It's been hard to be a cinephile these past couple of years. In addition to everything else, the COVID-19 pandemic has upended release schedules, disrupted film shoots and generally caused delay after delay. But movie studios must be optimistic for 2022, because the next year looks packed at the box office. Whether you're looking for romantic comedies, action movies, family films or superhero movies — lots and lots of superhero movies — there's something to look forward to on the horizon. The best movies of 2022 will add on to our favorite franchises, bring back beloved characters, translate the real lives of some amazing trailblazers on screen or show us all something totally new. So grab your tickets, get your popcorn and get ready for a night out out in theaters.
One thing to keep in mind: The pandemic is an ongoing concern, as is movie studios' relationships to their own streaming services. It's very possible that these release dates will shift around as the pandemic ebbs and wanes, or that they'll go straight to streaming or VOD instead of theaters. Before you head out to the cinema, check your local listings to make sure the schedule hasn't changed.
The 355
Release Date: January 7, 2022
Named after a female spy during the Revolutionary War, The 355 follows a group of international agents — all women — who band together to track down a dangerous mercenary with a powerful weapon. The cast brings together a set of amazing actresses, including Jessica Chastain, Lupita Nyong’o, Diane Kruger, Penelope Cruz and Fan Bingbing.
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Scream
Release Date: January 14, 2022
Just when you think you've seen the last of Ghostface, he pops back up again, usually with a knife in hand. And once again, Sidney Prescott, Dewey Riley, Gale Weathers and the Woodsboro crew have to figure out how these new murders are connected to the ones from 25 years ago.
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Munich – The Edge of War
Release Date: January 21, 2022
This movie takes place in Germany in the run-up to the war, and follows two former friends working for opposing governments. They put their differences behind them to expose Hitler's plans. Jeremy Irons also co-stars as Neville Chamberlain.
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Jackass Forever
Release Date: February 4, 2022
The Jackass team has been doing ill-advised stunts for more than two decades now — you think approaching their 50s would stop them? They prove they're up for anything, from encounters with bears, bulls and spiders to physical challenges likely to give them concussions.
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Moonfall
Release Date: February 4, 2022
Director Roland Emmerich, master of the art of the disaster epic (see: Independence Day, Godzilla, The Day After Tomorrow, 2012, etc.), takes on a catastrophe on a galactic scale: The moon gets knocked out of orbit and comes hurtling towards Earth. Can a ragtag team of scientists save the planet in time?
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RELATED: The Best End-Of-The-World Movies for When You're Feeling a Wild Ride
Kimi
Release Date:February 10, 2022
KIMI might be like certain other smart devices you know — the kind that you can shout out a question like, "What's the weather?" and it'll respond in a pleasing voice. This thriller gets underway when an agoraphobic tech worker, played by Zoë Kravitz, monitors anonymous KIMI feeds for quality control, and thinks that tone of the devices may have picked up evidence of a crime in progress.
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Marry Me
Release Date: February 11, 2022
Bring back the big-screen rom-com! In this one, Jennifer Lopez plays — what else? — a musical mega-star. When her plans to marry another celebrity on stage go awry, she picks a random guy (played by Owen Wilson) to wed instead. They then have to figure out if they made a huge mistake, or if they should make a go of the relationship.
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Death on the Nile
Release Date: February 11, 2022
Belfast's Kenneth Branagh directs and stars in the second of his Agatha Christie adaptations. In it, famed detective Hercule Poirot is called to solve a murder on the S.S. Karnak, and the list of suspects is long and played by actors like Gal Gadot, Annette Bening, Russell Brand and Sophie Okonedo.
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Bigbug
Release Date: February 11, 2022
This Netflix film is written and directed by Jean-Pierre Jeunet, creator of offbeat movies like Amélie and Delicatessen. This one seems no different: It takes place in 2050, when AI stage a coup and a group of suburbanites (and their household robots) lock themselves in for their protection.
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Tall Girl 2
Release Date: February 11, 2022
Netflix has become the home of the romantic-comedy franchise. First, there was The Kissing Booth series. Then, To All The Boys I've Loved Before. Now, Tall Girl gets a sequel. This time, Jodi is in a school play, which starts to affect her relationship.
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Blacklight
Release Date: February 11, 2022
Liam Neeson stars as a very Liam Neesony character, a freelance government "fixer" known for strong-arming bad guys. But when his daughter and granddaughter are threatened, he has to unravel an operation hidden within the FBI along with the help of a journalist.
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Uncharted
Release Date: February 18, 2022
This movie serves as a backstory to the famed video-game franchise of the same name. It stars Tom Holland and Mark Whalberg as two adventurers who go on a quest for "the greatest treasure never found."
