Django Unchained: Peter Bradshaw gave Quentin Tarantino’s slavery-era blaxploitation flick five stars earlier this month, which bodes well (especially as he handed out just one to Inglourious Basterds). Christoph Waltz and Jamie Foxx play bounty hunters traveling the US, searching for Foxx’s wife, who’s in the ownership of dastardly Leonardo DiCaprio. A turn by Samuel L Jackson has been warmly received; Tarantino’s own cameo a little less so.Photograph: Andrew Cooper, SMPSP/APDon Jon's Addiction: Joseph Gordon-Levitt had four films out last season (The Dark Knight Rises, Premium Rush, Looper and Lincoln). But here’s where his heart is: a directorial debut (which he also scripted) about a ladykilling porn-addict’s attempt to become less selfish. Levitt takes the title role, as a modern-day Don Juan. Scarlett Johansson, Julianne Moore and - hooray! - Tony Danza co starPhotograph: PRThe Double: Richard Ayoade and Jesse Eisenberg were both Men of 2010; the former for directorial debut Submarine, the latter for his lead in The Social Network. This adaptation of the Dostoevsky novella, shot in Belfast, directed by Ayoade and co-written by him and Avi Korine, stars Eisenberg as a man haunted by a mysterious doppelganger. Submarine alumni Noah Taylor is part of a supporting cast that includes Wallace Shawn and Mia WasikowskaPhotograph: PREffie: Girl wonder Dakota Fanning (pictured on set) is John Ruskin’s child bride in this period drama from the pen of Emma Thompson (who co-stars, and whose husband, Greg Wise, plays Ruskin). Expect massive hats and big whiskers, liberally shared among the likes of Robbie Coltrane, Julie Walters, Derek Jacobi and - more unexpectedly - Claudia Cardinale. Thompson is a sparing screenwriter (save from Nanny McPhee, this is her first script since Sense and Sensibility); this looks likely to do well on both sides of the pond.Photograph: GettyElysium: Neill (District 9) Blomkamp’s latest sci-fi is starting to push the definition of “eagerly awaited”; footage first premiered at Comic Con last July. It’s set in the segregated society of 2159, where the wealthy have decamped to a pristine space station, while the rest struggle on overpopulated Earth. Jodie Foster is a hard-nosed immigration official; Matt Damon is an ex-cop in a spot of bother.Photograph: Columbia PicturesFlight: Denzel Washington has a good shot at sneaking off with the best actor Oscar this spring with his gatecrash-great turn as an alcoholic coke-head pilot who’s behind the controls when his plane crashes. But were the intoxicants to blame? And will the fact that he pulled off a miraculous crash land aid his case? Robert Zemeckis directs; there’s strong support from Kelly Reilly and John Goodman.Photograph: Allstar/PARAMOUNT PICTURES/Sportsphoto Ltd./AllstarFrank: What Richard Did is the latest highly-acclaimed film from Lenny Abrahamson (Garage, Adam and Joe). That’s out here at the start of the month; an autumn festival premiere hopefully awaits his followup, scripted by Jon Ronson, and featuring Michael Fassbender (pictured) as an enigmatic popstar. Rising tyke Domnhall Gleeson co-starsPhotograph: Alastair ThainFreezing People is Easy: It seems ages since Errol Morris’s last narrative film; this is a comedy drama about a man experimenting within the burgeoning field of cryogenics during the 1960s. The cast is a dream: Christopher Walken (pictured), Owen Wilson, Paul Rudd; the script is from Zach Helm, who wrote the sweet, tricksy Stranger than Fiction (2006)Photograph: Clint Spaulding/McMullan/Sipa USGangster Squad: Pushed to January from a slated autumn release and the subject of re-shoots following the Aurora cinema killings, this LA-set guns-and-girls 40s-set flick nonetheless looks stellar. Ryan Gosling and Emma Stone reunite after pairing up in Crazy Stupid Love; Sean Penn and Josh Brolin fill out the cast.Photograph: Wilson Webb/Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc.Gotti: In the Shadow of my Father: It’s had a sticky production history, but the mafia saga directed by Barry Levinson (pictured) finally slips into cinemas this year with John Travolta as John Gotti Snr, Ben Foster as his son and Al Pacino as “butcher’s assistant” Aniello Dellacroce. Levinson’s found footage eco drama The Bay (awarded five stars by David Cox at San Sebastian) would make a weird companion piece to Gotti, should both find UK release next year.Photograph: Christian Alminana/WireImage
