Movies Monday

With Gaza teetering on the brink of disaster, Movies Monday takes a timely look at The Law In These Parts, a Sundance award-winning documentary, which asks the architects of Israel’s military rule in Palestine some deeply uncomfortable questions.
You mightn’t be satisfied with all the answers…
 

 

 
 
Appetites for Quentin Tarantino’s new western, Django Unchained, are further whetted with the release of a new one-minute clip. Set two years before the outbreak of the American Civil War, the combined acting might of Samuel L. Jackson, Leonardo DiCaprio, Jamie Foxx and Christoph Waltz suggests it’s going to be a biggie.
Whilst decidedly un-festive in tone, The Weinstein Company are debuting the film Stateside on Christmas Day.
 

 
Finally getting a release date is The Host, Hollywood’s take on the Stephanie Meyer novel about – this all sounds rather familiar – body-invading extra-terrestrials hellbent on taking over the planet.
Dropping on March 29, its cast includes a very adult-looking Saoirse Ronan who has three more major Hollywood movies in the pipeline.
 

 
It’s not in cinemas until August 2013, but there’s already a major buzz surrounding The Mortal Instruments: City Of Bones.
Going very obviously for the Twilight market, it’s set in New York where a “seemingly ordinary teenager, Clary Fray discovers she is the descendant of a line of Shadowhunters, a secret cadre of young half-angel warriors locked in an ancient battle to protect our world from demons.”
The impossibly young and good-looking – bastards! – cast includes Lena Headey, Lily Collins. Kevin Zegers and Jemima West. There’s also strong Irish involvement courtesy of Jonathan Rhys Meyers and Robert Sheehan.
Based on Michael Connelly's best-selling series of young adult novels, it could be a smash hit franchise in the making.
 

 
Jesse Eisenberg, Isla Fisher, Morgan Freeman, Woody Harrelson, Mark Ruffalo, Michael Caine and Common are the leading lights in Now You See Me, a $70m “illusionist crime thriller” coming your way next June.
The action centres around The Four Horsemen, a group of Vegas musicians known for their ever more intricate and unexplainable stunts.
Invested with a social conscience, they decide to try and relieve a white-collar criminal of his ill-gotten gains so that they can give it to people in need. Will they succeed? We suspect they will…
 
 
 

 
“A comedy set in the middle of a war between rival a cappella groups and centered on a rebellious girl who joins one of the groups as an escape from her unhappy life at school,” is the sales pitch for Pitch Perfect, which after mixed US reviews arrives here early in the New Year.
With Elizabeth Banks, Anna Kendrick, Alexis Knapp, Rebel Wilson, Brittany Snow and Christopher Mintz-Plasse co-starring it promises to be another adolescent treat.
 

 
Movies Monday very much likes the look of the teaser for Star Trek: Into The Darkness, the sequel to JJ Abrams’ 2009 reboot, which features Benedict Cumberbatch as baddie-in-chief. According to well-placed sources, this could be Zachary Quinto's last appearance as Spock. It's been a darn tough act for him to follow, but the former Heroes man has done a top job.
 

 
 
Switching to the small screen and the trailer for the new Doctor Who Christmas special, The Snowmen, was unveiled as part of last Friday’s Children In Need telethon on the BBC.
If you were too engrossed watching Twink give a rare interview on the Late Late – someone has to invent a sarcasm font – here it is…
 

 
Which is where Movies Monday bids you a fond adieu for this week. Thoughts and comments should be sent to @stuartclark66