Whether it’s the return of ’80s classics like Fame, an annual visit from the Saw series, a new installment of Twilight, the tried and true team-ups of DiCaprio and Scorsese or Almodóvar and Cruz or the renaissance of stop motion animation, this fall, it’s all about resurrection.



SEPT. 23



Capitalism: A Love Story (Overture)

With a nation in crisis, our economy in the toilet and Congress giving billions to big corporations, who can we turn to? Obama? Maybe. But how about Michael Moore? That’s right, he’s baaaack. This time Moore is on a mission to uncover the truth behind the current economic crisis with interviews from Wall Street and government insiders. Expect fireworks, backlash, ruffled feathers and surprising illumination along the way.





SEPT. 25



Brief Interviews with Hideous Men (IFC)

Written and directed by “The Office”’s John Krasinski and based on the book by David Foster Wallace, Brief Interviews with Hideous Men investigates the twisted, seemingly irreconcilable relationship between men and women. In other words, it’s not really a date movie.



Coco Before Chanel (Sony Pictures Classics)

Yes, you know the suits, love the “parfume” and covet the bags, but get to know the woman who rose from humble beginnings to the zenith of the fashion community. Everyone’s favorite French gamine, Audrey Tautou, stars as Gabrielle “Coco” Chanel.



Fame (MGM)

Rememba’, rememba’ rememba’ … when this was an awesome movie and one of the best TV shows of the 1980s? Welcome back to the hallowed halls of New York City’s prestigious High School of Performing Arts. Leg warmers and Leroy not included.



Pandorum (Overture)

From the producers of Resident Evil, Dennis Quaid and Ben Foster star as two crewmembers who awaken aboard an abandoned spaceship with no idea who they are, where they are or how long they’ve been there. Soon they discover they’re not alone … and that’s not a good thing. Twilight hottie Cam Gigandet also makes an appearance in this psychological horror flick.



We Live in Public (Interloper/Abramorama)

Winner of the 2009 Sundance Film Festival Grand Jury Prize for Best Documentary, director Ondi Timoner’s film investigates the stranglehold the Internet has on our lives and the way it’s altered modern society according to “the greatest Internet pioneer you’ve never heard of,” futurist Josh Harris.



OCT. 2



A Serious Man (Focus)

Set in 1967, this film about a Midwestern professor who watches his life unravel after his wife says she’s leaving him because his brother won’t move out of their house sounds like it could be a total snoozefest. But that’s because I didn’t mention that it’s a dark comedy directed by the Coen brothers, the masterminds behind Fargo, Raising Arizona and O Brother, Where Art Thou? In other words, it’s almost guaranteed to be a hilarious classic.



More Than a Game (Lionsgate)

We all know his name now, but a few short years ago, LeBron James was just a high school kid in Ohio with four best friends, his teammates. This documentary follows their stories from a Salvation Army b-ball court to the high school state national championships to the NBA.



Motherhood (Freestyle Releasing)

A comedy, starring Uma Thurman, Minnie Driver and Anthony Edwards, about the tenuous balance between being a mother and not giving up the person who you were before you had kids.



St. Trinian’s (NeoClassics)

The students at St. Trinian’s, a rundown private girls’ school that’s “like Hogwarts for psychos,” plan a heist in order to save the institution from bankruptcy. Starring Colin Firth, Russell Brand, Mischa Barton and Rupert Everett in full drag, it’s been sitting on a shelf since 2007. That’s never a good sign.



Whip It (Fox Searchlight)

Drew Barrymore makes her directorial debut (and co-stars) in this roller derby romp. Ellen Page is an alt-rock girl in a Texas world who just wants to find a place she belongs. After she discovers a roller derby league in nearby Austin, her entire life changes.



Zombieland (Columbia)

A band of refugees makes a cross-country pilgrimage to an amusement park where they think they’ll be safe from the zombies who have taken over the world. Starring Jesse Eisenberg, Emma Stone, Abigail Breslin and Woody Harrelson, this is the movie Harrelson blamed for making him attack a paparazzo, claiming he thought the guy was a zombie.



OCT. 9



An Education (Sony Pictures Classics)

A coming-of-age story about a teenage girl in 1960s suburban London (newcomer Carey Mulligan, who many are calling the “Next Big Thing”) and how her life changes when she gets involved with a playboy (Peter Sarsgaard) nearly twice her age.