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Dog
Release Date: February 18, 2022
In this film, Channing Tatum plays an Army Ranger whose assignment is to escort Lulu to her partner's funeral. Lulu, though, is a Belgian Malinois military working dog, and the partner was handler. Tatum also directed the film.
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The Cursed
Release Date: February 18, 2022
For fans of creepy, atmospheric horror, The Cursed follows what happens after a brutal land baron does a violent act that unleashes a curse on his village. Some people suspect an animal is attacking, but are other forces at work?
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Texas Chainsaw Massacre
Release Date: February 18, 2022
There's just something about Leatherface that keeps bringing filmmakers back for more. In Netflix's take on the franchise, the horror icon terrorizes influencers who move into his Texas territory.
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Cyrano
Release Date: February 25, 2022
Director Joe Wright, who's previously taken on adaptations of literary heavyweights like Pride and Prejudice and Anna Karenina, turns his attention to anther classic. This time, he's filmed a musical version of Cyrano de Bergerac, based on the 2018 stage show with music by The National.
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Studio 666
Release Date: February 25, 2022
Dave Grohl stars in the part he was born to play ... Dave Grohl! The movie, which was filmed in secret, follows what happens when the Foo Fighters move into a spooky house and try to record their tenth album. Can the band withstand the supernatural forces there?
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A Madea Homecoming
Release Date: February 25, 2022
Tyler Perry's most enduring character is back! (On Netflix, at least.) This time, Madea and "Mrs. Brown’s Boys" cause drama at Madea's great-grandson's college graduation.
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Against the Ice
Release Date: March 2, 2022
For those who like survival stories, this Netflix film stars Nikolaj Coster-Waldau as the real-life Captain Ejnar Mikkelsen, an explorer who set out to sled across Greenland to disprove the United State's claim to the territory. It's based on the book Two Against the Ice, about Denmark's 1909 polar expedition.
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The Weekend Away
Release Date: March 3, 2022
In this Netflix thriller, Leighton Meester stars as a girl who goes on a trip to Croatia with her best friend — only to have her BFF disappear. She has to figure out what happened to clear her name as the prime suspect.
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The Batman
Release Date: March 4, 2022
A Dark Knight's work is never done. This time, Robert Pattinson takes up the cowl for a movie directed by Cloverfield's Matt Reeves. This one goes back to Batman's early years in Gotham City, and his first run-in with the Riddler.
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RELATED: Every Upcoming Superhero Movie From Marvel and DC
After Yang
Release Date: March 4, 2022
From Columbus director Kogonada, After Yang takes place in a world where robots are integrated into family life. Colin Farrell and Malea Emma Tjandrawidjaja play a father and daughter who desperately try to get their robot, Yang, fixed after he becomes unresponsive.
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The Adam Project
Release Date: March 11, 2022
Ryan Reynolds stars in this Netflix film, about a fighter pilot who crash lands and needs to enlist the help of a 12-year-old boy. The twist? The pilot is a time-traveler, and the 12-year-old boy is younger self, and they have to work together to save the future.
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Umma
Release Date: March 18, 2022
Sandra Oh stars in a movie with a very relatable premise: When her estrange mother moves from Korea into her American farm, she starts to fear that she's turning into her mom. (We all do it.)
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The Outfit
Release Date: March 18, 2022
Mark Rylance stars in a crime drama about a Savile Row tailor who relocates to Chicago and winds up with a clientele of gangsters. Eventually, he finds himself in a position where he must outsmart a group of mobsters in order to survive.
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Windfall
Release Date: March 18, 2022
In this Netflix film, Jesse Plemons and Lily Collins play a wealthy, married couple who go to their vacation house and find it's in the middle of being robbed. As they spend time trapped in the house with the robber, played by Jason Segel, different truths come to light.
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The Lost City
Release Date: March 25, 2022
The date-night movie that has something for everybody, The Lost City stars Sandra Bullock as a reclusive romance novelist. When she goes on a book tour with her cover model (Channing Tatum), the two get involved in kidnapping scenario that turns their tour into a jungle adventure.
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Everything Everywhere All at Once
Release Date: March 25, 2022
Michelle Yeoh plays a woman who suddenly can connect to different universes and the lives she could have led, and needs to use this power to save the world. It's from Daniels, the directors behind Swiss Army Man, so expect something offbeat.
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Morbius
Release Date: April 1, 2022
After Venom, Morbius is next in the series of Spider-Man villains getting their own, stand-alone movies. Jared Leto plays the "living vampire," a doctor with a rare blood disease on the hunt for an unconventional cure.
