2003 Most Anticipated Movies (Page #9)

Based partially on the shootings at Columbine High School, writer-director Gus Van Sant presents "Elephant", which takes place during one day at a typical American high school. Following ten kids in their daily activities, an atmosphere of violence and lawlessness becomes brutally evident as tension mounts, leading to a tragic event.

This movie tells two stories in three settings, going back and forth between each story as the film proceeds. One is the story of two cowboy brothers (Joseph Fiennes, David Wenham) who worked as mercenaries in Turkey around the turn of the century, and fall in love with the same woman (Anne Brochet). The other is set in contemporary New York, and is about a 90-year-old woman with a secret horde of Balkan gold and a thief (Adrian Lester), who surprisingly become friends. The third setting is the Ottoman Empire, circa 1913.

"Prey for Rock & Roll" is the adrenaline-filled story of a contemporary LA all-girl punk band led by singer/guitarist Jacki (Gina Gershon), bassist Tracy (Drea De Matteo), lead guitarist Faith (Lori Petty), and drummer Sally (Shelly Cole). The directing debut of esteemed music supervisor/producer Alex Steyermark, the film captures the color and energy of a veteran band struggling to make it while personal obstacles and disturbing new events threaten to tear them apart.

Set during the final days of the war between Iran and Iraq, this is the story of an elderly Iranian Kurd musician who ventures off with his two sons, also musicians, into the dangerous territory of Kurdish Iraq in search of his wife, Hanareh, a singer with an amazing voice, who they fear may be in danger there, after she ran away with the old man's best friend.

April Burns (Katie Holmes) is a 21-year-old wild child with a very big problem. Against her better judgment, she's invited her straightlaced family for Thanksgiving dinner. Her boyfriend, Bobby, wants to help, but she banishes him from the apartment while she attempts to cook the meal. To make matters worse, she then discovers that her oven doesn't work. So, while April is forced to ask her eccentric neighbors for help in cooking her fifteen pound turkey, the Burns Family begins a reluctant journey from suburban Pennsylvania toward New York City's Lower East Side. April's Dad, Jim Burns (Oliver Platt) tries to convince the family that the day will be beautiful. Her mom, Joy (Patricia Clarkson) has her doubts and freely voices them. April's teenage sister and brother are squeezed between Grandma Dottie and a bag of snacks in the back seat as the Burns' family car hurtles toward Manhattan and what will most likely be certain disaster.

Ben is an overachieving high-school student in Orange County, Calif. He's at the top of his class and set to matriculate at an Ivy League school. But Ben has a darker side. While he maintains academic success, to alleviate the pressure put upon him by his parents, he indulges in acts of crime. His life slowly begins to spin out of control and he eventually joins a gang.

The second feature film from writer-director Sofia Coppola ("The Virgin Suicides") is set in Tokyo, where two bored Americans — a fading TV star (Bill Murray) shooting an alcohol ad and a young married woman (Scarlett Johansson) with an ambitious, neglectful husband — become fast friends after meeting in a hotel bar. The two then spend an adventure-filled weekend together "finding themselves."

This documentary explores the lives and worlds of women who explore their masculine sides as "drag kings," using a legendary Drag King Night in New York as a starting point to follow some of the women into their lives, whether their drag persona be an identity they assume part or full-time. Drag kings in London and Zurich are also interviewed, including some who are experimenting with hormones to accelerate their masculinity.

This documentary presents 90 minutes of interview footage (edited down from more than ten hours) with Traudl Junge (1920-2002), who from 1942 to 1945 was one of three personal secretaries of Adolf Hitler, whom she describes as a "pleasant boss and fatherly friend". Ms. Junge describes first-hand experiences of what life was like within the most inner circles of the Third Reich, including those chilling last days for Hitler, Goebbels and Eva Braun in the bunker, where she transcribed Hitler's last will and testament before he and the others committed suicide.

On the afternoon of July 1, 1981, Los Angeles police responded to a distress call at 8763 Wonderland Avenue and soon discovered a grisly quadruple homicide, later compared to the gruesome slaughter at the Tate household at the hands of the Charles Manson family 10 years earlier. Ron Launius (Josh Lucas), Billy Deverell (Tim Blake Nelson), Barbara Richardson (Natasha Gregson Wagner) and Joy Miller (Janeane Garofalo) were brutally murdered, and Ron's wife Susan (Christina Applegate) was left in critical condition. The police investigation that followed - led by detectives Sam Nico (Ted Levine), Louis Cruz (Frankie G.) and Mike Peters (M.C. Gainey) - would unearth a seedy world of drugs and violence, ultimately revealing a motley crew from LA's underbelly including ex-con David Lind (Dylan McDermott), nightclub impresario Eddie Nash (Eric Bogosian), the most unlikely of American heroes - porn legend John Holmes (Val Kilmer) - Holmes' estranged wife Sharon (Lisa Kudrow) and his teenage lover Dawn Schiller (Kate Bosworth).

