And now for something entirely different. Focus and Miramax have hit GATW and hit us hard with some great info about their fall films. As much as I am enjoying geeking out over all the Comic-Con juice flooding our inboxes, RSS feeds, Twitters, Facebooks, carrier pigeon intake cages, and smoke signal detection machines, it’s beneficial to remember there are other films coming out soon (although, I did have a pretty serious AVATAR-based dream last night, heeeeey, Sam Worthington). Let’s talk fall films, babies.

TAKING WOODSTOCK

Opening date: August 28
Director: Ang Lee
Writers: James Schamus (screenplay), Elliot Tiber and Tom Monte (book)
Cast: Demetri Martin, Dan Fogler, Henry Goodman, Jonathan Groff, Eugene Levy, Jeffrey Dean Morgan, Imelda Staunton, Emile Hirsch, Liev Schreiber
Studio: Focus Features

Oddly enough, this is a film my mother is incredibly excited about. Hopefully, it won’t be a letdown, like when she took our entire family to see SUMMER OF SAM because she “thought it was about disco” (this is a true story, James can confirm this). TAKING WOODSTOCK is Academy Award-winning director Ang Lee’s latest, and it’s a bit of a departure from BROKEBACK MOUNTAIN. Based on the memoirs of Elliot Tiber, it  stars Demetri Martin as Elliot, who inadvertently played a role in making 1969’s Woodstock Music and Arts Festival into the famed happening it was. The entire cast is stand-out, the music is going to be amazing, and the trailer is utterly hilarious and totally charming. I foresee Mama Erbland and I being first in line on opening day.

Six more fall films to get excited about, after the jump!

9

Opening date: September 9
Director: Shane Acker
Writer: Pamela Pettler
Cast: Elijah Wood, John C. Reilly, Jennifer Connelly, Christopher Plummer, Crispin Glover, Martin Landau
Studio: Focus Features

Not to be confused with NINE, as I suspect there won’t be a lot of dancing in this one.  This animated fantasy epic has a great pedigree – it’s produced by Tim Burton and Timur Bekmambetov. When #9 first comes to life, he finds himself in a post-apocalyptic world. All humans are gone, and it is only by chance that he discovers a community of other small creatures like him taking refuge from fearsome machines that roam the landscape intent on doing them harm. But our small cadre of created heroes have much more in store for them besides hiding out – they just might have to save the world. The trailer captures much of what is going to make 9 stand out, I believe the term “visual feast” applies.

PIRATE RADIO (THE BOAT THAT ROCKED)

Opening date: November 6
Director: Richard Curtis
Writer: Richard Curtis
Cast: Philip Seymour Hoffman, Bill Nighy, Rhys Ifans, Nick Frost, Kenneth Branagh, Tom Sturridge
Studio: Focus Features

I am so ready to rock this film, I can’t even come up with a more clever pun. In the late 1960s, American radio stations blasted rock and roll 24 hours a day. But in the home country of The Beatles and The Rolling Stones, the only way 25 million people could hear their music was to tune in…to a boat. The film tells the incredible story of a band of rogue deejays who captivated British radio listeners in the ‘60s, playing the music that defined a generation and boldly defying the government that tried to shut them down. The cast is incredible, there will be more jams than you can shake a stick at, and there will be plenty of opportunities for various audience members to yell “I’m on a boat!”

EXTRACT

Opening date: September 4
Director:  Mike Judge
Writer: Mike Judge
Cast: Jason Bateman, Mila Kunis, Kristen Wiig, J.K. Simmons, David Koechner, Clifton Collins, Jr., Gene Simmons, Ben Affleck
Studio: Miramax Films

The latest comedy from writer/director Mike Judge. Joel (Bateman) is one step away from selling his flavor extract factory and retiring to easy street when a freak workplace accident sets in motion a series of disasters that put his business and personal life in jeopardy. Is Judge back on his game? I’m thinking yes.

THE BOYS ARE BACK

Opening date: September 25
Director:  Scott Hicks
Writer: Simon Carr
Cast: Clive Owen, Emma Booth, Laura Fraser, George MacKay, Nicholas McAntulty
Studio: Miramax Films

Inspired by a true story, THE BOYS ARE BACK is a deeply moving, wryly confessional tale of fatherhood, that intimately evokes both the fragility and wonders of family life. It follows a witty, wisecracking, action-oriented sportswriter (Owen) who, in the wake of his wife’s tragic death, finds himself in a sudden, stultifying state of single parenthood. I think Owen does serious drama well, and I’m looking forward to seeing what he can turn in here.

A SERIOUS MAN

Opening date: October 2
Director: Joel and Ethan Coen
Writers: Joel and Ethan Coen
Cast: Michael Stuhlbarg, Richard Kind, Aaron Wolf, Sari Lennick, Jessica McManus, Adam Arkin
Studio: Focus Features

The Coens are coming! The Coens are coming! Joel and Ethan’s new film is the story of an ordinary man’s search for clarity in a universe where Jefferson Airplane is on the radio and “F-Troop” is on TV. It is 1967, and Larry Gopnik (Stuhlbarg), a physics professor at a quiet Midwestern university, has just been informed by his wife Judith (Lennick) that she is leaving him. She has fallen in love with one of his more pompous colleagues, Sy Ableman (Melamed), who seems to her a more substantial person than the feckless Larry. That’s just the tip of the iceberg as, in typical Coen fashion, our main man has got a lot more on his plate than just that one problem (a problem that would sink a lower man). The Coen kids will come out for this, and I doubt they’ll be disappointed. Roger Deakins fans, get on it.

EVERYBODY’S FINE

Opening date: December 4
Director: Kirk Jones
Writer: Kirk Jones
Cast: Robert De Niro, Drew Barrymore, Kate Beckinsale, Sam Rockwell
Studio: Miramax Films

A remake of Giuseppe Tornatore’s “Stanno Tutti Bene,” the film follows a widower (De Niro) who embarks on an impromptu road trip to reconnect with each of his grown children only to discover that their lives are far from picture perfect. Do you see that cast? Anyone who has ever heard me speak about actors working today for more than three minutes knows that I would watch Rockwell discuss the merits of painting a room with primer versus without primer and be damn happy doing so. De Niro as a papa trying to reconnect? I think this one is going to be something special.

What looks good to you guys?