Craving to feast your eyes on something other than superheroes and spies? Whether or not you’ve already seen the latest Marvel releases and Mission: Impossible installment, the end of summer signals the coming influx of Oscar-minded films, so be sure to catch the season’s notable releases in order to keep up with the race.
The Hollywood Reporter highlights seven Oscar contenders to see on the big screen (while you still can):
Directed by James Ponsoldt (The Spectacular Now), Jesse Eisenberg portrays Rolling Stone reporter David Lipsky as he goes on a five-day interview with the enigmatic writer David Foster Wallace, 12 years before the influential writer’s suicide at age 46. Watch for Jason Segel’s “heartbreaking” portrayal of Wallace.
Crystal Moselle’s stirring documentary introduces a gang of siblings who have been raised in near-complete isolation in downtown Manhattan, as their father was distrustful of the outside world and kept his family under lock and key. Most of their contact with the outside world came from films — which they hungrily digested and reinterpreted — acting out entire movies, complete with homemade costumes.
Antoine Fuqua helms the sports drama about a boxing champ who loses it all and has to fight his way back to keep custody of his daughter. Watch for a notable performance by Jake Gyllenhaal, who transformed from his extremely thin figure in Nightcrawler to become unrecognizable as the tattooed, beefed-up athlete.
Oscar-nominated producer Bill Pohlad (The Tree of Life) makes his directorial debut with the pop biopic zooming in on Brian Wilson, whose mental illness was a storm gathering on the Beach Boys’ horizon and years later, as he tried to break away from a doctor who was using that illness to control his life. Wilson is portrayed notably by both Paul Dano and John Cusack.
Directed by Pete Docter (Up), the animated family film is Pixar’s second movie to revolve around a female protagonist, following 2012’s Brave. It goes into the mind of an 11-year-old girl named Riley (Kaitlyn Dias) as she moves across the country with her family — and her emotions: Joy (Amy Poehler), Sadness (Phyllis Smith), Fear (Bill Hader), Anger (Lewis Black) and Disgust (Mindy Kaling).
Asif Kapadia (Senna) respectfully looks back at the life and death of singer Amy Winehouse, from her rapid rise after her 20-million-selling breakthrough album Back to Black to her death from alcohol poisoning in 2011, at age 27. The documentary’s main dramatic engine is the self-destructive musician’s stormy romance with her jailbird lover Blake Fielder, plus how her father, Mitch Winehouse, seemed far too eager to exploit her fame.
O’Shea Jackson Jr., Corey Hawkins and Jason Mitchell join forces to portray N.W.A members Ice Cube, Dr. Dre and Eazy-E. Director F. Gary Gray is being praised for “breathing life into the origin story of a group whose influence is still being felt.”
