Tenzing
Premiere Date: in select theaters October 9; on Apple TV starting October 16
Director: Jennifer Peedom
Noteworthy Cast: Tom Hiddleston, Genden Phunstock, Caitríona Balfe, Willem Dafoe
Based on a true story, the film chronicles Tenzing Norgay, a Himalayan mountain climber who, alongside New Zealander Edmund Hillary (Tom Hiddleston), became the first person to summit Mount Everest. This is an old-school adventure film with stunning cinematography, told from the point of view of a lesser-known figure. The film’s core tension is between the British climbing team and the native Sherpas, who view the mountain as a spiritual being. The film will have its Canadian premiere at the Toronto Film Festival, followed by a small theatrical release and a streaming debut on Apple TV. —J.R.
Misty Green
Premiere Date: October 9
Director: Chris Rock
Noteworthy Cast: Adam Driver, Daniel Kaluuya, Anna Kendrick, Topher Grace, Chris Rock, Rosalind Eleazar
Slow Horses star Rosalind Eleazar plays the titular Misty Green, an award-winning actress caught wrestling with the fickle entertainment industry and attempting a comeback after reconnecting with her former agent. While the British Eleazar is better known across the pond, she’s surrounded by a cast of A-listers including Adam Driver, Anna Kendrick, Topher Grace, Oscar-winner Daniel Kaluuya, and even Chris Rock himself. Misty Green marks Rock’s first return to the director’s chair since his critically acclaimed Top 5 (2014), which also satirized the entertainment industry. Like Top 5, Rock wrote the screenplay for Misty Green, so expect sharp insights into his decades in Hollywood. —C.M.
Poetic License
Premiere Date: October 16
Director: Maude Apatow
Noteworthy Cast: Leslie Mann, Cooper Hoffman, Andrew Barth Feldman, Nico Parker
Euphoria star Maude Apatow follows in her father Judd’s footsteps with her directorial debut, a charming comedy about a former therapist (played by Maude’s mom, Leslie Mann) who joins a college poetry class and befriends a pair of young men (Cooper Hoffman and Andrew Barth Feldman) who develop crushes on her. “It reminded me of all of the movies that I love, tonally,” Maude told me before the movie debuted at the Toronto Film Festival last year. “It felt sort of timeless, but very modern and sort of weird. I’m always attracted to strange, offbeat humor.” —R.F.
Sense and Sensibility
Premiere Date: October 16
Director: Georgia Oakley
Noteworthy Cast: Daisy Edgar-Jones, Esmé Creed-Miles, Caitríona Balfe, George MacKay, Fiona Shaw
There won’t ever be an adaptation of Jane Austen’s 1811 classic that can outdo Ang Lee’s Oscar-winning 1995 version. Still, this new take on Sense and Sensibility is a charming, sweeping adaptation with a very strong cast. Daisy Edgar-Jones is dynamic as Elinor Dashwood, but it’s Esmé Creed-Miles who really shines as her sister Marianne. Creed-Miles, the daughter of Samantha Morton, seems to have inherited much of her mother’s talent: expect this performance to be a star-making moment for her. —R.F.
