Movies: Grimmer, stranger, true-life offerings for fall

What do striking miners in Margaret Thatcher-era Britain, persecuted journalists in Iran and Nicaragua, a brilliant code-breaker exposed as a homosexual, a brilliant physicist debilitated by Lou Gehrig's disease, a Newtown Square multimillionaire turned killer, a British romantic landscape artist in his sunset years, a reformed addict on a 1,100-mile trek, an Olympic-track-star prisoner of war, and a pair of 1950s kitschmongers with a penchant for saucer-eyed waifs have in common?

They're all coming to theaters this fall: true-life tales of prejudice, cruelty, creativity, murder, marital disharmony, and survival against the odds.

Movies as escapist fare, you say? Ha!

The window between mid-September and Christmas Day is traditionally when studios and their boutique specialty wings unleash likely candidates for awards consideration - brainier, more substantial, A-list material. But this fourth quarter seems especially laden with serious stuff. Even Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie are in on the action, each with a reportedly intense drama about World War II.

Sure, there are animated family features, musicals, comedy knuckleheaders, and epic fantasies set in ancient Middle-earth and the dystopian future of Panem, but the thrust of fall 2014 seems grimmer, stranger. Even the fictional entries are rife with scandal, violence, tragedy.

Herein, some of the most anticipated of the almost 90 films due out before year's end. (Release dates are subject to change.)

The Maze Runner. (Sept. 19) Post-apocalyptic YA dystopia, anyone? Getting a jump on Katniss Everdeen and her crew, this creepy-crawly adaptation of the first installment in James Dashner's trilogy finds a gang of boys trapped behind looming concrete walls. They know not why, nor how, nor if it's possible to escape. PG-13

A Walk Among the Tombstones. (Sept. 19) Liam Neeson is Matt Scudder, private eye, in this Scott Frank scripted-and-directed take on Lawrence Block's kidnapping tome. R

The Boxtrolls. (Sept. 26) Little impish trolls - no, not the kind that wreak havoc on the Internet - are accused of stealing children, and cheese, too, in this stop-motion romp from the animation studio behind Coraline and ParaNorman. PG

The Equalizer. (Sept. 26) Denzel Washington may have a new franchise on his hands, playing Robert McCall, an ex-government operative who helps folks out of jams. Serious jams, like extortion and teen sex trafficking. A noirish reboot of the '80s TV show starring Edward Woodward. R

Gone Girl. (Oct. 3) Gillian Flynn's mega-selling whodunit - the one with the missing wife and the husband who looks like suspect No. 1 - gets a classy Hollywood 'do, with Ben Affleck as the suspicious spouse, Rosamund Pike as the missing missus, and David Fincher (The Social Network, The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo) calling the shots. Flynn, who wrote the screenplay, has hinted that she's added new twists to the already twisting tale. R

Kill the Messenger. (Oct. 10) Jeremy Renner stars as a journalist who uncovers a CIA arms-and-drugs plot in 1990s Nicaragua - and pays the price for doing so. Based on a true story, and directed by Michael Cuesta, who knows his way around Langley conspiracies (Homeland). R

Pride. (Oct. 10) Gay and lesbian activists try to join forces with striking miners in Margaret Thatcher's Britain, but there are obstacles - cultural, social - to overcome. Bill Nighy, Imelda Staunton, and Dominic West head the cast; the film won the "Queer Palm" at Cannes. R

The Book of Life. (Oct. 17) Guillermo del Toro is one of the producers of this animated feature about a young, guitar-plucking fellow and his up-and-down day on the Day of the Dead, the Mexican holiday. Diego Luna, Zoe Saldana, and Channing Tatum vocalize. PG

Birdman. (Oct. 24) Michael Keaton plays a Michael Keaton-like movie star, trying to revive a flagging career by mounting a Broadway show. The Alejandro Iñárritu-directed feature has been generating near-ecstatic responses from critics and festival audiences. Can the film - with Edward Norton, Emma Stone, Naomi Watts, and Zach Galifianakis - possibly live up to the hype and hoohah? We hope so. R

St. Vincent. (Oct. 17) Bill Murray has the title role as a hard-drinking, horse-betting grump who grudgingly agrees to babysit the boy who moved in next door. Kooky role model buddy comedy ensues, with Melissa McCarthy as the kid's single mom, Naomi Watts as a "lady of the night," and Jaeden Lieberher as the grade schooler who gets to frequent bars and the track. PG-13

