Maps to the Stars
David Cronenberg’s latest film follows a group of lost souls—an emotionally stunted actress, a cold-hearted child star, a superstar guru and a mysterious new girl in town—as they orbit around (and crash into) one another in Los Angeles.
Whiplash
The Devil Plays Parker is more or less the idea behind director Damien Chazelle’s electrifying peek into the world of competitive drumming. Miles Teller stars as a young jazz drummer whose overbearing mentor (a stunning J.K. Simmons) drives his pupils with maniacal determination.
Gone Girl
The opening-night selection for the Film Festival is also the world-premiere of this much-buzzed-about adaptation of Gillian Flynn’s bestselling thriller. Come for director David Fincher’s mastery of dark storytelling, stay for Ben Affleck and Rosamund Pike as unstable spouses with some seriously suspect ways of working out their issues.
’71
Boy-of-the-moment Jack O’Connell’s latest feat is this Yann Demange-directed look at a soldier in Belfast during the 1971 riots. It’s another tough role for O’Connell—whose recent Starred Up found him playing a violence-prone inmate—but the tale of a British soldier abandoned by his platoon promises to be moving, if not easy to watch.
Saint Laurent
The second of this year’s YSL biopics, this film focuses on Saint Laurent’s dark days in 1966 and ’67 and explores the designer’s infamous magnetism and appetite for self-destruction. A must for fans of film and fashion.
Clouds of Sils Maria
Juliette Binoche’s Maria made her name in her twenties as the ingénue in a popular play. Years later, she’s been asked to participate in a revival, only this time as her original character’s older foil. Meanwhile, life imitates art as she faces off with another whippersnapper (Chloe Grace Moretz) and her own assistant (Kristen Stewart) in this gimlet-eyed look at celebrity culture and the passing of time.
Mr. Turner
An exquisitely detailed biography of English painter J.M.W. Turner (Timothy Spall) written and directed by Mike Leigh, this film sheds light on the life of the brilliant but prickly Turner whose work came to prominence in the early 19th century.
Foxcatcher
Based on the true story of sibling Olympic wrestlers Dave and Mark Schultz (Mark Ruffalo and Channing Tatum) and their ill-fated relationship with the demented millionaire John E. du Pont, Bennett Miller’s gripping drama features a barely recognizable Steve Carell in his most transformative role yet.
Two Days, One Night
Marion Cotillard stars as a recently fired employee of a small factory in France who has the weekend to convince her former co-workers to give up their bonuses so she may get her job—and her dignity—back.
Birdman or The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance
Director Alejandro González Iñárritu’s closing-night film provides a refreshing respite from his previous, heavier dramas. Riggan Thomson (a magnificent Michael Keaton) is a former box-office superhero attempting to regain his credibility as an actor who must contend with an ensemble of troublesome actors—and his own mounting issues—while staging a Broadway play.
Inherent Vice
One of the most impressive aspects of Paul Thomas Anderson’s adaptation of Thomas Pynchon’s acclaimed novel is its sheer star power: Joaquin Phoenix, Josh Brolin, Reese Witherspoon and Benicio Del Toro are just of a few of the actors who bring to life the drug culture of 1970s Los Angeles.
Goodbye to Language
Legendary director Jean-Luc Godard’s latest project—a hit at the Cannes Film Festival—is enhanced by multiple video formats, including 3-D, making for an exciting new addition to his oeuvre.
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