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Holiday Movies 2018: All Creatures Great and Small

Eddie Redmayne’s Newt Scamander has more than wayward creatures on his mind in “Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald.” Credit...Warner Bros.

Here is a highly select list of noteworthy films due this season. Release dates are subject to change.

THE FRONT RUNNER Just in time for the midterm elections, Hugh Jackman plays the Democratic presidential candidate Gary Hart in Jason Reitman’s film about the end of his 1988 candidacy in the wake of reports suggesting that he had an affair with Donna Rice (Sara Paxton). Vera Farmiga and J.K. Simmons co-star. The journalist and former New York Times Magazine writer Matt Bai is one of the screenwriters, adapting his own book.

NARCISSISTER ORGAN PLAYER The performance artist Narcissister writes and directs this deconstruction of herself — that is, of her art, her background and the pivotal influence of her mother.

THE BALLAD OF BUSTER SCRUGGS In a six-part anthology film, the Coen brothers apply their sardonic wit and world-weary outlook to several different flavors of western: Tim Blake Nelson stars in a violent riff on a Gene Autry musical; James Franco tries his hand at bank robbing in Sergio Leone country; Zoe Kazan appears in what is, amazingly, her second wagon train picture (after “Meek’s Cutoff”); and Tom Waits steals the show in a Jack London adaptation.

CHEF FLYNN Cameron Yates directs this portrait of Flynn McGarry, who became a celebrity chef as a teenager.

DR. SEUSS’ THE GRINCH

Dr. Seuss’ curmudgeon

Who tries Christmas to snatch

Returns in cartoon form

Voiced by Benedict Cumberbatch.

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Malena Villa as Marisol and Lorenzo Ferro in “El Angel.”Credit...The Orchard

EL ANGEL In a splashy style perhaps influenced by one of its producers, Pedro Almodóvar, the director Luis Ortega recounts the crime spree of the serial killer Carlos Robledo Puch (Lorenzo Ferro), who has been called Argentina’s longest-serving prisoner.

FAIL STATE Sporting the imprimatur of Dan Rather, this documentary is an exposé of the for-profit college industry.

THE GIRL IN THE SPIDER’S WEB A long way from Buckingham Palace, Claire Foy (“The Crown”) takes over for Rooney Mara and Noomi Rapace as the leather-clad, tatted avenger Lisbeth Salander, in the first film adapted from a book by David Lagercrantz, who continued the series begun by Stieg Larsson. Sverrir Gudnason, Lakeith Stanfield, Vicky Krieps (“Phantom Thread”) and Claes Bang (“The Square”) also star. Fede Alvarez (“Don’t Breathe”) directed.

HERE AND NOW In a film with structural similarities to Agnès Varda’s “Cléo From 5 to 7,” Sarah Jessica Parker plays a singer who is trailed over the 24 hours after she receives a dire diagnosis. Common co-stars.

IN A RELATIONSHIP Just as things get complicated between a couple played by Emma Roberts and Michael Angarano, her cousin (Dree Hemingway) and his friend (Patrick Gibson) change their status to something, well, less complicated.

LEZ BOMB Jenna Laurenzo writes, directs and stars in this comedy about a woman who tries to bring her girlfriend (Caitlin Mehner) to Thanksgiving and come out, in roughly that order. Brandon Michael Hall, Kevin Pollak and Deirdre O’Connell co-star.

THE LONG DUMB ROAD Tony Revolori (the trainee bellhop in “The Grand Budapest Hotel”) stars as a 19-year-old who’s bound for California on a road trip and gains a friend and traveling companion (Jason Mantzoukas) when his car breaks down. Hannah Fidell directed.

THE NEW ROMANTIC Jessica Barden plays a college senior who begins dating a sugar daddy as research for the school paper.

OUTLAW KING David Mackenzie (“Hell or High Water”) directs this epic about Robert the Bruce, an outlaw who became the king of Scotland (and was previously seen in “Braveheart”). The film has been edited since it opened the Toronto International Film Festival, where the reaction seemed largely focused on the undraping of its star, Chris Pine. With Aaron Taylor-Johnson and Florence Pugh.

OVERLORD Jovan Adepo plays an American soldier who, as D-Day nears, is dropped into occupied France. He encounters creatures engineered in a Nazi lab. J.J. Abrams is one of the producers.

