While many fans are content to stay at home during the hottest months of the year, the best movies of 2024 so far are going to theaters rather than direct to streaming. And if you don’t want to wait months to see some of this year’s biggest hits, then you’re just going to have go out and have a movie night.
To help you keep track of the best new movies coming to theaters in 2024, we’ve laid out the top choices from the next three months’ worth of films, which will take us almost through the summer. And each week, we’ll be adding more movies from 2024 as we get closer to the summer.
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May 2024
The Strangers: Chapter 1
Release date: May 17
Renny Harlin has had some ups and downs over his four decades in Hollywood, from the highs of Die Hard 2 to helming Cutthroat Island, one of the biggest flops of all time. For The Strangers: Chapter 1, Harlin returned to his horror roots and shot an entire trilogy in 52 days.
The first chapter focuses on Ryan (Froy Gutierrez) and Maya (Madelaine Petsch), a couple that’s about to experience some Airbnb horror when their isolated cabin is attacked by three masked individuals who will stop at nothing to kill them. How this is going to stretch into two more movies is anyone’s guess.
The Garfield Movie
Release date: May 24
Hollywood, take note: There are other actors besides Chris Pratt. The leading voice of The Super Mario Bros. Movie is now the new voice of Garfield, the world’s most famous comic strip cat who isn’t named Heathcliff. In this reboot, Garfield meets his father, Vic (Samuel L. Jackson), for the very first time before getting swept up in a heist alongside his faithful canine companion, Odie.
Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga
Release date: May 24
Anya Taylor-Joy reportedly only has 30 lines in the entirety of Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga. So she’ll just have to let her actions speak louder than words as she comes after Warlord Dementus (Chris Hemsworth), the man who stole Furiosa from her family. You can expect to see a glimpse of Mad Max, but this is Furiosa’s origin from start to finish.
Robot Dreams
Release date: May 31
Strangely enough, Robot Dreams was nominated for Best Animated Feature at this year’s Oscars even though it didn’t get a theatrical release in the U.S. until this year. This may not be an animated film for very young fans, as there’s no dialogue.
The story follows Dog, an anthropomorphic canine who is chronically lonely. The cure to Dog’s dilemma is Robot, a companion he literally puts together. Their bond is adorable, but once they’re separated, it’s an open question if they can come back together.
Young Woman and the Sea
Release date: May 31
Since the final weekend of May doesn’t have many new movies of note, Daisy Ridley’s new period flick, Young Woman and the Sea, actually has a good chance of doing well at the box office — assuming it’s not crowded out by Furiosa and The Garfield Movie. Ridley plays Trudy Ederle, a young woman who attempts to swim the English Channel.
June 2024
Bad Boys: Ride or Die
Release date: June 7
Mike Lowrey (Will Smith) and Marcus Burnett (Martin Lawrence) have been putting criminals behind bars for three decades. But in Bad Boys: Ride or Die, Mike and Marcus find themselves on the wrong side of the law after being framed by a master criminal. They’re going to have to watch their backs and protect their families while trying to clear their names.
The Watchers
Release date: June 14
M. Night Shyamalan‘s daughter, Ishana Night Shyamalan, is making her directorial debut with The Watchers. Here’s hoping that she didn’t inherit her father’s bad habit of relying on twist endings. Dakota Fanning stars in the film as Mina, a young woman who comes across a seemingly idyllic forest in Ireland.
Unfortunately for Mina, once she arrives, she can’t easily leave because enigmatic creatures surround the area at night. Three strangers, played by Georgina Campbell, Oliver Finnegan, and Olwen Fouéré, are stuck alongside Mina. Now, Mina has to wonder whether she can trust her new companions.
Inside Out 2
Release date: June 14
Disney would very much like to print money. And maybe it will with Inside Out 2, the sequel to one of Pixar’s best, most successful original movies. Although as a sequel, it’s now just regular IP. As before, a good deal of the movie takes place inside the mind of Riley Andersen (Kensington Tallman), a teenager who has no idea that her emotions are anthropomorphized beings that control her responses.
Now that she’s older, Riley is experiencing even more complex emotions, as embodied by Anxiety (Stranger Things season 5 star Maya Hawke), Envy (Ayo Edebiri), Boredom (Passages star Adèle Exarchopoulos), and Embarrassment (Paul Walter Hauser). Joy (Amy Poehler) is probably already freaking out.
The Bikeriders
Release date: June 21
Jodie Comer’s new drama, The Bikeriders, may be a surprise sleeper hit at the box office this summer. Comer’s character, Kathy, provides the perspective as she witnesses a motorcycle club called The Vandals slowly transform over the course of the 1960s from a social group of bikers into a feared group of outlaws played by Austin Butler (Dune: Part Two), Tom Hardy, Michael Shannon, Mike Faist (Challengers), Norman Reedus, and Boyd Holbrook.
Fancy Dance
Release date: June 21
Killers of the Flower Moon‘s Lily Gladstone is back this summer in Fancy Dance, an original movie produced by Apple Studios that will get a theatrical release. Gladstone will portray Jax, a woman who is taking care of her niece, Roki (Isabel Deroy-Olson), because her sister is missing. Jax and Roki want to stay together, while Roki’s grandfather, Frank (Shea Wigham), wants sole custody of his granddaughter. The only solution that Jax and Roki see is to find Roki’s mother, if they can.
Kinds of Kindness
Release date: June 21
Yorgos Lanthimos, stop being weird. The director of Poor Things has a follow-up film that has a confusing premise. As far as we can tell, almost every member of the cast is playing three different characters from separate anthology stories. At the very least, Lanthimos didn’t have any trouble attracting A-list talent, including Poor Things stars Emma Stone and Willem Dafoe, as well as Jesse Plemons, Margaret Qualley, and Hong Chau.