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RELATED: How to Watch the Spider-Man Movies in Order
Apollo 10½: A Space Age Childhood
Release Date: April 1, 2022
Director Richard Linklater uses an animation process similar to his famed rotoscoping technique (which animates over a live-action performance) to create this tale of the 1969 moon landing. The events of this Netflix movie unfold through the perspectives of two different people: an astronaut on the Apollo 11 mission, and a 10-year-old boy on Earth.
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The Bubble
Release Date: April 1, 2022
This Judd Apatow Netflix comedy is a movie about making a movie — the sixth installment of a dinosaur franchise, to be exact. They're supposed to be in a "bubble" for COVID precautions, but of course things don't go as planned.
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Ambulance
Release Date: April 8, 2022
Director Michael Bay returns with more action, chases and suspense with a film starring Jake Gyllenhaal and Yahya Abdul-Mateen II as foster brothers and criminals. When a heist goes wrong, they steal an ambulance, take hostages and go on the run.
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Sonic the Hedgehog 2
Release Date: April 8, 2022
For Sega fans, Tails and Knuckles are both in this Sonic sequel. They're all after the same thing: the Master Emerald, which controls all the powers of the chaos emeralds.
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Metal Lords
Release Date: April 8, 2022
Game of Thrones' Greg Shapiro and D.B. Weiss bring us this Netflix movie, about a high-school metalhead who is desperate to win an upcoming Battle of the Bands. But when he can't find a bassist, he turns to an unlikely candidate from the school orchestra.
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Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore
Release Date: April 15, 2022
The third film in the Fantastic Beasts series still centers on trying to stop Gellert Grindelwald's nefarious plans, only this time, Mads Mikkelsen has replaced Johnny Depp in playing the dark wizard. In order to stop him, Albus Dumbledore sends Newt Scamander and his friends on a secret mission.
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Choose or Die
Release Date: April 15, 2022
In this movie, two friends decide to revive an old '80s video game when they realize the prize money remains unclaimed — but it drags them into a world of terror. And to make it a true '80s horror experience, Robert Englund makes an appearance (as himself, naturally).
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The Bad Guys
Release Date: April 22, 2022
Some animals just have bad reputations. In this animated film, a wolf, python, shark, piranha and tarantula set out to rehab their images and walk the straight and narrow instead.
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The Northman
Release Date: April 22, 2022
As a director, Robert Eggers has made The Witch, about supernatural beings in Puritan New England, and The Lighthouse, about an isolated duo going mad in a lighthouse in Nova Scotia — and his third film is just as unconventional in its subject matter and location. It takes place in an Icelandic village way back in the 10th century, when a Viking prince sets off to avenge his murdered father. Alexander Skarsgård stars in cast that also includes Nicole Kidman, Anya Taylor-Joy, Björk, Ethan Hawke and Willem Dafoe.
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The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent
Release Date: April 22, 2022
Nic Cage stars in a role in was born to play: Himself! In The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent, he accepts $1 million to make an appearance at the birthday party of a super fan, who happens to be a drug kingpin. When things go south, he has to adopt some of his film personae to make it out again.
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Along for the Ride
Release Date: April 22, 2022
Super Pumped's Emma Pasarow stars in this movie, based on a novel by Sarah Dessen. She plays Auden, an insomniac who strikes up a friendship with Eli, a fellow night owl. The two have adventures while the rest of their town sleeps.
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Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness
Release Date: May 6, 2022
Sam Raimi, director of three Spider-Man movies (the ones with Tobey Maguire), jumps to a new Marvel character with the sequel to Doctor Strange. Loki fans should definitely tune in, since Wanda Maximoff is going to be joining the Sorcerer Supreme this time around. There will also be some MCU newcomers, like The Baby-Sitters Club's Xochitl Gomez, who will be playing America Chavez.
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RELATED: How to Watch All 24 Marvel Movies in the Correct Order
Downton Abbey: A New Era
Release Date: May 19, 2022
It's time to check in once again with the Crawley family. Only this time, the action moves away from the estate in Yorkshire to a grand escape in the South of France.
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Legally Blonde 3
Release Date: May 20, 2022
No news from Elle Woods in nearly 20 years? We object! Mindy Kaling and Dan Goor are writing the script for the third installment of the Legally Blonde series, so it's sure to be a hoot.
Men
Release Date: May 20, 2022
This is the newest film from Alex Garland, the writer/director of Ex Machina. It stars Jesse Buckley as a woman who goes on a solo trip after the death of her husband, only to get more than she bargained for.
