As the Christmas festivities wind down and the summer heat sets in, Australian cinemas are gearing up for a season packed with major blockbusters, intriguing dramas, and family-friendly animations. From long-awaited sequels to locally-shot comedies, there's a film for every taste escaping the holiday lull.
Blockbuster Season Heats Up
The cinematic event of the season is undoubtedly Avatar: Fire and Ash, which is now showing. James Cameron's third instalment in the epic franchise sees the Sully family grappling with grief while facing a new threat: the fire-wielding Ash People of Pandora. Cameron has used the film to reaffirm his belief that large-scale blockbuster cinema is here to stay.
Also currently screening is Rental Family, starring Brendan Fraser as a struggling actor in Tokyo who joins an agency that hires out actors to play roles in clients' real lives. Fraser has spoken about how the project helped him tackle personal insecurities.
Post-Christmas Cinematic Feast
Boxing Day brings a slew of new releases. The comedy Anaconda, starring Paul Rudd and Jack Black, sees the duo attempt to film a amateur remake of the 1997 cult classic. Notably, the film was shot in Queensland and co-written by Tom Gormican, director of The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent.
Also debuting on December 26 is the psycho-drama The Housemaid, featuring Sydney Sweeney as a woman who uses a fake resume to become a live-in housekeeper for a wealthy couple played by Amanda Seyfried and her on-screen husband. The film is adapted from Freida McFadden's 2022 novel.
Rounding out the Boxing Day offerings is Song Sung Blue, a musical romance starring Hugh Jackman and Kate Hudson as struggling musicians who find love and success through a Neil Diamond tribute act.
Family Fun and Award Contenders
New Year's Day provides perfect family entertainment with The Pout-Pout Fish. This G-rated animation, based on the beloved children's book series, features the voice of Nick Offerman as a perpetually glum fish whose outlook is changed by a cheerful sea dragon named Pip.
Also arriving on January 1 is The Choral, starring Ralph Fiennes as a Yorkshire choirmaster in World War I struggling to keep his choir together as members leave for the front.
The following week brings the highly-praised drama Sentimental Value on January 8. Stellan Skarsgård stars as a filmmaker seeking redemption with the daughters he neglected for his career. The film has already received a five-star review.
Mid-January Highlights
January 15 is another big date for releases. Marty Supreme features Timothée Chalamet as Marty Mauser, a man with an unlikely dream of becoming a table-tennis champion. Chalamet has described the film, which also stars Gwyneth Paltrow, as evolving from a sports story into a heist film and finally a human drama.
That same day sees the release of Hamnet, director Chloé Zhao's adaptation of Maggie O'Farrell's acclaimed novel. Paul Mescal and Jessie Buckley play William Shakespeare and his wife Agnes, navigating grief after the loss of their son years before the creation of Hamlet.
Also launching on January 15 is South Korean maestro Park Chan-wook's black comedy No Other Choice. The film follows a newly unemployed man (Lee Byung-hun) who decides the best way to beat the competition for jobs is to eliminate the other applicants.
With this diverse lineup offering everything from epic sci-fi and heartwarming family tales to intense dramas and sharp satires, Australian moviegoers have plenty of reasons to seek refuge in the cool darkness of the cinema this summer.
