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[UltraCruelSummer]

So another new feature coming to the movies forum is that there will be a preview each week ahead of the films coming out on that weekend. I hope you enjoy this and this will give you information on certificate, plot, reviews, actors, directors, box office potential and more. You can also discuss which of these you want to see and are interested in and also recommend if you have seen any of them [and none of this apart from plot is copied and pasted]

American Sniper
Release Date: 16th January
How Big Is The Release: Unknown but I would guess saturation [which is biggest possible release]
Certificate: 15
Director: Clint Eastwood [Million Dollar Baby, Unforgiven, Mystic River]
Cast: Bradley Cooper [The Hangover, American Hustle, Silver Linings Playbook], Sienna Miller [G.I. Joe, The Edge Of Love]
Reviews: 75% [from 79 reviews]
Plot: The autobiography of Chris Kyle, a Texas native who journeyed from rodeo cowboy to SEAL Chief with the highest number of sniper kills in U.S. military history
Notable Award Nominations So Far: BAFTA [Screenplay and Sound] and won best picture at AFI Awards
Detail: This is Clint Eastwood's 34th film behind the camera [if I counted correctly] and his first in 7 months since Jersey Boys. The film stars one of the biggest moviestars in the form of Bradley Cooper. American Sniper has received very good reviews so far but had surprisingly been shut out at the Golden Globes and got a poor nomination total at the BAFTA's. It will be interesting to see how this will do with Oscar nominations but it will probably disappoint. On the other hand, it has made a killing so far at the box office and it has scored 3 of the 20 biggest weekend theatre averages ever in North America and has already earned over $3m at 4 theatres. The film premiered at the AFI film festival in November.

UK Box Office Potential: I am expecting this to do really well. I can see this performing similar to Zero Dark Thirty [£1M] and Lone Survivor [£750k] which are both January releases with a war context but I can see it doing even higher than ZDK because even though it has less award potential, the buzz seems to be higher and the talent infront and behind the camera should be a big draw. I will predict £1.2M OW.




Testament Of Youth
Release Date: 16th January
How Big Is The Release: Wide
Certificate: 12A
Director: Clint Eastwood [Million Dollar Baby, Unforgiven, Mystic River]
Cast: Alicia Vikander [Anna Karenina, A Royal Affair, Ex-Machina], Kit Harrington [Game Of Thrones], Colin Morgan [Merlin, The Fall], Taron Egerton [Kingsman], Hayley Attwell [Captain America], Emily Watson [The Book Thief, Gosford Park], Dominic West [Appropriate Adult [TV], Pride], Joanna Scanlan [The Invisible Woman]
Reviews: 90% [from 10 reviews]
Plot: The story of Vera Brittain, who postponed her studies at Oxford University during World War I to serve as a Voluntary Aid Detachment nurse in London, Malta and France, and later became a writer and a pacifist
Notable Award Nominations So Far: Best Actress [Alicia Vikander] at British Independent Film Awards and London Critics Film Circle Award for Best Breakthrough Filmmaker [James Kent]
Detail: The film is based on the 1st World War memoir of the same name. Saoirse Ronan was originally sent to play the lead role and the film is a BBC Films production and has been in development since 2009. The film was shot in London, Oxford and Yorkshire.

UK Box Office Potential: I think this will do well but will be one of those films that has a solid opening followed by great legs. I will predict a £750k opening




Whiplash
Release Date: 16th January
How Big Is The Release: Wide
Certificate: 15
Director: Damien Chazelle
Cast: Miles Teller [Divergent, The Spectacular Now, 21 And Over, Upcoming Fantastic Four Reboot], J.K. Simmons [Law And Order, Oz, Spider Man 2/3]
Reviews: 95% [from 212 reviews]
Plot: Haunted by the failed writing career of his father, Andrew is determined to rise to the top of the country's most elite music conservatory. Terence Fletcher, a talented but terrifying conductor, requests that Andrew be transferred into his band.
Notable Award Nominations So Far: 99 Nominations So Far. Won Golden Globe for best supporting actor [Simmons], Nominated for 4 BAFTA'S [including Supporting Actor and Screenplay], Screen Actors Guild [Simmons], Cannes Film Festival and won the Audience Award and the Grand Jury award at Sundance Film Festival.
Detail: Sony Pictures Worldwide acquired Whiplash after it premiered at Sundance. It was on the 2012 Black List [hottest scripts not yet produced] and was originally an 18 minute short film starring Johnny Simmons and J.K. Simmons. The film has done very well in limited release at the American box office and has absolutely superb reviews and should be a nominated for a few of the big Oscars including possibly a win for J.K. Simmons.

UK Box Office Potential: I think this will do well but will be one of those films that has a solid opening followed by amazing legs. The future Oscar Nominations/possible wins, increased marketing and possible BAFTA wins will give this absolutely great legs. I think it will start around £600k but finish with at least a 5x multiplier.




Wild:RECOMMENDATION OF THE WEEK
Release Date: 16th January
How Big Is The Release: Wide
Certificate: 15
Director: Jean-Marc Vallee [Dallas Buyers Club, The Young Victoria]
Cast: Reese Witherspoon [Walk The Line, Legally Blonde, Sweet Home Alabama], Laura Dern [The Fault In Our Stars, Rambling Rose]
Reviews: 91% [from 171 reviews]
Plot: Still haunted by the death of her mother, and with an addiction to drugs that leads to a marriage breakdown, a young woman decides to head into the wild to face her demons on a journey of self-discovery.
Notable Award Nominations So Far: 37 Nominations including 19 of them for Reese Witherspoon including a nomination for her at the BAFTAS, Screen Actors Guild Awards and Golden Globes. She also won best actress at the Palm Strings Festival.
Detail: Each week I will give a recommendation of the week which will be the film which I think looks/sounds the best. This week I chose Wild based on the amazing reviews, a very good looking film and the fact Reese Witherspoon is one of my favourite ever actresses. The film is based on the book Wild: From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail and Nick Hornby wrote the screenplay. Fox Searchlights Pictures got the rights to the movie in July 2013 and it premiered at the Tellrude Film Festival in August 2014.

UK Box Office Potential: I think this will do well but will be one of those films that has a solid opening followed by amazing legs. The future Oscar Nominations/possible wins, increased marketing and possible BAFTA wins will give this absolutely great legs. As you can tell there is a very similar theme between all the films this week [there will be more box office comparisons for films like Kingsman/Big Hero 6/Shaun The Sheep etc when released and I will predict a £700k weekend for this though I can see this as low as £500k and as high as £1M so I'm really not sure




QUICK AMERICAN 16TH JANUARY LOOK AHEAD It is a 4 day weekend this week with it being MLK weekend
American Sniper- See info above. Box Office Prospects/Prediction: Should be a big hit judging by the limited release and I expect this to do similar numbers to Lone Survivor last year 38M/45M
Blackhat- Chris Hemsworth stars in a Michael Mann thriller. Box Office Prospects/Prediction: looking to disappoint 12M/14.5M
Paddington- The 2nd biggest film in the UK last year heads abroad this week and should do well, I can see this starting similar to The Nut Job [but will hold up better in the long run with excellent reviews] 18.5M/24.6M
The Wedding Ringer- This should be big, especially after Ride Along set the record for the biggest January opening ever last year 34M/40M