THE OWL’S LEGACY This 1989 television series from Chris Marker (being shown here as a film) looks at how the inventions of ancient Greece have reverberated through the modern world. Each of 13 chapters begins with a Greek-derived word.

PIMP Keke Palmer, in what has to count as a huge about-face from her star-making role in “Akeelah and the Bee,” plays a pimp who rises in a cutthroat world. Christine Crokos wrote and directed.

POSTCARDS FROM LONDON After more than 20 years away, the New Queer Cinema director Steve McLean (“Postcards From America”) returns to moviemaking with this film starring Harris Dickinson (“Beach Rats”) as a young man who falls in with a group of London escorts.

THEY FIGHT Based on a Washington Post article, this documentary follows a youth sports program in Washington, D.C., that’s intended to get teenagers off the streets by introducing them to boxing.

TIME FREAK Eager to fix a relationship that fell apart, a physicist (Asa Butterfield) goes back in time to make some tweaks. Sophie Turner plays the object of his affection — and course correction. The writer-director, Andrew Bowler, expanded this feature from a short.

WEIGHTLESS Alessandro Nivola plays an isolated, socially maladroit loner who, having largely abandoned society, is reunited with a son. Julianne Nicholson and Johnny Knoxville — yes, of “Jackass” fame — co-star.

SHOAH: FOUR SISTERS Claude Lanzmann, who died in July, carved four short movies out of interviews he shot for the making of his monumental “Shoah” (1985). Each focuses on testimony from a different female Holocaust survivor. In the longest, the harrowing “The Hippocratic Oath,” Ruth Elias, a Czechoslovakian Jew, remembers being pregnant at Auschwitz and having Josef Mengele as her physician.

JINN A teenager in Los Angeles (Zoe Renee) finds her confusion about her identity thrown into relief when her mother (Simone Missick) converts to Islam. Reviews from South by Southwest were strong. Nijla Mu’min wrote and directed.

THE WILD BOYS In Bertrand Mandico’s oddball feature, the wild boys of the title — teenagers sentenced to an island — turn into women after eating magical fruit. They’re played by women from the get-go, though. With Elina Lowensohn as a doctor who has also undergone the transformation.

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Willem Dafoe as Vincent van Gogh in his final days.Credit...Lily Gavin/CBS Films

AT ETERNITY’S GATE Drawing on his own eye as a painter, Julian Schnabel tries to give audiences a sense of how Vincent van Gogh saw the world. Stepping into a role inhabited onscreen by Kirk Douglas, Tim Roth and Martin Scorsese, among others, Willem Dafoe plays the Dutch painter during a period of productivity and — in this telling — apparent madness in France. With Oscar Isaac as Paul Gauguin and Rupert Friend as Theo Van Gogh.

THE CLOVEHITCH KILLER In a Hitchcockian premise (specifically, what sounds like a spin on his “Suspicion”), a teenager (Charlie Plummer) starts to suspect his father, a scout leader, could be a serial killer.

FANTASTIC BEASTS: THE CRIMES OF GRINDELWALD In the continuing expansion of J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potter universe, the dastardly Grindelwald (Johnny Depp) has escaped capture, and Newt Scamander (Eddie Redmayne) signs on to help catch him at the behest of a young Dumbledore (Jude Law, joining the series).

55 STEPS Bille August directed this story about a hospitalized psychiatric patient (Helena Bonham Carter) who agrees to let a patients’ rights lawyer (Hilary Swank) represent her.

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Mark Wahlberg, left, Rose Byrne, Gustavo Quiroz, Isabela Moner and Julianna Gamiz in “Instant Family.”Credit...Hopper Stone/Paramount Pictures

INSTANT FAMILY Mark Wahlberg and Rose Byrne play a couple who adopt three foster siblings in a dramedy that draws on the experiences of Sean Anders, the director. Isabela Moner, Octavia Spencer, Tig Notaro and Margo Martindale also star.

JONATHAN Did you think “Dead Ringers” was kinky? Thanks to the wonders of science, two brothers (both played by Ansel Elgort) are forced to share one body. Taking turns works well enough — until they both fall for Suki Waterhouse.

THE LAST RACE Warmly received at Sundance, Michael Dweck’s documentary looks at the operations and culture of Riverhead Raceway, the last stock-car racing site on Long Island, as the couple who own it contemplate its future.

MISS DALÍ Ventura Pons directs this biopic about the artist’s relationship with his younger sister (played, at different ages, by Sian Phillips and Eulalia Ballart), who influenced his art.

