Amazon Fall Movie/TV Preview: Woody Allen and Todd Haynes Highlight A Strong Season

Director: Mike White
Starring: Ben Stiller, Jenna Fischer, Michael Sheen
Release date: September 15th

It feels strange, given what an authorial stamp Mike White has had on the movies he’s written (School of Rock, The Good Girl, Chuck & Buck), that he’s only ever directed one feature film, 2007’s Year of the Dog. He’s back with his second this fall with Brad’s Status, in which Ben Stiller plays the dad of a teenage boy who’s going out to interview at colleges (Harvard, in this case), which sends Stiller’s character on a downward spiral of anxiety about how his own life has turned out. White’s scripts have always boasted a dark edge, but ever since he did Enlightened on HBO, there’s also been a prominent streak of humanity in them. If it delivers on the promise of the trailer, Stiller could have his best role in years.

Director: Todd Haynes
Starring: Julianne Moore, Michelle Williams, Oakes Fegley, Millicent Simmonds
Release date: October 20th

Todd Haynes’s last movie, 2015’s Carol, was essentially perfect, so he’s got a lot to live up to here with Wonderstruck. When it premiered at Cannes back in May, the reviews were great (99% on Rotten Tomatoes), but still somewhat more muted than the Carol reception. So it will be interesting to see what happens when the film makes it to the States (it will play as the centerpiece selection at the New York Film Festival on October 7th). The story itself is a whimsical and child-centric story about a boy in the 1970s (Fegley) who runs away to New York City, and an alternate timeline in the ’20s where a young girl (Simmonds) runs away, also to New York. Moore plays an actress who the young girl idolizes. Haynes’s career has been defined by bold style in service, very often, of repressed characters. With Wonderstruck, it sounds like he’s moving towards something more exuberantly open, which ought to be fascinating to see.

Director: Richard Linklater
Starring: Steve Carell, Bryan Cranston, Laurence Fishburne
Release date: November 3rd

Richard Linklater remains one of our most eclectic movie directors. Hopping from genres to styles and back again, Linklater remains impossible to pin down. After the Oscar breakthrough for his long-gestating Boyhood in 2014, Linklater followed up with the pure-pleasure college bro-down Everybody Wants Some!! The great thing about Linklater is that wherever he hops, the results are (usually) great. Which gives a lot of hope for Last Flag Flying, which promises to be a sentimental but hopefully well-earned story about a trio of war veterans who reunite to help bury the son of one of them, who died in military service of his own. Carell plays the father, Cranston the showy, rambunctious role that, from the trailer, feels Bradley-Cooper-in-The-Hangover-but-old, and Fishburne the reluctant pastor. It’s a very TV cast, with Carell and Cranston both getting famous on the small screen, though ironically Fishburne’s been a regular on two TV series since the last time Carell or Cranston were on one. This one will open the New York Film Festival on September 28th, which says there are some Oscar hopes for either the film or performances, so lots of eyeball will be on this one.

Director: Woody Allen
Starring: Kate Winslet, Justin Timberlake, Juno Temple, Jim Belushi
Release date: December 1st

Woody Allen is a director whose films are either big-deal Oscar contenders or else bits of fluff that are entertaining to varying degrees. Blue Jasmine in 2013: serious Oscar contender. Magic in the Moonlight (bleh), Irrational Man (boo), and Cafe Society (quite lovely) were all fluff to one degree or another. Wonder Wheel looks like something we’ll have to keep in mind for the Oscar race. Nobody’s seen it yet, but it’s closing the New York Film Festival on October 15th, and then opening in the award-friendly month of December. Perhaps we could be looking at a Best Actress nomination for Kate Winslet (it’d be her first in that category since she won for The Reader). Not much is known about the plot yet, except that it is set in the 1950s at Coney Island.

Director: Lynne Ramsay
Starring: Joaquin Phoenix, Ekaternine Samsonov
Release date: TBA

Counting her 1999 debut Ratcatcher in 1999, Lynne Ramsay has only directed three feature films, including Movern Callar and We Need to Talk About Kevin. That does not include Jane Got a Gun, the Natalie Portman movie that Ramsay was fired from/walked away from in 2013, a controversy that put a dark cloud over Ramsay as an artist. Which is why You Were Never Really Here is such an intriguing prospect, pairing her with a famously uncompromising artist like Joaquin Phoenix. The story is about a brutal enforcer (Phoenix) who is set on a mission to rescue an abducted young girl. The film was hailed as powerful and gripping when it premiered in Cannes in May. It has yet to receive a release date for 2017.