From Stephen Frears, the Oscar®-nominated director of "The Grifters" and "Dangerous Liaisons", comes a new film set in London's secret underworld, where everything is for sale. It's the story of a young man, Okwe (Chiwetel Ejiofor) and a Turkish chambermaid, Senay (Audrey Tautou), who work at the same West London hotel--a breeding ground for illegal activity. They are put to the test when Okwe makes a shocking discovery late one night.

Set on an American Army Base in 1989, as the Berlin Wall is about to fall, "Buffalo Soldiers" takes a satiric look as these men steal, drink, fight, and make, take, and sell drugs. Elwood (Joaquin Phoenix) is the brains behind the operation, easily duping his superior (Ed Harris) and sleeping with his wife (Elizabeth McGovern). But with the arrival of the new Sergeant (Scott Glenn), everything changes. The Sergeant cracks down; Elwood retaliates by dating his daughter (Anna Paquin) and attempting a big "weapons for drugs" deal, with the Sergeant in closer pursuit.

In this romantic comedy, British artist Colin Ware (Colin Firth) discovers that his fiance, Vera (Minnie Driver), the love of his life, is going to marry another man. Distraught and despondent, he gets on a plane for America and ends up in the tiny town of Hope in New England. At first, Colin is depressed, but he soon finds more than a shoulder to cry on when his innkeepers introduce him to Mandy (Heather Graham), a beautiful nurse. All's going well and Colin has almost forgotten his old flame until Vera suddenly shows up with a surprise of her own. "Hope Springs" is about finding happiness where you least expect it.

A love story spanning two continents, "Nowhere in Africa" is the extraordinary true tale of a Jewish family who flees the Nazi regime in 1938 for a remote farm in Kenya. Abandoning their once-comfortable existence in Germany, Walter Redlich, his wife Jettel (Juliane Kohler) and their five-year-old daughter Regina each deal with the harsh realities of their new life in different ways. Attorney Walter is resigned to working the farm as a caretaker; pampered Jettel resists adjustment at every turn; while the shy yet curious Regina immediately embraces the country-learning the local language and customs, and finding a friend in Owuor, the farm's cook. As the war rages on the other side of the world, the trio's relationships to their strange environment become increasingly complicated as Jettel grows more self-assured and Walter more haunted by the life they left behind. As they eventually learn to cherish their life in Africa, they also endeavor to find a way back to each other.

Four skaters follow the summer tour of a skateboard star (Colin McKay) from Chicago to Oceanside, CA, pulling tricks and tearing it up, in their wild attempts to get noticed and grab a major sponsor and a chance to become stars themselves.

Renee Zellweger and Ewan McGregor are the toast of the town in the most stylish romantic comedy of the year! From the producers of "American Beauty" and the director of "Bring It On" comes a teasing, tantalizing battle of the sexes that is "pure enchantment" ("Daily News"). When best-selling feminist author Barbara Novak (Zellweger) becomes the target of dashing playboy Catcher Block (McGregor), these sparring, would-be lovers generate enough sparks to fly you to the moon and back. In other words, the ultimate catch has just met his match!

This love story chronicles the romance that develops between an American disaster relief doctor (Clive Owen) and an aristocratic philanthropist socialite (Angelina Jolie) who keep meeting over several years in countries torn apart by wars and disasters.

Rock stars as Mays Gilliam, a Washington D.C. neighborhood Alderman, who's about to be red-lined out of his job. But after the untimely death of the party frontrunner, Gilliam is plucked from obscurity and thrust into the limelight as his party's nominee -- for President of the United States. Bernie Mac stars as Gilliam's older brother Mitch, who becomes his running mate, Robin Givens is the ex-girlfriend who dumped Gilliam, but who has a sudden change of heart when she sees a chance at becoming First Lady, Dylan Baker plays Gilliam's campaign manager; Tamala Jones is Lisa, the woman who believes in Gilliam, and Lynn Whitfield stars as Gilliam's reluctant advisor.

This is the story of an FBI "deep woods tracker" (Jones) who captures an assassin (Del Toro) who makes a sport of hunting deer hunters in the forests outside Portland. When he escapes in the city, the tracker must team up with a female FBI agent (Nielsen) to hunt the assassin down before he comes hunting for them... the assassin kills for fun

Cassandra Reilly (Judy Davis) is an American translator who has moved permanently to Barcelona. She's quite broke, though, so when a glamorous stranger asks for her help, she can't afford to refuse. The hot femme-fatale Frankie Stevens (Marcia Gay Harden) is another American in Barcelona. Her husband has disappeared under mysterious circumstances, and she asks Cassandra to help her find him. As she offers a significant amount of money for the assistance, Cassandra simply can't refuse. Soon she finds herself caught up in a web of mistaken identities, double-crossing families and a devilish kidnapping plot.