Top 5 Most Anticipated Films 2012

It's getting late to post this list, but I can honestly say that none of the movies released this year so far would have made it to the top 5 anyway. It's also usual that the best movies are released late in the year.

It's not only a good thing for a movie to be highly anticipated, because the audience will expect a great movie, therefore the risk of people being disappointed is high.

I will try to guess what I will rate each of the five movies in this list and when I have seen them all I will make a post where I follow up how it went, which will be sometime at the beginning of next year.

Nr. 5: Dark Shadows

Directed by: Tim Burton
Stars: Johnny Depp, Michelle Pfeiffer, Helena Bonham Carter
Genre: Comedy, Fantasy
Release date: 11 May

Tim Burton + Johnny Depp + Helena Bonham Carter. Sounds familiar? This is a vampire movie, which there aren't a shortage of nowadays, but I don't think this will be just another one of them.
Barbaras, played by Johnny Depp, is a rich, powerful man in the 18th century America. He breaks the heart of a witch, who curses him, makes him a vampire and buries him alive. He wakes up in 1972 and finds the world changed and his estate in ruins.

I think I will rate this: 7
Nothing really indicates that this will bad, but not much indicates that it will be great either. I think it will be a good movie, but maybe not a favorite. I'd say it will be a strong 7 or a weak 8.

Nr. 4: The Dark Knight Rises

Directed by: Christopher Nolan
Stars: The usual ones + Liam Neeson, Anne Hathaway, Tom Hardy, Marion Cotillard and Joseph Gordon-Lewitt
Genre: Action, Crime
Release date: 20 July

The movie itself is maybe not one of the personally most anticipated movies of the year, but I'm very curious to see what kind of respons this one will get. The Dark Knight is by many considered one of greatest movies ever, but I think many can agree that Heath Ledger's amazing performance as The Joker was the big reason behind that. Really interesting however to see how good the final entry in Nolan's Batman trilogy will be. Commercially it feels as if Christopher Nolan will never fail.

I think I will rate this: 8
I think it will be a degree lower than The Dark Knight and about as good as Batman Begins.

Nr. 3: Seven Psychopaths

Directed by: Martin McDonagh
Stars: Colin Farrell, Sam Rockwell, Christopher Walken, Woody Harrelson, Abbie Cornish
Genre: Comedy, Crime
Release date: Not decided but probably sometime late in 2012


The director of In Bruges returns this year with his second feature film. I think we can expect another crime/comedy with lots of black comedy and obviously lots of great actors.
In Bruges was so good that I will look forward to anything made by this director in the future, but honestly, McDonagh is in a tight spot where nothing less than great is expected of him.

I think I will rate this: 8
I don't think Seven Psychopaths will be even close to as good as In Bruges was, but I really hope so. It's hard to guess as Martin McDonagh is a new director, but this is what I believe.

Nr. 2: Django Unchained

Directed by: Quentin Tarantino
Stars: Leonardo Dicaprio, Jamie Foxx, Kurt Russell, Christoph Waltz, Samuel L. Jackson, Sacha Baron Cohen and more.
Genre: Western, Comedy
Release date: 25 December

Quentin Tarantino is a big fan of westerns, but he has never made a real western, only movies with western elements, so I guess this is something he has wanted to do for a while.
The Plot (taken from Wikipedia): Django (Jamie Foxx), a freed slave, treks across America with the German dentist turned bounty hunter Dr. King Schultz (Christoph Waltz), to retrieve Django's wife Broomhilda (Kerry Washington) from the charming but sadistic Francophile plantation owner Calvin Candie (Leonardo DiCaprio) and his entourage of ruthless slavers.

I think I will rate this: 9
I love westerns and I love Quentin Tarantino's movies, so I don't think it can go wrong. Also the actors are great and Tarantino always seems to get the best out of them.

Nr. 1: The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey

Directed by: Peter Jackson
Stars: Martin Freeman, Elijah Wood, Orlando Bloom, Cate Blanchett, Andy Serkis, Ian McKellen, Richard Armitage, Christopher Lee, Luke Evans and more.
Genre: Fantasy, Adventure
Release date: 14 December

The very long awaited prequel to The Lord of the Rings, about Bilbo Baggins joining a company of thirteen dwarves led by the legendary warrior, Thorin Oakenshield, to reclaim the lost Dwarf Kingdom of Erebor from the fearsome dragon Smaug.
I have read the first 40 pages of the book and I plan to read it before this movie is released, so it's going to be really interesting to compare them.


I think I will rate this: 10
I'm a big fan of this The Lord of the Rings and there's really nothing that indicates that this won't be great. It's such a huge production that it couldn't go wrong. I think I will rate this 10 or possibly a 9. Anything else would be a huge disappointment.


Other higly anticipated movies 2012: The Master, Gravity, Lincoln, Lawless*, Moonrise Kingdom, The Great Gatsby, The Impossible, Only God Forgives, Untitled Terrence Malick Project, Stoker, The Amazing Spider-Man, Prometheus.

* It seems as if there are going to be two big movies named Lawless released in the coming years, one 2012 and one 2013.

List of upcoming movies from known directors