Tig Notaro’s semi-autobiographical TV series returns for its second season with Tig making herself at home in Mississippi, while her brother and step-father also try to move on with their lives. Guest stars in season 2 include Notaro’s real-life wife Stephanie Allynne, as well as Sheryl Lee Ralph as a love interest for Bill. There is also a scene that mirrors some of the alleged sexual misconduct that have been rumored about Louis C.K. for some time now, which if nothing else should get people talking.

Release Date: September 8

Stream One Mississippi on Amazon Prime.

After a stellar third season (one that somehow failed to impress Emmy voters, but whatever), Transparent picks up with season 4 as the Pfeffermans are still searching for whatever it is that’s going to make them happy, or at least a good deal less fucked up than they are now. Here’s what we can glean from the trailer: Sarah (Amy Landecker) ends up tumbling into a threesome with her ex-husband Len (Rob Huebel) and a character played by Alia Shawkat; Shelly (Judith Light) looks like she’s maybe taking an improv class, and she’s definitely having a romantic relationship with a submarine sandwich; Alli (Gaby Hoffmann) gives Maura (Jeffrey Tambor) and weed gummi bear; and the Pfeffermans take a trip to Israel.

Release Date: September 22nd

Stream Transparent on Amazon Prime.

Amazon’s acclaimed series about backstage intrigue at the New York Symphony will be back this fall for its fourth season. Gael Garcia Bernal will be back as Rodrigo De Souza, brash orchestra conductor and classical music “rock star.” As will Lola Kirke as emergent oboist Hailey. This season, the show will benefit from guest stars like Michael Emerson (Emmy winner for Lost) and Masi Oka (Emmy nominee for Heroes), so if nothing else, Mozart in the Jungle will benefit from the hottest TV stars of 2007.

Release Date: December 8th

Stream Mozart in the Jungle on Amazon Prime.

The Man in the High Castle is set to return with their third season to a very different America than the last time they premiered a season. It’s not as drastically different as what’s depicted on the show, an America where the Nazis and Japanese won World War II, but still, depictions of an America besieged by Nazis and under threat of nuclear bombs is less the stuff of pure historical fiction here in the fall of 2017. It will be very interesting to see if this adds up to more press and attention for the series or if audiences will end up fleeing for something less … plausibly catastrophic.

Release Date: TBA

Stream The Man in the High Castle on Amazon Prime.

Red Oaks has been underrated and under the radar since the day its first season debuted in October of 2015. Season 2 premiered in November of 2016. So it seems logical to assume that the show’s third and final season will arrive around the fall of 2017. It’ll be a shame to see the show go — any comedy that boasts a stable of directors including David Gordon Green, Hal Hartley, Gregg Araki, and Amy Heckerling is to be celebrated — but knowing that season 3 will be its last ought to give the show some confidence and freedom to end things on their own terms.

Release Date: TBA

Stream Red Oaks on Amazon Prime.

Hollywood meta stories about washed-up actors continuing to coast on their fame are so hot right now. Or have we not convinced you of the merits of Episodes yet? In Jean-Claude Van Johnson, action star Jean-Claude Van Damme plays a heightened version of himself as a washed-up action star whose real career is as a deadly spy. Sounds fun, yes? Sounds more fun when you know the supporting cast includes Isla Fisher as his love interest and Phylicia Rashad as Jean-Claude’s agent.

Decider’s review of the pilot said, “…the central story of the pilot is fun and allows JC to show off his fierce moves while refusing to take himself too seriously. There are also enough Van Damme references and cameos to make any fan of the actor’s happy.” Jean-Claude Van Johnson‘s pilot was picked up for a series order at the same time as The Tick and I Love Dick, both of which have already premiered their first seasons, so JCVJ feels overdue.

Release Date: TBA

Watch the Jean-Claude Van Johnson pilot on Amazon Prime.