Couples Retreat (Universal)

Four couples head to a tropical island resort for some intensive therapy. With the husbands being played by Vince Vaughn, Jon Favreau, Jason Bateman and Faizon Love and director Peter Billingsley (a.k.a. the kid from A Christmas Story who grew up to become one of Hollywood’s biggest wheelers and dealers) at the helm, the chance that you won’t laugh until you spew $6 soda through your nose is slim to none.



Good Hair (Roadside Attractions)

Chris Rock’s daughter came to him crying one day and asked, “Daddy, why don’t I have good hair?” The question shook him so greatly he set out to make a documentary, as only Rock can, about the business, self-esteem and societal pressures involved in African-American hairstyles. With appearances by Salt-N-Pepa, Ice-T, Nia Long, Reverend Al Sharpton and Maya Angelou.



OCT. 16



Law Abiding Citizen (Overture)

When his wife and child are murdered before his eyes and the killers set free thanks to a plea deal, Clyde Shelton (Gerard Butler) sets out to exact revenge on the system and prosecutor (Jamie Foxx) that failed him. Directed by F. Gary Gray, who managed to make MINI Coopers look badass in The Italian Job.



New York, I Love You (Vivendi Entertainment)

The companion piece to Paris, Je T’aime, 11 directors – including Mira Nair, Brett Ratner and Natalie Portman, making her directorial debut – contributed to New York, I Love You. Featuring a massive cast of stars from Bradley Cooper to Anton Yelchin, the film is a kaleidoscope of the little moments that make New York a magical place.



The Stepfather (Screen Gems)

In the 1987, this was a horror flick with the tagsline “Daddy’s Home and He’s NOT Very Happy.” This time it stars “Gossip Girl”’s Penn Badgley as the product of a broken home who returns from military school to find his mother (Sela Ward) living with her new boyfriend, David (“Nip/Tuck”’s Dylan Walsh). After a neighbor catches an episode of “America’s Most Wanted” that seems to have starred David, things get slice-y and dicey.



Where the Wild Things Are (Warner Bros.)

Since 1963, children have been falling asleep to the story of mischievous Max, sent to bed without his supper, whose bedroom turns in to a magical jungle landscape filled with mysterious creatures, the “Wild Things” (not to be confused with Neve Campbell and Denise Richards). Visionary director Spike Jonze brings the beloved story to life.



OCT. 23



Amelia (Fox Searchlight)

The life of legendary pilot Amelia Earhart, who disappeared over the Pacific Ocean in 1937 while attempting a history-making flight around the world, as portrayed by two-time Oscar winner Hilary Swank. Beautifully shot by Mira Nair (Mississippi Masala, Monsoon Wedding, Vanity Fair), award buzz has been circling this project for months.



Astro Boy (Summit)

Astro Boy, Osamu Tezuka’s international manga sensation, which first appeared in 1952, makes his way to the American big screen with the voice talent of Freddie Highmore, Nathan Lane, Bill Nighy, Donald Sutherland and Nicolas Cage.



Cirque Du Freak: The Vampire’s Assistant (Universal)

Think of it as Twilight meets Dumbo. Jumping into the tsunami of vampire projects, this film adaptation of the popular Cirque Du Freak books is about Darren Shan, a teenager who is a recruited by a traveling freak show’s most mysterious attraction and soon finds himself being used as a pawn in a battle between vampires and their deadlier counterparts.



Ong Bak 2 (Magnolia)

Martial arts master Tony Jaa was hailed by international critics as the next Bruce Lee after the first Ong Bak film. He’s back as both director and star of this prequel about an orphan raised by a band of thieves who goes on a mission of revenge against the warlord who murdered his family. Set hundreds of years in the past, there’s a whole lot of kung fu and sword play in loincloths.



Saw VI (Lionsgate)

Every year, just before Halloween, Lionsgate releases another Saw movie. This one, the sixth, picks up where last year’s ended; Special Agent Strahm is dead and Detective Hoffman (Costas Mandylor) has emerged as the successor to Jigsaw’s legacy. With the FBI closing in, he is forced to set a game into motion and Jigsaw’s grand scheme is finally revealed.



OCT. 30



This Is It (Sony)

As Michael himself would say, don’t stop ’til you get enough. In the wake of Michael Jackson’s death, Kenny Ortega, choreographer turned multi-billion dollar-earning director (thank you, “High School Musical”), took rehearsal and backstage footage of MJ as he prepared for his sold-out concerts in London, mixed it with interviews, and created a final performance of the musical legend.



