What’s Actually Getting Good Buzz? ‘Poor Things,’ ‘Saltburn’ and ‘All Of Us Strangers’

All throughout the summer I’ve been hearing whispers, here and there, about the upcoming fall movie slate, which has lowered my expectations about the amount of quality we might be getting at the September fests.

Word has so far been mixed on “Priscilla,” “Maestro,” “Ferrari,” “The Iron Claw,” “The Royal Hotel,” and “Dumb Money,” among others. Although, expecting for Mann to, at the very least, get decent notices for “Ferrari” — his fans love anything he does.

Alexander Payne’s “The Holdovers” is not playing at Venice and NYFF, it will however be at Telluride and TIFF. The term crowd-pleaser was mentioned a few times when it test screened a few months ago. Payne is coming off the critically panned “Downsizing.”

Meanwhile, Miyazaki’s “The Boy and the Heron” was released in Japan to polarized reviews. Some believe it to be a masterpiece, while others are not quite sure what to make of Miyazaki’s, supposed, swan song. TIFF CEO Cameron Bailey stated that, in a just world, the film would get Best Picture nominated.

Word is starting to trickle in about Yorgos Lanthimos’ “Poor Things.” It’s getting screened for exhibitors, publicists and others. I heard great things about it last night, although one person had previously told me, earlier in the summer, that they didn’t like it.

So, maybe we can expect polarized reviews for Lanthimos’ latest. One thing’s for sure, Emma Stone’s performance is said to be a major highlight. One person I spoke said “the performance completely floored me. It’s an outrageous tour-de-force, I’d be shocked if she doesn’t get nominated for an Oscar.”

If there’s one film that majorly won over test audiences earlier this year it’s Emerald Fennell’s “Saltburn.” However, we all know how test screenings don’t always qualify as the final word on a film’s quality. NYFF passed on “Saltburn,” and it seems like the kind of film that won’t win over high brow critics. I’m still expecting highly positive notices to come out of Telluride.

As for David Fincher’s “The Killer,” nobody really knows what to make of this film. A Venice programmer compared it to the great Jean-Pierre Melville’s films, but why is it only playing at Venice? Word is that Netflix isn’t really sure how to market it to Oscar voters, but that doesn’t mean much in terms of quality.

If there’s one film that I’d be eyeing this fall it’s Andrew Haigh’s “All Of Us Strangers.” The 50-year-old filmmaker, riding high off his last three critically-acclaimed films (“Weekend”, “45 Years,” “Lean on Pete”), has maybe made his best film. ‘Strangers! has been praised by the NYFF crowd and is said to be a hybrid of drama, romance and surrealism.

Finally, as far as the foreign titles go, there’s been good buzz for Betrand Bonello’s “The Beast,” Ryusuke Hamaguchi’s “Evil Does Not Exist,” Agnieszka Holland’s “Green Border,” Fien Troch’s “Holly” and Timm Kröger’s “The Theory of Everything.”