A Quiet Place: Day One
Release date: June 27
Now this is more like it: A summer release that’s both a sci-fi film and a horror story. A Quiet Place: Day One acts as a prequel to the first two films by showing what happened when the aliens invaded New York City. In just a short period of time, a city of millions is cut down to just a handful of survivors, including Sam (Lupita Nyong’o) and Eric (Joseph Quinn).
They’ve both smart enough to realize that the aliens can only hear them. Yet that knowledge may not be enough to save them when New York City is sealed off from the rest of the state.
Horizon: An American Saga
Release date: June 28
Kevin Costner really loves Westerns. So much so that he put up his own money to write, direct, and star in Horizon: An American Saga, which will hopefully play out over the course of four movies. Only two of the films have already been shot, and both are coming out this year.
Story details are still a bit hard to come by, but Costner is playing a man who is leading a group of settlers west so they can build new lives for themselves after the Civil War.
July 2024
Despicable Me 4
Release date: July 5
It’s been seven years since the last Despicable Me movie, and the Minions have since launched a film franchise of their own. But everybody is back together this summer for Despicable Me 4.
This time, Gru (Steve Carell) and his family have new adversaries: Maxine Le Mal (Will Ferrell) and Valentina (Sofia Vergara). Unfortunately for Gru, he badly underestimated his foes, and the family will have to stay one step ahead of these latest villains.
MaXXXine
Release date: July 5
Mia Goth returns as Maxine Minx in MaXXXine, the sequel to X and Pearl. This time, the film is set in Los Angeles in 1985, as Maxine finally takes a real shot at achieving her dreams of stardom. However, Maxine hasn’t lost her talent for attracting big trouble, and she will have to contend with the Night Stalker.
Director Ti West has put together an impressive cast that includes Giancarlo Esposito, Bobby Cannavale, Michelle Monaghan, and Elizabeth Debicki to close out his trilogy of terror.
Fly Me To The Moon
Release date: July 12
Fly Me To the Moon gets points for originality if nothing else. How many other romantic comedies get to play off the race to put a man on the moon in the ’60s? Channing Tatum plays Cole Davis, the man in charge of NASA’s moon landing project, while Scarlett Johansson portrays Kelly Jones, a marketing specialist who crafts NASA’s public image. Somewhere along the way, they fall in love.
Twisters
Release date: July 19
Twister was not really a film that needed a sequel 28 years later, but when has that ever stopped Hollywood before? Twisters has cast the new Superman, David Corenswet, to star alongside Daisy Edgar-Jones, Glen Powell, and Anthony Ramos as the latest generation of storm chasers. Together, they go looking for trouble – and they’re gonna find it.
Deadpool & Wolverine
Release date: July 26
If anything is going to break Marvel’s box office slump, it’s Deadpool & Wolverine. Getting Hugh Jackman to reprise his role as Wolverine after two decades of X-Men movies was just the boost that the film formerly known as Deadpool 3 needed. Ryan Reynolds practically willed this movie to happen, and it’s Marvel’s best defense against superhero fatigue.
As for the plot, who cares?! It’s got Deadpool and Wolverine beating each other up before teaming up to fight the villain. That’s good enough for us.
August 2024
Harold and the Purple Crayon
Release date: August 2
There have been plenty of children’s’ books that have been turned into movies, but Harold and the Purple Crayon may be the first that’s actually a sequel to the book that inspired it. Zachary Levi (Shazam! Power of the Gods) plays Harold, a guy who lived his entire life in a book making his dreams come true with his magical purple crayon. Now, Harold has used the crayon to enter the real world, and he became a real man in the process. Harold has a lot to learn about being an adult, but his magic crayon still works in this world.
Trap
Release date: August 9
M. Night Shyamalan is back with a new movie this summer called Trap. Oppenheimer‘s Josh Hartnett plays Cooper, a man who brings his daughter, Riley (Ariel Donoghue), to see Lady Raven in concert. Think of Lady Raven as Taylor Swift on a much smaller scale. But after arriving with his daughter in tow, Cooper realizes that the entire concert is a trap to lure a serial killer called The Butcher into police custody.
And since Cooper is The Butcher, the real question is how far he’s willing to go to escape now that he’s sealed in with his daughter and thousands of unsuspecting music fans.
Borderlands
Release date: August 9
August is usually where the summer movies wind down a month early. Director Eli Roth (Thanksgiving) is looking to buck that trend with his adaptation of the Borderlands video games. Cate Blanchett leads the cast as Lilith, the leader of an intergalactic group of mercenaries that includes Roland (Kevin Hart), Kreig (Florian Munteanu), Tiny Tina (Barbie‘s Ariana Greenblatt), Tannis (Jamie Lee Curtis), and Claptrap (Jack Black). If this reminds you of Guardians of the Galaxy, it’s not a coincidence.
It Ends With Us
Release date: August 9
Not every romance is a fairy tale. That’s a lesson that Lily Bloom (Blake Lively) learns the hard way in this adaptation of Colleen Hoover’s bestselling novel. Lily thought she found the man of her dreams in Ryle Kincaid (Justin Baldoni). Ryle’s a surgeon, he’s handsome, and he’s fabulously rich. Unfortunately for Lily, Ryle is also abusive toward her. Now, Lily will have to summon the strength to leave Ryle behind, if she can.
Alien: Romulus
Release date: August 16
We’ll all be screaming in space when the Alien franchise revisits its horror roots in Alien: Romulus. All we’ve seen so far is a teaser trailer that even makes the face huggers scary. We can only imagine what director Fede Álvarez is going to do with the xenomorphs themselves as he unleashes the lethal aliens on a young cast that includes Cailee Spaeny, Isabela Merced, Archie Renaux, and David Jonsson.
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