Horns. (Oct. 31) Harry Potter turns devilish in this Halloween-ready fantasy thriller, about a man - Daniel Radcliffe - wrongly accused of murdering his girlfriend (Juno Temple). He sets out to find the real killer, and grows a pair of horns on his head in the process. From the novel by Stephen King's chip-off-the-ol'-block, Joe Hill. R

Interstellar. (Nov. 7) Christopher (Dark Knight, Inception) Nolan's space odyssey is set in the near future, with life on Earth turning unsustainable, and humankind looking to the stars for a solution. Stars such as Matthew McConaughey, Anne Hathaway, Jessica Chastain, and Michael Caine, that is. PG-13

Rosewater. (Nov. 7) Daily Show host Jon Stewart took last summer off to make his directing debut, and the results don't look funny at all: Gael García Bernal plays a journalist detained for 100 days in Iran, where he is tortured and interrogated. Based on Maziar Bahari's prison memoir, Then They Came for Me. R

The Theory of Everything. (Nov. 7) The story of brainiac physicist Stephen Hawkings' Cambridge years, and the art student he fell in love with and would marry, and how the onset of ALS impacted their lives. With Eddie Redmayne and Felicity Jones, directed by Man On Wire's James Marsh. PG-13

Foxcatcher. (Nov. 14) Fresh from a best-director prize at Cannes (for Bennett Miller, who also helmed Capote), the real-life story of Newtown Square's John du Pont and Dave Schultz, the Olympic wrestling star the multimillionaire sponsored, and then killed. Steve Carell is du Pont, Mark Ruffalo is Schultz, and Channing Tatum is the wrestler's brother, Mark. R

Fury. (Oct. 17) Brad Pitt leads a Sherman tank crew through Germany in the bloody, battle-ridden final months of World War II. "Ideals are peaceful, history is violent," he says, and David Ayer's film reportedly doesn't shy from the violence at all. Shia LaBeouf, Michael Peña, and Logan Lerman, as the green recruit, are under Pitt's command. R

The Hunger Games: Mockingjay - Part 1. (Nov. 21) The final book in The Hunger Games trilogy gets cloven in two, the better to explore the intricacies of Suzanne Collins' dystopian fantasy, and maybe milk a few hundred million more out of the film franchise. Jennifer Lawrence returns as Katniss Everdeen, joining forces with the rebels in District 13 to fight the pompous tyranny of the Capitol. First person we see in the teaser trailer: Philip Seymour Hoffman, counseling, "Listen to me, no one else can do this but her." Sigh. PG-13

The Imitation Game. (Nov. 21) Benedict Cumberbatch stars as Alan Turing, the British mathematician and logician who cracked the Nazis' "Enigma" code in World War II - and whose life in subsequent years, when outed as a homosexual, turned hellish and cruel. R

Wild. (Dec. 5) Reese Witherspoon is stirring up awards season buzz with her star turn in the film adaptation of Cheryl Strayed's bestselling memoir about a 1,100-mile solo hike across the Pacific Crest Trail, trying to right a life that has gone crushingly wrong. R

Exodus: Gods and Kings. (Dec. 12) Christian Bale is Moses in Ridley Scott's Old Testament undertaking, leading the Israelite slaves out of Egypt and leading chariots into Gladiator-like battle against Ramses (Joel Edgerton) and his army. PG-13

Inherent Vice. (Dec. 12) From Paul Thomas Anderson (Magnolia, There Will Be Blood), an adaptation of the Thomas Pynchon novel - a crime thriller set in 1970s, Manson-era L.A. Joaquin Phoenix reteams with The Master director, starring as Pynchon's pothead private eye hero. Cast includes Josh Brolin, Benicio Del Toro, Owen Wilson, and Reese Witherspoon. R

The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies. (Dec. 17) Martin Freeman is Bilbo in Peter Jackson's Tolkien undertaking, leading the Company of Thorin out of the Lonely Mountain and into a big bash-up with orcs, wargs, elves, dwarves, and men. The final installment of The Hobbit trilogy. Pass the pipe, Master Baggins, we must celebrate forthwith! PG-13

Annie. (Dec. 19) Will Smith is one of the principals behind this new take on the 1977 musical, based on Harold Gray's vintage comic strip, Little Orphan Annie. Beasts of the Southern Wild's Oscar-nominee Quvenzhané Wallis has the title role and Jamie Foxx is the Daddy Warbucks-ian Will Stacks, a multimillionaire running for mayor who thinks it would be good PR to have his photo taken with a cute little orphan. Cameron Diaz and Rose Byrne also star. Yes, it's a hard-knock life. PG.