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Top Gun: Maverick
Release Date: May 27, 2022
It's been a long wait for Top Gun fans: This movie was originally supposed to come out in 2019, but faced several delays, especially due to the pandemic. But now, they can see Pete “Maverick” Mitchell training his own series of Top Gun graduates, including "Rooster" (Miles Teller), the son of his deceased buddy, "Goose."
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The Bob's Burgers Movie
Release Date: May 27, 2022
Devotees of the TV show of Bob's Burgers will be delighted to hear it's headed to the big screen. Even better: It's a musical! Show creator Loren Bouchard has also described it as a comedy, mystery and coming-of-age story.
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John Wick: Chapter 4
Release Date: May 27, 2022
First, The Matrix got its fourth installment. Now, Keanu follows up his John Wick franchise with another entry, which picks up right where John Wick: Chapter 3 – Parabellum leaves off.
Jurassic World: Dominion
Release Date: June 10, 2022
This is the follow-up to 2018's Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom, which ends with dinosaurs being set free to roam around an Earth inhabited by people. This film takes place four years later, when humans are learning how to live with invasive dinosaur species.
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Lightyear
Release Date: June 17, 2022
To infinity and beyond! This is a movie about Buzz Lightyear, but it's not a Toy Story movie. Instead, it's about the fictional Space Ranger who inspired the toy — what Andy might've watched to make him want a Buzz Lightyear action figure in the first place.
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The Black Phone
Release Date: June 24, 2022
Get ready to stay up all night: This movie follows a kid who has been trapped by a child killer. He finds a phone connected to the killer's past victims, who tell him things that might help him escape.
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Where the Crawdads Sing
Release Date: June 24, 2022
Normal People's Daisy Edgar-Jones stars in this adaptation of the best-selling novel by Delia Owens. It follows a girl called "Marsh Girl" because she lives alone in the wilderness. When a man turns up dead, she becomes the first suspect.
Minions: The Rise of Gru
Release Date: July 1, 2022
Now, Minions are everywhere, from toothbrushes to Facebook memes. But where did they get this start? This movie takes it back to the beginning, when the yellow creatures looking for a master cross paths with a wannabe supervillain.
Thor: Love and Thunder
Release Date: July 8, 2022
Chris Hemsworth, Tessa Thompson and Natalie Portman all return for this MCU movie — though which one of them wields Mjollnir is still up for speculation. And might there be an appearance by the Guardians of the Galaxy?
Bullet Train
Release Date: July 15, 2022
This film comes from the director of John Wick, so expect fast-moving action on a fast, fast train. Brad Pitt stars in a story about five assassins on a moving train who discover their assignments are all connected. Sandra Bullock, Zazie Beetz, Bryan Tyree Henry, Joey King, Andrew Koji and Aaron Taylor-Johnson round out the cast.
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Nope
Release Date: July 22, 2022
Jordan Peele's horror movies have become events unto themselves, so mark your calendars even if you don't know what it's about. (The teaser trailer will let you take a few educated guesses.) What we do know is that it stars Daniel Kaluuya, Keke Palmer, Steven Yeun, Barbie Ferreira, Brandon Perea and Michael Wincott.
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DC League of Super-Pets
Release Date: July 29, 2022
We've seen so many films about superheroes — but what about their pups? In this one, the Justice League is in danger, and Superman's Krypto has to convince other super-powered pets to go on a rescue mission.
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Secret Headquarters
Release Date: August 12, 2022
This is yet another superhero movie, but one thing makes it distinct: It's an original screenplay, and not an adaptation of a comic. It's a family adventure, starring Owen Wilson, about a kid who discovers a secret hero HQ under his house, leading him to ask questions about his estranged father.
The Man From Toronto
Release Date: August 12, 2022
Who doesn't love a case of mistaken identity? In this action-comedy, Kevin Hart stars as a screw-up who gets mistaken for an international assassin at an Airbnb rental.
Samaritan
Release Date: August 26, 2022
And, just in case you haven't had your fill of superheroes yet, here's another one — albeit a darker take on the genre, starring Sylvester Stallone. In it, a kid finds reason to believe that a superhero who had gone missing years earlier might still be around.
Distant
Release Date: September 16, 2022
For sci-fi fans, this survival adventure follows an asteroid miner (Anthony Ramos) who gets struck and lands on an alien planet. He must be resourceful and use his AI survival suit to find the only other survivor and escape.
White Bird: A Wonder Story
Release Date: September 16, 2022
Helen Mirren stars as Grand-mère, a Jewish girl growing up in Nazi-occupied France in World War II. It's called "A Wonder Story" because Grand-mère is the grandmother of Julian, the bully in the YA novel and film Wonder by R. J. Palacio.
