Fall Features 

• 20th Century Studios

It's beginning to feel a lot like the Before Times. Cinema this autumn is chock full of popcorn entertainment, Oscar hopefuls (with some overlap between the two) and fun flicks for the whole family to enjoy over the holidays. (Releasedates are for theaters unless otherwise noted.)

Awards Bait: Expect plenty of awards-season love for Cate Blanchett in writer-director Todd Field's TÁR (Oct. 7), about a world-renowned classical conductor/composer. Lydia Tár is fictional, but Oscar loves a true story. Till (Oct. 14) is the story of Mamie Till-Mobley(Danielle Deadwyler) as she seeks justice for the lynching of her son, Emmett. She Said (Nov. 18) stars Carey Mulligan andZoe Kazan as the New York Times journalists who exposed Harvey Weinstein as a sexual predator.

Films spun from reality also include The Fabelmans (Nov. 23)—Steven Spielberg's semi-autobiographical coming-of-agedrama, starring Michelle Williams and Paul Dano as "his" parents—and Blonde(theaters Sept. 16; Netflix Sept. 28), with Ana de Armas as a fictionalized Marilyn Monroe, from Joyce Carol Oates's novel.

Oscar loves movies about movies, too. Empire of Light (Dec. 9), written and directed by SamMendes, is a romantic drama set in an old cinema in 1980s England, starring Olivia Colman and Colin Firth. La La Land'sDamien Chazelle returns to Tinseltown with Babylon (Dec. 25), a drama set during Hollywood's transition to "talkies;"Margot Robbie, Brad Pitt and Tobey Maguire star.

Comedies: The success of 2019's Knives Out seems to have kicked off a revival of murder-mystery comedies. In See HowThey Run (Sept. 16), Sam Rockwell and Saoirse Ronan team up to investigate the murder of Adrien Brody in 1950s London.David O. Russell's Amsterdam (Oct. 7) gives us Margot Robbie, Christian Bale and John David Washington as friends racing to solve a murder they've been wrongly accused of. Finally, there's Glass Onion (theaters Nov.TBA; Netflix Dec. 23), another star-studded case from the files of Daniel Craig's Knives Out hero Benoit Blanc.

Exotic travel goes darkly funny in The Menu (Nov. 18), a black-comedy horror about a couple (Anya Taylor-Joy andNicholas Hoult) who sign up for a destination culinary experience dished up by an enigmatic chef (Ralph Fiennes). The funny is more of the anti-rom-com type in Ticket to Paradise (Oct. 21), with George Clooney andJulia Roberts as bickering exes out to sabotage their daughter's wedding.

Cult comedy gets its due this autumn. Weird: The Al Yankovic Story (Roku Nov. 7) sends up biopics, with Daniel Radcliffein the semi-fictionalized life story of the polka-playing pop parodist. And holiday perennial A Christmas Story gets a1970s-set sequel in A Christmas Story Christmas (HBO Max Nov. 17); Peter Billingsley returns as an adult Ralphie giving hisown kids a special Christmas.

Action: James Cameron returns to Pandora in the long-awaited Avatar: The Way of Water (Dec. 16), butmostly, Black power rules fall action. Gina Prince-Bythewood directs Viola Davis as The Woman King (Sept.16), a historical epic set around the all-female warriors defending a 19th-century African kingdom. Dwayne Johnson is DCComics' Black Adam (Oct. 21), who got his powers from Egyptian gods in ancient times. And in Black Panther: WakandaForever (Nov. 11), the leaders of the fictional African nation face the aftermath of the death of their king, T'Challa.

Spooky Stuff: Psychological suspense drips from Don't Worry Darling (Sept. 23), in which Florence Pugh's sojourn with husband Harry Stylesin a 1950s experimental utopian community comes with sinister undertones. Halloween Ends (theaters/Peacock Oct. 14), the13th installment of the long-running slasher franchise, pits Jamie Lee Curtis against hockey-fan Michael Myers again. In HocusPocus 2 (Disney+ Sept. 30), Bette Midler, Sarah Jessica Parker and Kathy Najimy are up to no good again as the witchy Sanderson sisters.

Family Fare: Disney's offerings include Strange World (Nov. 23), an animated sci-fi adventure about a family of humanexplorers on an alien planet, and Pinocchio (Disney+ Sep 8), starring Tom Hanks as Geppetto in the latest live-actionreboot of an animated classic. Guillermo del Toro's Pinocchio (theaters Nov. TBA; Netflix Dec. 9) is definitely not a Disneyfilm; the stop-motion-animated reimagining is set in 1930s Fascist Italy, for a "darker" take on thetraditional tale.

More kiddie tales retold: Roald Dahl's Matilda the Musical (theaters Dec. 9; Netflix Dec. 25) stars Emma Thompson as Miss Trunchbull. And in Puss in Boots: The Last Wish (Dec. 21), Antonio Banderas returns ofthe voice of the swashbuckling cat—who is now down to his ninth life.