Angela Ortiz and Edgar Ramírez

Star Wars: The Force Awakens is killing it at the box office, but that’s not stopping many new films opening this holiday weekend and a few of them are really fantastic!

So many film openings and so little time to see them. Here’s my list in order of my preference, Joy, The Revenant, Concussion, The Hateful Eight, Point Break, and Daddy’s Home.

Joy

Jennifer Lawrence has officially become one of my favorite actors; she carries this movie all the way. The film is intense, funny, and emotional. It shows how family and enterprise dynamics work or not in the world of unforgiving commerce.

The other stars are Edgar Ramírez, Robert De Niro, Virginia Madsen, Bradley Cooper, and Isabella Rossellini who all give some great performances. Directed by David O. Russell (American Hustle, Silver Linings Playbook) who as directed Lawrence, Cooper and De Niro together before.

The Revenant

The Revenant is a beautiful and intense film to watch, directed and produced by academy award winner Alejandro González Iñárritu with a cast that includes Leonardo DiCaprio, Tom Hardy, Domhnall Gleeson, Lukas Haas, Forrest Goodluck, and Will Poulter. Iñárritu and Mark L. Smith did the screenplay, based in part on the novel by Michael Punke. And beautiful cinematography by Emmanuel Lubezki who shot the film with the new Arri Alexa 65 camera that allowed the Oscar winner to shoot with available light.

Iñárritu

I came across an NPR interview that Mandalit del Barco did with Iñárritu, who talked about the making of the film. It’s a good listen.

Concussion

Is a dramatic thriller based on the incredible true David vs. Goliath story of American immigrant Dr. Bennet Omalu (Will Smith), a brilliant forensic neuropathologist who made the first discovery of CTE, a football-related brain trauma, in a pro player and fought for the truth to be known.

Smith gives a great performance and keeps us watching.

The other stars are Alec Baldwin, Albert Brooks, Gugu Mbatha-Raw, Eddie Marsan, Luke Wilson, Hill Harper, and Paul Reiser.

The Hateful Eight

If you are familiar with Tarantino’s films, you know he loves dialogue. He knows his actors and how to get great performances out of them. The film is beautifully shot in Ultra Panavision 70, which was last used in 1966 on the film Khartoum.

Hateful 8

The one draw back of the film is its length; it’s over three hours (187mins) long that included a 12 minute intermission.

We sat in on a press conference with director Quentin Tarantino and actors Samuel L. Jackson, Kurt Russell, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Walton Goggins, Tim Roth, Bruce Dern, Demián Bichir, Michael Madsen, and Channing Tatum, listen in on the conversation, just click on the audio button.

Point Break

Edgar Ramírez (Bodhi) in Point Break, which is inspired by the classic 1991 hit. This version is quite high tech and they used some amazing extreme athletes in the film.

The film is about thrill-seeking criminals performing a series of daredevil stunts to steal money and gems, only to give it away to the poor and less fortunate. Who are infiltrated by an FBI, young recruit played by Luke Bracey (Johnny Utah).

The rest of the cast includes Ray Winstone, Matias Varela, Clemens Schick, and Teresa Palmer. Directed by Ericson Core.

Daddy’s Home

Something for the family, Daddy’s Home follows a mild-mannered radio executive (Will Ferrell) who strives to become the best step dad to his wife’s two children, but complications ensue when their freewheeling and freeloading real father (Mark Wahlberg) arrives, forcing him to compete for the affection of the kids.

Other stars include Linda Cardellini and Thomas Haden Church.