Last week in trailers: Wonder women and wheels

It’s South by Southwest time and the world of trailers is booming. It doesn’t matter if you like Charlize Theron, action or Charlize Theron action — there’s something in this list for everybody. So sit back, relax, and let’s get stoked for the future of cinema.

Baby Driver

Critics have been raving about Edgar Wright’s Baby Driver, a film that premiered this weekend at South by Southwest.

“A talented, young getaway driver (Ansel Elgort) relies on the beat of his personal soundtrack to be the best in the game. When he meets the girl of his dreams (Lily James), Baby sees a chance to ditch his criminal life and make a clean getaway. But after being coerced into working for a crime boss (Kevin Spacey), he must face the music when a doomed heist threatens his life, love and freedom,” the description reads.

And while Dirty Dancing may be intolerable because the protagonist’s name is Baby, I get the feeling this film’s dope soundtrack and vibrant visuals will be enough to ignore every time someone refers to Ansel Elgort as “Baby.”

Baby Driver is in cinemas on 11 August.

The Fate of the Furious

This franchise really knows how to up the ante.

The Fate of the Furious talks about family and love for about one third of this trailer, and the other time is spent controlling every car in the entire world. Charlize Theron has joined the franchise as a cyber terrorist who can control anyone’s car, eventually turning the trailer into one big Mad Max on ice.

What it lacks in brains it makes up for in muscle — and, let’s be honest with ourselves, that’s the only reason we’re watching these films.

The eighth installment in the Cars live-action franchise [lol – ed] is due out 14 April.

Atomic Blonde

Atomic Blonde looks set to be a “James Bond, but as a woman” scenario that boasts Charlize Theron playing a bisexual lead — probably because viewers aren’t ready to see men objectified as much as Bond women are.

I’d be stoked if the lesbian love interest wasn’t obviously created for the male gaze and didn’t take up a whole ten seconds of screen time. But, hey, in the world of bisexual representation you take what you can get.

The comment section is going crazy about feminism taking over the world, though, so at least the film is doing some good.

Catch Atomic Blonde in cinemas 28 July.

Rough Night

Speaking of feminism taking over the world, here’s another film making dudes living in their moms’ basements angry.

Rough Night seems to be an all-women version of Very Bad Things, in which a bachelorette party goes very, very wrong.

“Five best friends from college (played by Scarlett Johansson, Kate McKinnon, Jillian Bell, Ilana Glazer, and Zoë Kravitz) reunite 10 years later for a wild bachelorette weekend in Miami. Their hard partying takes a hilariously dark turn when they accidentally kill a male stripper. Amidst the craziness of trying to cover it up, they’re ultimately brought closer together when it matters most,” the description reads.

From the writers of Broad City comes a film that stars Kate McKinnon and Zoe Kravitz, and really, what more do you need?

Watch it in theatres 16 June.

The Get Down

Rumours may have circulated that Netflix’s The Get Down had been cancelled, but the second season’s trailer is here to shut them up once and for all.

“A mythic saga of dreams, desire, soul and sound, The Get Down chronicles the epic musical evolution from disco to hip hop that defined 1970s New York City – as told by the relationships, struggles, triumphs, and artistry of the South Bronx teens who saw it through.”

Baz Luhrmann’s series has received generally positive reviews, but it was overshadowed last year by other Netflix original Stranger Things.

They aren’t making the same mistake twice, and this year The Get Down is premiering on 7 April, months before Stranger Things is released in October.

The Handmaid’s Tale

Based on Margaret Atwood’s eponymous bestseller, The Handmaid’s Tale is a Hulu series about a future America in which a totalitarian theocracy is in power.

“As one of the few remaining fertile women, Offred (Elisabeth Moss) is a Handmaid in the Commander’s household, one of the caste of women forced into sexual servitude as a last desperate attempt to repopulate the world. In this terrifying society, Offred must navigate between Commanders, their cruel Wives, domestic Marthas, and her fellow Handmaids – where anyone could be a spy for Gilead – all with one goal: to survive and find the daughter that was taken from her,” reads the synopsis.

The show premieres 26 April.

Lady Macbeth

Lady Macbeth doesn’t tell the story of Shakespeare’s famous manipulator, but instead is a loose adaption of Nikolai Leskov’s novella Lady Macbeth of the Mtsensk District.

The lesser-known story details the life of a young woman sold into marriage.

“Katherine (Florence Pugh) is stifled by her loveless marriage to a bitter man twice her age, and his cold, unforgiving family. When she embarks on a passionate affair with a young worker on her husband’s estate, a force is unleashed inside her so powerful that she will stop at nothing to get what she wants,” the description reads.

The trailer is remarkable — the visuals are astounding, the score entrancing. It may not be for everyone, but it looks like it does what it sets out to do with style and careful restraint.

Live Cargo

Live Cargo is yet another film that has premiered at film festivals to critical acclaim.

“After an unspeakable tragedy, grieving couple Nadine (Dree Hemingway, ‘While We’re Young’) and Lewis (Lakeith Stanfield, ‘Get Out’) retreat to a remote island in the Bahamas where Nadine grew up vacationing. They’re soon caught up in an ongoing conflict between Roy (Robert Wisdom, ‘The Wire’), the island’s ageing patriarch, and Doughboy, a dangerous human trafficker using stolen boats to transport Haitians to the US.”

The film was shot entirely in black and white and looks to be a thoughtful piece about the fallibility of human beings.

It’s out in cinemas on 31 March.

Wonder Woman

What a week for women.

It’s not very often that a superhero passes the Bechdel test (or even the Sexy Lamp test, for that matter), so when only the trailer passes them, it’s time to pop bottles.

DC’s next origin movie in the run-up to Justice League — its answer to The Avengers — stars the wonderful Gal Godot as the Amazonian demigoddess in Wonder Woman. 

Everyone in the trailer’s comments section is praying for DC to make a good movie, but considering the trainwrecks that were Batman v Superman and Suicide Squad, I would even settle for an average movie at this point.

Wonder Woman hits theatres on 2 June.