Don't Worry Darling
Release Date: September 23, 2022
Book Smart's Olivia Wilde directs this film, about a 1950s housewife living in a utopian community who begins to suspect that her husband is hiding something. Florence Pugh and Harry Styles play the husband and wife.
Puss in Boots: The Last Wish
Release Date: September 23, 2022
In this animated film, the sequel to a 2011 Shrek spin-off, Puss in Boots has already burned through eight of his cat lives. He goes on an adventure to find the Last Wish to restore himself back to nine.
Mission: Impossible 7
Release Date: September 30, 2022
Ethan Hunt returns for a series of ever-more-daring, stunt-filled escapes. And, if this one doesn't get the pulse pounding, Mission: Impossible 8 is already filming.
Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse - Part One
Release Date: October 7, 2022
Tom Holland's Peter Parker isn't the only Spider-Man swinging around — don't forget about Miles Morales! He takes another spin through the multi-verse in this animated feature, which slaps an intriguing "Part One" onto the title at the end of its teaser trailer, so there's plenty coming more after this adventure.
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Till
Release Date: October 7, 2022
Danielle Deadwyler takes on the nearly impossible task of capturing the life of Mamie Till-Mobley, mother of Emmet Till, and her pursuit of justice after her son's lynching in 1955. Whoopi Goldberg, Frankie Faison, Sean Patrick Thomas and Haley Bennett join her in the cast.
Halloween Ends
Release Date: October 14, 2022
Halloween Kills, which came out in October 2021, left things in the Strode household in particular disarray. Halloween Ends will try to end the power of Michael Myers once and for all.
Black Adam
Release Date: October 21, 2022
The superheroes keep on coming! Dwayne Johnson stars as the title anti-hero in this Shazam! spin-off. It focuses on his entanglements with the Justice Society of America, or JSA.
Black Panther: Wakanda Forever
Release Date: November 11, 2022
We may have lost Chadwick Boseman, but the Black Panther sequel will still come out in 2022 — though the part of T'Challa will not be re-cast. The plot is still under wraps, but Lupita Nyong'o, Martin Freeman, Letitia Wright, Winston Duke and Angela Bassett will be returning.
She Said
Release Date: November 18, 2022
Carey Mulligan and Zoe Kazan star as New York Times reporters Megan Twohey and Jodi Kantor on their way to breaking the Harvey Weinstein #MeToo story. The movie is based on their book of the same name and it's directed by Unorthodox's Maria Schrader.
Strange World
Release Date: November 23, 2022
The newest Disney Animation film promises to be an adventure on an epic scale. It follows the legendary Clade family, a clan of explores, whose differences threaten to topple their most recent mission.
The Fabelmans
Release Date: November 23, 2022
Steven Spielberg has always put a lot of autobiographical elements into his work, but this is the closest he's come to making a movie about his own life. It's based on his life growing up in Arizona, and Tony Kushner (who most recently scripted Spielberg's phenomenal West Side Story) wrote the screenplay.
Shazam 2: Fury of the Gods
Release Date: December 12, 2022
Sure, Batman gets all the attention, but don't forget about Shazam! He returns for another adventure, this time going up Hespera and Kalypso, the daughters of Atlas.
Avatar 2
Release Date: December 16, 2022
It's been 13 years since we've checked in on Jake Sully and Neytiri, and they've been in Pandora making a life together. But when an old threat returns, they're forced out of their home and have to explore Pandora's other lands.
Mario
Release Date: December 21, 2022
Chris Pratt wants to star in movies of all your childhood favorites. First it was dinosaurs.. Then it was Legos. Now, it's your NES. He plays Mario in a new, animated Super Mario Bros. adventure, with Charlie Day as his Luigi. The cast is full of comedians: Seth Rogen is Donkey Kong, Jack Black is Bowser and and Fred Armisen is Cranky Kong, among others.
I Wanna Dance with Somebody
Release Date: December 23, 2022
The end of the year is usually when the biopics start to crop up, and there's no more worthy a subject than Whitney Houston. Naomi Ackie, known for The End of the F***ing World, tries to fill Houston's shoes (and pipes).
Babylon
Release Date: December 25, 2022
Damien Chazelle, director of La La Land, returns for this movie, and the two are said to share a similar milieu: Hollywood. But unlike La La Land, Babylon is a period drama, starring Brad Pitt and Margot Robbie, taking place in the era when silent films gave way to sound.
Operation Fortune: Ruse de Guerre
Release Date: 2022 TBD
Jason Statham teams up with Snatch director Guy Ritchie again for another action flick. This time, Statham plays Orson Fortune, a spy who has to team up with a movie star to infiltrate the world of the rich and famous.
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