With 2016 fast approaching, it's time to take a look at the most anticipated movies for
the year!
And like every year, Beyond The Trailer's 2016 preview is divided into the Top Ten original
movies, sequels and wild cards!
But I have to say that even with all those slots, thirty, I've never seen competition
like this for one of them.
And so today we're going to take a look at the top WILD CARD movies set for 2016 - and
this episode is sponsored by Lynda.com - the online business school that allows you to
be your very own wild card, improving skills you already have or learning new ones!
Now number ten?
That would be Dirty Grandpa, not to be confused with 2013's Bad Grandpa - or, come to think
of it, I'm sure Lionsgate wouldn't mind at all if you confused their comedy with Johnny
Knoxville's huge box office hit!
Dirty Grandpa is a wild card because while stars Zac Efron and Robert De Niro have had
their box office hits, they've also had their box office flops, and a January release date
isn't very reassuring.
Still, Sacha Baron Cohen's long-time collaborator Dan Mazer directs and Efron - who won MTV's
Best Shirtless Performance prize two times in a row - seems to be going for a third win!
Speaking of hot guys, our number nine wild card - The Nice Guys - has a full house with
Ryan Gosling, Russell Crowe and Matt Bomer.
Kim Basinger also stars.
Basically this 1970s porn murder mystery is Boogie Nights meets LA Confidential, and 90s
wunderkid screenwriter Shane Black writes and directs.
Black got this movie off of Iron Man 3, but then he also still has to live down Iron Man
3.
Plus Ryan Gosling and Russell Crowe?
Well, they WISH they had Efron and De Niro's 50-50 box office track record.
At number eight, it seems the exclamation mark is making a comeback, from Jeb Bush's
presidential campaign to the Coen Brothers' Hail Caesar!
This comedy takes place at a movie studio in the 1950s where a "fixer" is trying to
find out the whereabouts of one of the studio's actors who's vanished.
And Hail Caesar is a cavalcade of stars itself with Josh Brolin, George Clooney, Channing
Tatum, Tilda Swinton, Jonah Hill, Francis McDormand, Ralph Fiennes and Scarlett Johansson!
Yet movies about the film industry never seem to connect with mainstream audiences, and
lately the Coen Brothers have been hit or miss both at the box office and with critics.
But while the public isn't too keen on movies about Hollywood, they love zombies - and British
television and HBO - which our number seven wild card hopes to capitalize on.
Pride and Prejudice and Zombies stars Downton Abbey's Lily James - also from Disney's smash
hit Cinderella - and Matt Smith from Doctor Who!
Plus Lena Headey and Charles Dance from Game of Thrones and Jack Houston from Boardwalk
Empire!
And while David O Russell is no longer directing as originally planned, his fingerprints are
apparently still on the script.
But the real question mark here, besides Russell's departure, it's that novelist turned screenwriter
Seth Grahame-Smith's similarly themed Abraham Lincoln Vampire Hunter was such a huge flop.
Then at number six we have one of our most exciting wild cards, The Great Wall, which
is the first true co-production between Hollywood and China!
Shot in China with a chinese director, Zhang Yimou, China's Andy Lau and America's Matt
Damon co-star in what's being described as a sci-fi actioner that revolves around The
Great Wall of China.
Chinese audiences are turning out to see Hollywood flicks in droves, but will American audiences
be as open to a film that's so heavily Chinese?
Now before we get to the second half of this list I'd like to take a moment to thank our
sponsor, Lynda.com, who is offering a FREE ten day trial to Beyond The Trailer viewers!
Just go to Lynda.com/BTT to sign up and get unlimited access to courses and tutorials
taught by experts - like how to how to copyright your original work, how to shoot on location,
or how to become really good at photoshop!
Again, just go to Lynda.com/BTT - that's L-Y-N-D-A dot com slash BTT - to take a look around,
and sign up for that free ten day trial.
So what's number five?
That would be The Lonely Island's first true movie, Connor4Real, after their practice run
back in 2007 with Hot Rod.
Shrewdly, this new comedy will be about a boy band that comes back together, allowing
The Lonely Island to include what's sure to be a killer soundtrack - as music has so far
proven to be their strongpoint.
Why is this a wild card?
Well, again, Hot Rod, and also while The Lonely Island is very popular with the East and Left
Coast, they've yet to transition their short-form success with hits like Lazy Sunday, Dick in
a Box and I'm on a Boat to long-form entertainment.
Then interestingly, number four is another TV sketch group looking to find success on
the big screen, and that's Key and Peele with Keanu.
In the comedy, two friends must pose as drug dealers to retrieve their stolen cat.
Key and Peele couldn't be hotter right now, especially Key, yet just look at The Lonely
Island to see how difficult it is to transition from short-form to long-form comedy.
Plus having Will Forte in your movie is never a good sign, sorry Will Forte.
Next at number three we've got Warner Bros Tarzan, as the studio continues to try and
share in Disney's live action fairytale success.
Tarzan will star Margot Robbie as Jane, who has become an important talent for Warner
Bros with Focus, Suicide Squad and now Tarzan.
And while Christoph Walz and Samuel L Jackson co-star, the big question mark here is True
Blood's Alexander Skarsgard who stars as Tarzan, and has yet to make his mark on the big screen.
What's more, this is a Tarzan sequel, with our hero returning to the jungle after years
of living in London with his wife Jane.
Then, our second wild card is Fox's Gambit, which is looking more and more like an actual
Gambit.
Since Hugh Jackman is getting ready to leave the X-Men franchise, Fox has high hopes that
Channing Tatum can takeover as their new mutant heartthrob and box office draw - and so does
Tatum who's apparently a big Gambit fan.
Yet script problems and other issues almost made Tatum walk, and now the film just lost
its director.
Seems it's gonna take a lot of Cajun charm, and luck, for this film to succeed.
Then finally, the number one wild card of 2016 is Paul Feig's all female Ghostbusters
reboot!
Which, by the way, seems less and less of a reboot with the original Ghostbusters jnow
all set for cameos, the exception of Harold Ramis who sadly passed away in 2014.
Spy has proven to be a real success and of course there's Bridesmaids, proving audiences
feel women are just as funny as men.
But we'll have to wait and see how they react to having women not join men but fully replace
men in a beloved franchise.
Then again, Sony can always play up Chris Hemsworth...
And those are the top ten wild card movies of 2016!
I'm Grace Randolph and this has been a Movie Byte!
Be sure to stay tuned for the top ten original movies and sequels...