The summer movie season is here, and with it, the blockbuster tentpoles audiences crave. Our May film preview runs them down: Marvel-heads will finally get their first taste of Thunderbolts* while the Impossible Mission Force continues Reckoning with rogue agent Ethan Hunt. Tom Cruise may be on his last run with the Mission: Impossible movies, but Death is making a comeback in Final Destination Bloodlines, and so is Disney with a live-action remake of Lilo & Stitch. Most importantly, I Think You Should Leave fans can finally hear Tim Robinson scream in Dolby Atmos as Robinson makes his debut as a big-screen lead in Friendship.
While the world waits patiently for Paul Feig to make a theatrically released Spy sequel, he’s doing Another Simple Favor for Amazon. The sequelcontinues Stephanie’s (Anna Kendrick) Hitchcockian deal with the devil, Emily (Blake Lively), who convinces her to attend her wedding in Capri and, seemingly, collaborate on a new crime. A gentlewoman’s agreement is one thing, but Another Simple Favor adds Allison Janney to ensure this Favor is molto semplice.
After a tricky phase of the MCU, Marvel hopes to tie up some loose ends and leave audiences happy with Thunderbolts*. Without an Avenger to anchor the team, Marvel’s most charismatic assassin Bucky Barnes (Sebastian Stan) assembles a new group of superhero C-listers from the Black Widow and Falcon And The Winter Soldier‘s ensembles, including Florence Pugh, David Harbour, and Wyatt Russell. Thunderbolts* pits this suicide squad against The Void, a new baddie that can disappear people with mysterious shadows.
Shadow Force (May 9)
Once the leaders of Shadow Force, a multinational special ops unit, Kyrah (Kerry Washington) and Issac (Omar Sy) broke protocol by falling in love, then broke up. Several years and one foul-mouthed child (Jahleel Kamara) later, Jack Cinder (Mark Strong) puts a hit out on the lapsed commandos and sends his goons after them. The latest from Joe Carnahan certainly leans into the goofiness of its premise and tries to have fun with an estranged Mr. And Mrs. Smith attempting to keep their child safe.
After moving to the destitute corn-syrup capital of the Midwest, Quinn (Katie Douglas) meets a group of YouTube pranksters, known for turning the town’s mascot, Friendo The Clown, into the town’s Bogeyman. Making social media slasher shorts for their followers is one thing, but when a series of clown-related murders start to spring up, the blame falls on the meddling teens. Clown In A Cornfield is a hard-R take on a popular YA series, with director Eli Craig playing into the genre with inventive kills and funny performances.
Tim Robinson and Paul Rudd solve the male loneliness problem in Friendship. In what could probably be an I Think You Should Leave sketch, Robinson plays Craig, an insufferable 40-something with zero social skills, who tries to make friends with his amiable neighbor Austin (Paul Rudd). As one can imagine, Craig takes it personally when Austin tries to end things.
Fight Or Flight (May 9)
Josh Hartnett gets on the Bullet Train in Fight Or Flight. As the bleach-blond mercenary Lucas Reyes, Hartnett hunts a target on a plane crawling with assassins and navigates a series of violent and confined fight sequences that use the whole airplane as a weapon. Though it boasts the bright colors and bloody sense of humor of a David Leitch movie, Fight Or Flight is an original creation, giving Hartnett a chance to show off his very particular set of skills.
Sister Midnight (May 16)
In Karan Kandhari’s directorial debut, Sister Midnight, Uma (Radhika Apte) escapes domesticity after determining that homemaking in Mumbai with her stinky new husband (Ashok Pathak) and prying neighbors wasn’t for her. After all, she’s a firecracker and he’s a dud. But after a bug bite, Uma turns into a night owl who hungers for blood, sending her on a darkly surreal comic adventure.
Final Destination Bloodlines (May 16)
Death is back to its old tricks in Final Destination Bloodlines. Resurrecting after over a decade, the series has more of the Rube Goldberg death machines and a new set of teens to torture. This time, Death is after the descendants of a woman who spoiled its plans at the Space Needle in the ’60s, setting its sights and springing traps on the whole family.
Hurry Up Tomorrow (May 16)
The Weeknd made a movie? Of course he did. Hurry Up Tomorrow is the companion film to his new album of the same name. Weeknd, a.k.a. Abel Tesfaye, plays an insomniac pop star who embarks on a surreal odyssey after meeting Jenna Ortega and Barry Keoghan. The result looks a bit like that meme-able Super Bowl performance where Tesfaye got lost in a hall of mirrors.
Lilo & Stitch (May 23)
Disney burns through another live-action remake with Lilo & Stitch, giving one of Disney’s final 2D animated classics a firmware update to look more like Sonic The Hedgehog. The story remains the same: Stitch crash-lands on Hawaii and befriends a little Elvis-loving girl as two aliens follow in hot pursuit. Thankfully, Lilo & Stitch doesn’t come with some of the baggage of other Disney remakes, and at least the studio brought back Chris Sanders to voice Stitch.
Mission: Impossible: The Final Reckoning (May 23)
It’s Tom Cruise’s last chance to kill himself for the moviegoing public. Well, at least as Ethan Hunt. Hunt has gone rogue once again, and the world’s governments are hunting him to make him answer for the various laws he’s broken while on his missions. As the Impossible Mission Force closes in, the world’s last hope against AI movie stars rests on Ethan Hunt’s ability to run really, really fast. All that, and Cruise hangs off the side of a plane.
Karate Kid: Legends (May 30)
The multiple Karate Kid universes unite in Karate Kids: Legends. Combining the mythos from the original timeline, the 2010 remake, and Cobra Kai, Karate Kid: Legends sees the original Karate Kid, Daniel LaRusso (Ralph Macchio), graduate to sensei. Teaming up with Mr. Han (Jackie Chan), Daniel heads to the Big Apple to help train Han’s grandson.
Bring Her Back (May 30)
In their follow-up to Talk To Me, directors Danny and Michael Philippou make a bad situation worse. After their mother dies, a brother and sister end up in the foster care of Laura (Sally Hawkins), who already has a possessed child of her own. Lucky for the newcomers, their new family is interested in VHS exorcisms and some light resurrection.
The Phoenician Scheme (May 30)
Michael Cera has finally entered the Wes Anderson arena. Anderson’s latest features an all-star cast moving delicately around the director’s ever-expanding dollhouse and trying to get to the bottom of a conspiracy to kill Europe’s wealthiest man, Zsa-zsa Korda (Benicio del Toro). Anderson’s currently on one of the most prolific streaks of his career, and Phoenician Scheme promises to be one of his most ambitious and intricate creations to date.