MOBILE HOMES Vladimir de Fontenay’s feature stars Imogen Poots as a single, homeless mother who hustles to get by with her 8-year-old son.

OF FATHERS AND SONS A prizewinner at Sundance, the director Talal Derki’s documentary follows two boys and their family, a radical jihadist household.

SPEED KILLS John Travolta gets a chance to rebound from “Gotti” by playing a speedboat champion who uses his boats as a ferry service for a lucrative drug-smuggling operation. All it needs is one positive review.

UNDER THE WIRE The war correspondent Marie Colvin — played by Rosamund Pike in the current biopic “A Private War” — was killed in Homs, Syria, in 2012. Retracing how she covered the conflict that took her life, this documentary views the story through the eyes of the photographer Paul Conroy, who wrote a memoir of the same title about his experiences working with Colvin.

WELCOME HOME A couple (Aaron Paul and Emily Ratajkowski) making a concerted effort to jump-start their flagging romance with an Italian vacation run into trouble when a handsome neighbor comes a-calling. Any number of ominous possible scenarios present themselves. George Ratliff (“Joshua”) directed.

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Viola Davis as one of the title “Widows.”Credit...Merrick Morton/20th Century Fox

WIDOWS A team of Chicago criminals’ bereaved wives (Viola Davis, Michelle Rodriguez and Elizabeth Debicki) forge a tentative alliance to execute the heist that their husbands never got to pull off. Updating a British TV production, the director, Steve McQueen (“12 Years a Slave”) and his co-screenwriter, Gillian Flynn (“Gone Girl”), have more than just the caper on their minds; the story comments on police brutality and the city’s machine politics. The cast is all-star even on the margins, with Cynthia Erivo, Colin Farrell, Brian Tyree Henry, Liam Neeson, Daniel Kaluuya and Robert Duvall.

CREED II “Rocky” got its sequels, and so now does “Creed.” Michael B. Jordan returns as Adonis Creed (son of Carl Weathers’s Apollo) and Sylvester Stallone, now 72, returns as the Italian Stallion, Adonis’s mentor. Tessa Thompson is also back. Steven Caple Jr. takes over directing duties from Ryan Coogler (“Black Panther”).

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Michael B. Jordan is back in the ring as Adonis Creed with, from left, Jacob ‘Stitch’ Duran, Sylvester Stallone and Wood Harris.Credit...Barry Wetcher/MGM and Warner Bros.

GREEN BOOK Peter Farrelly (who with Bobby Farrelly, his brother, is responsible for “There’s Something About Mary” and other sweet-gross comedies) makes his solo directing debut with this drama about the friendship between the African-American pianist Don Shirley (Mahershala Ali) and his white driver (Viggo Mortensen) during a tour of the Deep South in 1962. It was a huge crowd-pleaser at the Toronto Film Festival and probably will be everywhere else, too.

¡LAS SANDINISTAS! Jenny Murray’s documentary focuses on the women who fought with the Sandinistas in Nicaragua and their advocacy for reform.

RALPH BREAKS THE INTERNET Only a bad take or a good meme can break the internet. But Ralph (John C. Reilly) and Vanellope (Sarah Silverman) of “Wreck-It Ralph” try in a sequel that finds them mixing it up with new characters from across the web. Gal Gadot, Jack McBrayer and Taraji P. Henson also lend their voices.

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Ralph (John C. Reilly), Yesss (Taraji P. Henson), center, and Vanellope (Sarah Silverman) in “Ralph Breaks the Internet.” Credit...Disney

ROBIN HOOD You think it’s too soon to reboot Robin Hood, seen on screen, in the form of Russell Crowe, as recently as 2010? Nonsense: Hollywood should keep giving to poor moviegoers until it gets this legend right. In a version that looks to have a slight martial-arts tinge, Taron Egerton stars as Robin of Loxley, Eve Hewson plays Marian, and Jamie Foxx plays Little John.

ROMA Alfonso Cuarón’s first Mexican feature since “Y Tu Mamá También” takes its title from a neighborhood in Mexico City and revolves around the housekeeper (Yalitza Aparicio) for a middle-class family. But a plot description doesn’t do justice to this rapturously received, semi-autobiographical movie, shot in widescreen black-and-white that demands to be seen on the big screen.

THE WORLD BEFORE YOUR FEET Matt Green has been walking every block of New York City. His story is told in this documentary.

