Autumn Autumn FILM SPECIAL FILM SPECIAL FILM SP L
FAMILY FUN Matthew Turner looks forward to the best upcoming family fi lm releases
T here are rich pickings ahead when it comes to family i lms. First up is British comedy What We Did On Our Holiday (26 Sep), from the creators of TV’s Outnumbered. David Tennant and Rosamund Pike star as a couple trying to keep their marriage difi culties a secret from their children’s ailing grandfather (Billy Connolly) while on a family trip to Scotland.
Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day (24 Oct) offers wholesome American family comedy in a similar vein. Loosely based on a children’s book by Judith Viorst, the i lm stars Steve Carell and Jennifer Garner as a couple whose entire family is having the worst day imaginable. Animation fans, both young and old, are in for a treat too. Produced by Guillermo del Toro, Book of Life (24 Oct) is a CGI-animated adventure that sees two spirits making a wager as to which of two childhood friends (voiced by Diego Luna and Channing Tatum) will win the heart of a young woman (Zoe Saldana). And The Penguins of Madagascar (5 Dec) get
a spin-off movie to go with their spin-off TV show, with the quartet of superspy penguins encountering a rival group of animal secret agents.
there’s always If you prefer your talking crime-i ghting animals a bit bigger, the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (17 Oct), which is getting an effects-heavy reboot, throwing in Transformers’ Megan Fox (as reporter April O’Neill) for good measure. A treat for both young children and nostalgia- chasing thirtysomethings alike.
Young adults are also well catered for in the autumn season, with the release of The Hunger Games: Mockingjay – Part One (20 Nov), which sees Katniss Everdeen (Jennifer Lawrence) turning revolutionary. This is the i rst half of the i nal book in the Hunger Games series – the concluding part is currently scheduled for November 2015. And if you can’t get enough of fantasy novel adaptations split into multiple movies, there’s also Peter Jackson’s The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies (12 Dec), which sees
Bilbo Baggins (Martin Freeman) and his band of dwarves going into battle against the mighty dragon Smaug. If dragons are too scary for the youngest family members, try your luck with a pair of children’s favourites instead. First up is Paddington (28 Nov), based on the books by Michael Bond. Ben Whishaw (Bright Star, Skyfall) voices the titular bear, who’s rendered in CGI alongside a live-action cast. And Aardman Animation’s eagerly awaited big screen adventure for Shaun the Sheep is out next year: the imaginatively titled Shaun the Sheep Movie (6 Feb), the teaser trailer for which is a very i ne thing indeed.
Finally, there’s Night At The Museum: Secret of the Tomb (26 Dec), in which Ben Stiller brings his magical living museum characters to London (cue Dan Stevens as Lancelot) and the updated remake of Annie (19 Dec), starring Quvenzhané Wallis and Jamie Foxx, not to mention the welcome 30th anniversary re-release of Ivan Reitman’s classic comedy Ghostbusters (31 Oct).
L-R: The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies; Shaun the Sheep Movie. Top: Book of Life. 20 THE LIST 21 Aug–18 Sep 2014