The stars are aligning…

Wondering what you’ve got to look forward to at the cinema this month? If you think you can ‘handle the truth’ — we’ve ’rounded up all the usual suspects’. And if you ‘feel the need, the need for a popcorn feed’ — remember Vox cinemas’ latest pledge is to fill any size tub with popcorn for just Dhs25. A bucket just won’t cut it, ‘you’re gonna need a bigger boat’.

Bullet Train

Based on a Kōtarō Isaka novel, directed by David ‘John Wick’ Leitch and starring Brad Pitt in the lead role — there are a lot of reasons why we’re excited about Bullet Train. It’s a heist movie, based on a train with a hitman looking to retire, but is dragged back in for one last score. Ok it’s not the most original premise, but the elements are there for an action classic, and for that reason, you son of a gun, we’re in.

Expected: August 4

Paradise Highway

Morgan Freeman plays the wise, grizzled ‘seen it all’ half of a law enforcement duo (never a bad start to a synopsis), his partner (played by Cameron Monaghan) is a young, enthusiastic FBI agent who may or may not play by the rules (TBC). They’re on the hunt for a missing girl, a trail that sets them on the heels of a frazzled truck driving Juliette Binoche, blackmailed by a prison gang into smuggling illicit cargo. Could the cargo be the aforementioned missing girl? The trailer seems to radio in a big ten-four.

Expected: August 4

Beast

Idris Elba is no stranger to voicing the part of an animal in movies. Just off the top of our heads, there’s that time he played a buffalo in Zootopia, a tiger in The Jungle Book, a sea lion in Finding Dory, a cat in Cats, and most recently a space echidna in Sonic 2. He just has one of those deeply stirring voices. This new movie, expected to hit screens around mid August, has turned the tables a little bit and sees our man Idris along with his two daughters trying to evade a particularly rampant lion on the open plains of the African Savanna.

Expected: August 11

Nope

It’s been an absolute joy watching Jordan Peele’s ascension from talented sketch comedian to the Oscar-winning filmmaker he is today. And this latest project from the king of modern thrillcore, Nope looks like it’s going to be another gloriously uncomfortable watch. The plot antagonists appear to be of extraterrestrial origin, a new direction for Peele, but once again no doubt succinctly satirizing some nuanced aspect of modern culture — whilst being absolutely petrifying in the process.

Expected: August 25

Three Thousand Years of Longing

Director and screenwriter George Miller, probably best known for the bleak brutality of his post-apocalyptic Mad Max saga, has taken a screeching cinematic turn here by reimagining, One Thousand and One Nights best seller: Aladdin. Whilst on a trip to Istanbul, Alithea (Tilda Swinton) buys herself a trinket from an old bazaar. It’s a lamp, which after an abrasive clean reveals a djinn played by our old lion bait mate, Idris Elba. True to form she gets three wishes if she agrees to set the djinn free. And if you think it’s all going to go smoothly, you havn’t been paying attention to your mythology (or the average run time of Hollywood movies).

Expected: August 31

Images: YouTube/Instagram