Youth In Revolt (Dimension)

Michael Cera stars as Nick Twisp, a teenager who can’t get laid to save his life so he develops a split personality to help him win the heart of his trailer park’s resident dream girl, Sheeni Saunders (Portia Doubleday) in the hopes of losing his virginity. Mayhem ensues. It’s like Fight Club meets American Pie.



NOV. 6



The Box (Warner Bros.)

A handsome young couple (Cameron Diaz and James Marsden) receives a mysterious box. Inside is a button. Push the button and someone, somewhere dies and they receive one million dollars. Don’t push the button and face the deadly consequences. Diaz doing scary? Can she pull it off?



Fantastic Mr. Fox (Twentieth Century Fox)

Wes Anderson makes his animation debut with Fantastic Mr. Fox, voiced by the fantastically foxy George Clooney. Adapted from the book by Roald Dahl about a group of animals who fight back against the evil farmers trying to run them out of their homes, Meryl Streep, Bill Murray and Owen Wilson also lend their voices to this stop motion film that will hopefully remind audiences why newer technology isn’t always better.



The Fourth Kind (Universal)

Drawing a thin line between narrative and document, Milla Jovovich introduces the film saying she’ll be “portraying Dr. Abigail Tyler” in “a dramatization of events on Oct. 2, 2000 … supported by archival footage” and that “some of what you’re about to see is extremely disturbing.” Is this film about alien abduction real, or it is another Blair Witch? Either way, it’s hella creepy!



The Men Who Stare at Goats (Overture)

Ewan McGregor, George Clooney and Kevin Spacey star in a comedy about Iraq War reporter Bob Wilton (McGregor) and Lyn Cassady (Clooney), a man who claims to be a member of the Army’s First Earth Battalion, a unit that uses paranormal powers and whose battalion’s founder is missing.



Precious: Based on the Novel Push by Sapphire (Lionsgate)

This film, about Precious (Gabourey Sidibe, in a star-making, shockingly powerful role), a 16-year old Harlem girl still in junior high school and pregnant with her second child, won the Special Jury Prize and Audience Award at the 2009 Sundance Film Festival. With heartbreaking, brilliant performances by Mo’Nique, Paula Patton and an unrecognizable Mariah Carey.



NOV. 13



2012 (Columbia)

It’s The Day After Tomorrow but way bigger! According to the ancient Mayan calendar, the world ends on Dec. 21, 2012. Get a preview of what that might look like in the hands of director Roland Emmerich, who showed us alien invasions and the White House exploding in Independence Day. This time he takes out the Obama residence with the USS John F Kennedy and a tidal wave to make Poseidon blush.



The Young Victoria (Apparition)

A major costume drama starring Emily Blunt about the turbulent first years of Queen Victoria’s rule and her romance with Prince Albert.



Women In Trouble (Screen Media)

One day in the lives of 10 women including a porn star, a flight attendant, a psychiatrist, a masseuse, a bartender and a pair of call girls, who all have one thing in common: trouble. Starring writer-director Sebastian Gutierrez’s constant muse, Carla Gugino.



NOV. 20



The Blind Side (Warner Bros.)

Combing the best elements of underdog sports flick and sentimental tearjerker, Sandra Bullock and Tim McGraw star as a well-to-do family who take in a teenager so disadvantaged, he’s never even had his own bed before. With their support, he matures into an athletically and academically successful NFL prospect. Based on the life story of Michael Oher, who was a 2009 first round draft pick.



Broken Embraces (Sony Pictures Classics)

One of cinemas most delightful pairings, Pedro Almodóvar and Penélope Cruz, are back with Broken Embraces, the story of a blind screenwriter (Lluís Homar) revealing the secrets of his past; from his former life as a filmmaker, to the accident which claimed his sight and led to the break-up with Lena (Cruz), a now-famous actress who lives in a gilded cage with her sugar daddy.



The Twilight Saga: New Moon (Summit)

Twilight fans have had this date marked in their calendars since it was announced last year. The second installment in the Twilight series hits theaters with its beloved cast, including Taylor Lautner, intact, but with a new director, Chris Weitz. When Bella (Kristen Stewart) gets a paper cut on her birthday and one of the Cullens can’t contain themselves, Edward (Robert Pattinson) abandons Forks and Bella for her own safety, leaving the door open for other vampires and a new, much closer relationship with Jacob (Lautner), whose been hiding a secret.