Mr. Turner. (Dec. 19) British filmmaker Mike Leigh harks back to the last decades of the great landscape and seascape painter J.M.W. Turner's life, with Leigh regular Timothy Spall in the title role. R

Night at the Museum: Secret of the Tomb. (Dec 19) The third and final installment in the hit series in which a former museum guard (Ben Stiller) hobs and nobs with figures from the past. This one has something to do with the waning magic powers of the the Tablet of Ahkmenrah. Ben Kingsley, Owen Wilson, Steve Coogan, Ricky Gervais, and the late Robin Williams pop up to help, or hinder. PG

Big Eyes. (Dec. 25) The story of celebrated kitsch artists Walter and Margaret Keane, famous in the '50s for their mass-produced paintings of wide-eyed children and clowns. Walter claimed the artwork as his, but then Margaret said she was responsible. Hence, a big, messy divorce. Christoph Waltz and Amy Adams are the Keanes, and Tim Burton, who explored the depths of schlock artistry in Ed Wood, directs. PG-13

Into the Woods. (Dec. 25) The James Lapine/Stephen Sondheim musical gets the Rob Marshall (Chicago, Nine) movie treatment, with Meryl Streep, Emily Blunt, Anna Kendrick, Chris Pine, Tracey Ullman, Christine Baranski, and Johnny Depp singing and dancing their way through a Grimm universe.

Unbroken. (Dec. 25) A World War II survival drama from director Angelina Jolie (her second feature - her first, In the Land of Blood and Honey, also dealt with the horrors of war). British newcomer Jack O'Connell stars as the real-life Olympic track star Louis Zamperini, who survived a plane crash in the Pacific, was adrift for 47 days, and then taken prisoner by the Japanese. The Coen Brothers get screenplay credit. R

The Disappearance of Eleanor Rigby. (Sept. 19) Jessica Chastain and James McAvoy in romantic throes - ecstasy, misery, the whole shebang - in Ned Benson's unique New York City-set project. The writer/director cut three separate films tracking the couple's relationship from different POVs: Him, Her and Them. This is the Them version, not to be confused with the 1950s giant-radioactive-ants Them! R

Tracks. (Sept. 26) The first of two movies this fall based on separate memoirs by women who set out on epic treks. Mia Wasikowska stars as Robyn Davidson, who logged 1,700 miles on her nine-month slog, with camels and a dog, across the Australian outback. PG-13

Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day. (Oct. 10) "I went to sleep with gum in my mouth and now there's gum in my hair and when I got out of bed this morning I tripped on the skateboard and by mistake I dropped my sweater in the sink while the water was running and I could tell it was going to be a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day." So begins the beloved Judith Viorst picture book, and this live-action adaptation (with Steve Carell and Jennifer Garner as the parentals) had better start the same way, or else. PG

The Judge. (Oct. 10) Robert Downey Jr. is a big-city lawyer returned to his Midwest hometown for his mother's funeral, only to discover that his father - Robert Duvall, in the title role - has been charged with murder. R

The Two Faces of January. (Oct. 10) Inside Llewyn Davis' Oscar Isaac meets a vacationing couple - Viggo Mortensen, Kirsten Dunst - in early-'60s Athens, getting caught up in a tangle of false identity, intrigue and murder. From the Patricia Highsmith thriller. R

Men, Women & Children. (Oct. 17) Teens and their respective parental units consider the ways social media have impacted their lives in this ensemble piece headed by Adam Sandler, Judy Greer, Ansel Elgort, Jennifer Garner, and Kaitlyn Dever. Jason Reitman (Juno, Up in the Air) looks up from his smart phone to direct. R

Laggies. (Oct. 24) "Hey, did you hear the one about the grown woman who started hanging out with a bunch of pubescent kids?" No? Well, Keira Knightley has. She's run away from her fiance and winds up with Chloë Grace Moretz and her crew, and then with Moretz's single, smart-aleck dad, played by Sam Rockwell. Lynn Shelton (Your Sister's Sister, Humpday) directs. R

Hot Tub Time Machine 2. (Dec. 25) A sequel to 2010's thought-provoking, existential science fiction masterpiece. In this one, Craig Robinson and Clark Duke jump in the Jacuzzi to try to go back to the past, but they apparently end up in the future, instead. R

The Interview (Dec. 25) Already vociferously condemned in North Korea, a comedy about two celebrity tabloid TV dudes (James Franco, Seth Rogen) who land an exclusive interview with dictator Kim Jong-un, only to find themselves enlisted by the CIA - in a plot to assassinate the Supreme Leader. R