Box Office Bae

We all know the biggest movies coming out this summer. Your Guardians of The Galaxies, Wonder Woman, and Alien: Covenants are already here or just about. They look great and will hopefully live up to the hype (or maybe not), but what’s great about this summer’s slate of movies is that we’re seeing so many great movies that aren’t your huge tentpoles. Summer is now when some of the high-concept, original, and just plain weird movies are unleashed. Below is a breakdown of my 10 favorite movies for this summer, a few blockbusters, but mostly the movies that give me hope for the future of cinema.

Dunkirk

Starting things off with the newest Christopher Nolan action movie about the evacuation of Allied soldiers from the French shore during World War II. This is his first movie since 2014’s meh sci-fi time travel movie Interstellar, and I’m hopeful that a more coherent plot and a decked out list of Britain's best actors (And Harry Styles?!) will give us one of the best movies of the year. In theaters July 21st

A Ghost Story

There was a rumor last year that a movie was coming out in which Casey Affleck (Manchester By The Sea) plays a dead man who haunts his wife while wearing a white sheet with eye holes. This is that movie. It looks a lot better than a basic reading of that plot suggests. Rooney Mara (Carol) plays the wife he tries to reconnect with from the dead. The movie seems to explore time and loss in a way that we haven’t yet seen, with some awards potential that could realize itself after release. In theaters July 7th

The Little Hours

Let’s face it, Aubrey Plaza is the comedic actress of our generation. She can do no wrong, especially this movie based on a 14th century novel about nuns gone wild. The supporting cast is stacked with comedy’s biggest names right now, which makes it even better. Molly Shannon (SNL), Allison Brie (Community), and Kate Micucci (Garfunkel & Oates) play fellow sex-crazed nuns with even fouler mouths. In theaters June 30th

Detroit

it’s been 5 years since Kathryn Bigelow and Mark Boal’s last movie, Zero Dark Thirty, which is frankly 5 years too long for me. These two are masters of suspense and tightly edited war-zone imagery, this time taking on a war zone on this side of the world. We’re also getting to see John Boyega (Star Wars) and Hannah Murray (Game of Thrones) in something totally different for them, and that is the ultimate treat. In theaters August 4th

Baby Driver

Edgar Wright is the king of the high-concept genre movie (Sean of The Dead, Hot Fuzz, Scott Pilgrim Vs. The World), and now he’s taking on the Bank Robbery genre with Baby Driver, about a young getaway car driver named Baby. All the trailers are very fun and it has the potential to be one of the breakout action movies of the year for Ansel Elgort (The Fault In Our Stars) and Lily James (Cinderella). In theaters June 28th

Spider Man: Homecoming

Third time must be the charm. Spidey’s back, with a not 30-year-old Peter Parker and the pedigree of Marvel Studios behind it for the first time ever. I’m so stoked for this, it looks like it could be the Spider-man movie we’ve always wanted and more-or-less deserve after Sony kept trying and failing to do it themselves. British actor Tom Holland (The Lost City of Z) is putting on the red and blue spandex, and he’s really the reason that I'm so excited for this movie. He’s only 20 and he has the sarcasm, wit, and intelligence needed to bring Peter Parker to the screen properly this time. In theaters July 7th

Atomic Blonde

Charlize Theron is now our best female action star in Hollywood and I’m LIVING for it. She plays an MI6 agent in Cold War-era Berlin trying to recover a list of double-agents after it was stolen. The plot seems pretty regular for this kind of fake James Bond type movie, but the action scenes look awesome and seeing Charlize Theron do everything Daniel Craig has done but backwards and in pumps should make for a fun time. James McAvoy (X-Men) and Sofia Boutella (Kingsman) also star. In theaters July 28th

Ingrid Goes West

I don’t know how many times I can compliment Aubrey Plaza, but here we go again.She’s still playing a mentally unhinged woman, but this time in present day Los Angeles where she stalks and tries to befriend a socialite she follows on Instagram. This is the movie I’m most hyped to see this summer, with one of the more enticing teaser trailers I’ve laid eyes on this year. In theaters August 4th

The House

Will Ferrell and Amy Poehler are together again and I couldn’t be happier. This time, they’re playing a husband and wife that decide to open an illegal casino in their basement to pay for their daughter’s college tuition. This kind of movie has been made before, but I don’t know if they’ve ever looked quite as funny as this does. In theaters June 30th

It Comes At Night

Finishing off with the contender for the creepiest movie of 2017. The world is under attack by an unseen cataclysm, and a family in the middle of the woods is joined by a couple of strangers that risk their safety. That’s all I know and that’s all I want to know until I get to see this in theaters. Joel Edgerton (Loving), Christopher Abbott (Girls), and Riley Keough (American Honey) star in what I’m really hoping will be the movie to scare me shitless this summer. In theaters June 9th