(This article first appeared in the June print issue of the Hendersonian)
The hopes of May ending on a strong note with the releases of Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga and The Garfield Movie were dashed, as both highly anticipated blockbusters performed well below expectations, leading to the worst Memorial Day Weekend at the theaters since Casper hit screens in 1995. Adding to the woes, the poor financial performance of The Fall Guy and IF, and the Amy Winehouse biopic Back to Black making less than $3 million in its opening weekend, the overall box office is down over 20% compared to last year. The few bright spots were the overperforming low-budget horror movies Tarot and The Strangers: Chapter One, with Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes meeting expectations and looking to break even on a monster budget. Needless to say, the summer movie season is off to a rough start and desperately needs a successful June to get back on track. Here are a few promising titles to keep an eye on this month, and as always, be sure to check the local listings for showtimes at your favorite AMC Theaters or Showplace Cinemas location.
Bad Boys: Ride or Die (June 7) – Miami’s finest are back for another adventure. This time around, the tables have turned, finding Mike Lowery (Will Smith) and Marcus Burnett (Martin Lawrence) on the wrong side of the law (and running out of Skittles)! Bad Boys for Life directors Adil El Arbi and Bilall Fallah return for this installment, with Vanessa Hudgens (High School Musical, Spring Breakers), Tiffany Haddish (Girls Trip, Night School), and Joe Pantoliano (Bad Boys, The Matrix) co-starring.
Inside Out 2 (June 14) – Ever wonder what Riley from Inside Out is thinking about now that she’s a teenager? Disney and Pixar hope you have! Most of the original emotions are back (Amy Poehler, Phillis Smith, Lewis Black, and Tony Hale), with a host of new emotions (voiced by Maya Hawke, Ayo Edebiri, Paul Walter Hauser, and Adele Exarchopolus) adding to the fun and confusion. Kelsey Mann makes her feature directorial debut, with Oscar-nominated co-writer Meg LeFauve back again for this sequel.
The Bikeriders (June 21) – The last major scheduling casualty of the 2023 SAG-AFTRA and WGA strikes, Jodie Comer (TV’s Killing Eve) and Best Actor Academy Award winner Austin Butler (Elvis) star as a couple caught up in the underworld of a Chicago biker gang in the 1960s. Jeff Nichols, acclaimed writer/director of Take Shelter and Mud, brings his naturalistic touch to this period film. A stacked cast of co-stars, including Tom Hardy (Inception, Bronson), Michael Shannon (Take Shelter, Revolutionary Road), Mike Faist (Challengers, West Side Story), Boyd Holbrook (Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny, Logan), and Norman Reedus (The Boondock Saints, TV’s The Walking Dead) are some of the notable names and faces joining the gang.
Kinds of Kindness (June 21) – Secret projects by top director/actor duos are tough to come by in the internet era, but based on the initial reaction at the Cannes Film Festival, this clandestine project from director Yorgos Lanthimos and star Emma Stone looks to have one of the most talked-about summer releases in recent history on their hands (fresh off their Oscar-winning collaborations The Favorite and Poor Things). Joining them in this narrative triptych are Cannes Best Actor winner Jessie Plemons (Civil War, Killers of the Flower Moon), Willem Dafoe (Poor Things, The Florida Project), Margaret Qualley (Poor Things, Once Upon a Time… in Hollywood), and Hong Chau (The Whale, The Menu). From early reports, this one will be a tough but rewarding watch, much like early Lanthimos efforts like his Oscar-nominated Dogtooth. Not for the faint of heart!
A Quiet Place: Day One (June 28) – While we saw a glimpse of how things began in the opening scene of A Quiet Place: Part II from a small-town perspective, this time, John Krasinski (relinquishing the directing duties to co-writer/director Michael Sarnoski) co-writes this big-city view of the apocalyptic alien arrival. Oscar winner Lupita Nyong’o (12 Years a Slave) and Joseph Quinn (Netflix’s Stranger Things) star, with Alex Wolff (Hereditary, Pig) and series standout Djimon Hounsou co-starring.
Horizon: An American Saga – Chapter 1 (June 28) – The directorial efforts of Kevin Costner have been amazing (Dances with Wolves), good (Open Range), and awful (The Postman), and all have essentially been Westerns. His first time in the director’s chair in over 20 years, this first chapter of a two-part epic clocks in at over three hours long and centers on the expansion and settlement of the American West during the Civil War era. Another star-studded cast joins multihyphenate Costner on the frontier, including Dale Dickey (Hell or High Water, Winter’s Bone), Jenna Malone (The Hunger Games Series, Contact), Sienna Miller (American Sniper, Layer Cake), Sam Worthington (Avatar, Avatar: The Way of Water), Thomas Hayden Church (Tombstone, Sideways), and Will Patton (The Postman, Armageddon).
Henderson resident McManus Woodend is an Assistant Professor of Digital Media at the University of Southern Indiana and has worked in film, television and commercials for more than 20 years. To see some of his work, visit www.mcmanuswoodend.com.