cushing, Forest Whitaker, Alan Tudyk
Opening Weekend (Projected): $98 Million
Details: Star Wars will never get old. It better not since we are going to be getting a new Star Wars movie every year until 2020. Rogue One is going to be great but the two following it are going to be even bigger, a Han Solo anthology set to be released in 2018 and a Boba Fett anthology coming out in 2020.
10. Finding Dory
Release Date: June 17th
Director: Andrew Stanton
Starring: Ellen DeGeneres, Albert Brooks, Diane Keaton, Eugene Levy, Ty Burrell, Kaitlin Olson, Ed O’Neil
Opening Weekend (Projected): $134 Million
Details: Since 2005, the rumor mill has been stocked with Finding Nemo sequel talks. Well, this June, it is finally going to happen.
9. Silence
Release Date: To Be Determined
Director: Martin Scorsese
Starring: Andrew Garfield, Liam Neeson, Ciaran Hinds, Adam Driver, Tadanobu Asano
Opening Weekend (Projected): $21 Million
Details: Five of Martin Scorsese’s last six films have been nominated for an Academy Award for Best Picture so it is fair to say he has a bit of a hot hand right now and we expect nothing but perfection with Silence.
8. Independence Day: Resurgence
Release Date: June 24th
Director: Roland Emmerich
Starring: Jeff Goldblum, Bill Pullman, Liam Hemsworth, Jessie Usher, Maika Monroe, Sela Ward, Judd Hirsch, Vivica A. Fox, Angelababy
Opening Weekend (Projected): $145 Million
Details: It has been 20 years since the original Independence Day shattered box office records. How do you make a sequel that will remain a box office success after that long of a hiatus? From the looks of the trailer, it’s by making the ships bigger, like, really big.
7. Deadpool
Release Date: February 12th
Director: Tim Miller
Starring: Ryan Reynolds, Morena Baccarin, Ed Skrein, T.J. Miller
Opening Weekend (Projected): $61 Million
Details: A movie trailer leaked onto the internet causing chaos and rumors about whether or not Deadpool the movie was finally going to happen. Well, it did and only because of the fans reaction to that trailer. That has to be one of the first times in cinema history that a movie was created from nothing but the support of the fans.
6. X-Men: Apocalypse
Release Date: May 27th
Director: Bryan Singer
Starring: James McAvoy, Michael Fassbender, Jennifer Lawrence, Olivia Munn, Nicholas Hoult, Rose Byrne, Oscar Isaac
Opening Weekend (Projected): $143 Million
Details: The most powerful mutant in the X-Men Universe is finally going to surface in X-Men: Apocalypse. Apocalypse is one of the best villains Marvel has ever created. He can manipulate molecules, energy, DNA, and psionic as well as transmutation, technopathy, super human strength, and is incredibly intelligent. How can this not be the best X-Men movie yet?
5. Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them
Release Date: November 18th
Director: David Yates
Starring: Eddie Redmayne, Katherine Waterston, Alison Sudol, Colin Farrell, Ron Perlman, Jon Voight
Opening Weekend (Projected): $83 Million
Details: 70 years before Harry Potter began his education at Hogwart’s, Newt Scamander was traveling around doing research on magical creatures from all over the World for a novel. This marks the first time Harry Potter creator and author, J.K. Rowlings, wrote a screenplay so we will find out real quick if the rest of the trilogy is worth watching.
4. Doctor Strange
Release Date: November 4th
Director: Scott Derrickson
Starring: Benedict Cumberbatch, Chiwetel Ejiofor, Rachel McAdams, Michael Stuhlburg, Tilda Swinton
Opening Weekend (Projected): $93 Million
Details: Benedict Cumberbatch is the perfect choice for the role of Doctor Strange. This will be one of the best Marvel movies, not just by Box Office standards, that we might ever get to watch simply because it is going to hit theaters long after the dust settles from the next three films.
3. Batman V Superman: Dawn of Justice
Release Date: March 25th
Director: Zack Snyder
Starring: Ben Affleck, Henry Cavill, Amy Adams, Jesse Eisenberg, Diane Lane, Jeremy Irons, Jason Momoa
Opening Weekend (Projected): $187 Million
Details: If DC Comics wants to succeed the same way Marvel has done then it is going to be now or never. This is the film that will either be the beginning of a very profitable Universe or it will mark the end of Batman, at least for now.
2. Suicide Squad
Release Date: August 5th
Director: David Ayer
Starring: Will Smith, Jared Leto, Margot Robbie, Cara Delevingne, Jai Courtney
Opening Weekend (Projected): $112 Million
Details: Harley Quinn is one of the most popular DC Comics characters over the past twenty years. Her popularity rose like Deadpool’s and this is the first time we are going to see her on the big screen. Margot Robbie looks to be the perfect candidate so far and Jared Leto’s portrayal of the Joker just might be the reason this movie becomes a box office masterpiece. We expect this movie to be better than pundits and critics are claiming simply because of the trailer. It looks like it could beat out Batman V Superman’s box office gross.
1. Captain America: Civil War
Release Date: May 6th
Director: Anthony Russo and Joe Russo
Starring: Chris Evans, Robert Downey Jr., Scarlett Johansson, Sebastian Stan, Don Cheadle, Paul Rudd, Paul Bettany, Daniel Bruhl, William Hurt, Anthony Mackie, Emily VanCamp, Jeremy Renner
Opening Weekend (Projected): $198 Million
Details: Iron Man faces off against Captain America in a battle that reaches the farthest lands in the World with both sides building an army. This is the movie Marvel has been building up to. This is why we have been watching Iron Man and Captain America for 7 films. This will be the highest grossing Marvel film ever.