It’s not a long weekend in South Africa, but with loads of people taking off the Monday to capitalise on Tuesday’s public holiday, it may as well be. Movie distributors seem to be in holiday-thinking mode as well because there are four new films hitting the big screen tomorrow.
This is in addition to hour-long South African documentary Don’t Be late For My Funeral, about the impact of a retired domestic worker and nanny; as well as slapstick comedy classic The Naked Gun, which is back as part of Ster Kinekor’s Throwback Cinema offering.
As for the four new features, it’s time to learn about them all below.
A thriller with a difference, Bad Genius centres on Lynn (Callina Liang), the daughter of immigrants, and a scholarship student at a prestigious high school. With her academic capabilities, Lynn becomes a central figure in a cheating ring to help students with their exams, and challenge a rigged college admissions system. Also starring Benedict Wong and Jabari Banks, Bad Genius is based on the record-breaking 2017 Thai film of the same name.
Look out for our Bad Genius review soon.
People who love dark crime comedies with an ensemble cast should definitely have Greedy People on their radar. In the process of cleaning up an accidental murder on their part, small town cops Will (Himesh Patel) and Terry (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) uncover one million dollars and decide to keep it. Bad decisions snowball, other quirky locals become involved, and things get even more chaotic. Also with Lily James and Tim Blake Nelson.
Halle Berry headlines in Never Let Go, the latest horror thriller from The Hills Have Eyes and Crawl’s Alexandre Aja. The world as we know it has ended, and a mother and her twin sons have to stay tethered to their remote cabin home whenever they leave to forage for supplies. However, when one of the boys starts to question if the evil is real, family bonds are severed and a battle for survival begins.
Animated adventure The Wild Robot arrives on a wave of buzz and critical acclaim. Based on Peter Brown’s bestseller, and led by the creative team behind How To Train Your Dragon, DreamWorks Animation’s latest effort follows a robot (voiced by Lupita Nyong’o) that is shipwrecked on an uninhabited island and must learn to adapt, gradually building relationships with the local animals and caring for an orphaned gosling. Also with the voices of Pedro Pascal, Catherine O’Hara and many more.