BECOMING ASTRID Astrid is Astrid Lindgren, the creator of Pippi Longstocking, in this biopic starring Alba August as the author in her late teens and early 20s, though played later in life by Maria Fahl Vikander, mother of the Oscar-winning Alicia Vikander.

THE FAVOURITE Yorgos Lanthimos (“The Lobster”) brings his absurdist wit to an 18th-century period piece — a dark comedy about cousins (Rachel Weisz and Emma Stone) who compete for the favor of Queen Anne (Olivia Colman). It’s been a festival favourite in Venice and New York.

INVISIBLE HANDS Charles Ferguson (“Inside Job”) produced this documentary on how child labor is involved in the supply chains of major industries like food and clothing.

SHOPLIFTERS Hirokazu Kore-eda’s poignant drama, which won the Palme d’Or at Cannes in May, concerns a family of petty thieves who take in a young girl.

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Lily Franky, left, and Jyo Kairi in “Shoplifters.”Credit...Magnolia Pictures

WRITE WHEN YOU GET WORK Stacy Cochran (the Winona Ryder movie “Boys”) directs an indie whose trailer has serious 1996 vibes. Rachel Keller stars as a prep school employee who re-encounters a man from her past (Finn Wittrock).

RAMS Gary Hustwit, who made viewers aware of the ubiquity of Helvetica, reveals the artistry of Dieter Rams, a designer known for his invisible, “functionalist” work. Brian Eno wrote the score.

ANNA AND THE APOCALYPSE If teenage romance and an evil headmaster weren’t trouble enough, high schoolers suddenly find themselves besieged by zombies over the Christmas season. Oh, and it’s a musical — by turns fun and sad. The project was the brainchild of the Scottish filmmaker Ryan McHenry, who died at 27 of bone cancer. His friends and collaborators worked to bring it to fruition.

BLOOD BROTHER The singer Trey Songz stars as a police officer whose old friend (Jack Kesy), just released from prison, seeks revenge on him and others, thinking he was the fall guy for their crime.

DRIVERX Patrick Fabian spent the most recent season of “Better Call Saul” trying to keep himself from falling apart. In this movie, he plays someone who’s partway there — an unemployed Los Angeles man who turns to driving for a rideshare service to make ends meet. Will it be “Taxi Driver” for the Uber era?

ELECTRO-PYTHAGORAS (A PORTRAIT OF MARTIN BARTLETT) Bartlett was an underheralded Canadian composer who experimented with handmade electronics. This tribute — itself an experimental work — takes its cues from him.

ELLIOT: THE LITTLEST REINDEER Blitzen is retiring, which means there’s an opening for a miniature horse who wants to do a reindeer’s job. It’s animated; Josh Hutcherson and Samantha Bee provide two of the voices.

HAPPY AS LAZZARO Alice Rohrwacher’s movie won a screenplay prize at Cannes. Said to be inspired by a real-life Italian incident, it begins by immersing viewers in life at an isolated estate that has continued the outlawed practice of sharecropping. Through her protagonist (Adriano Tardiolo), Ms. Rohrwacher blends in elements of the story of Lazarus.

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Stephan James and KiKi Layne play lovers in 1970s New York in “If Beale Street Could Talk.”Credit...Tatum Mangus/Annapurna Pictures

IF BEALE STREET COULD TALK Two years after his best-picture-winning “Moonlight,” Barry Jenkins is back with this adaptation of James Baldwin’s 1974 novel, focused on a young couple in Harlem, Tish (KiKi Layne) and Fonny (Stephan James), and what happens when Fonny is wrongfully accused of a rape. It’s a poetic character-driven piece, about race, love and coping.

THE MAN WHO MENDS WOMEN This documentary follows the work of Denis Mukwege, the Congolese gynecological surgeon who won the Nobel Peace Prize this year and has become internationally known for “repairing” women who were raped.

THE MERCY Colin Firth plays Donald Crowhurst, a real-life British sailor who in 1968 set off on a race to circumnavigate the globe solo. Rachel Weisz also stars. James Marsh (“The Theory of Everything”) directed.

MIRAI A boy jealous of his infant sister meets her as a time-traveling teenager in this anime feature from Mamoru Hosoda.

NEVER LOOK AWAY Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck, whose “The Lives of Others” won a foreign-language Oscar, directs this three-hour-plus historical drama, which follows a German artist (Tom Schilling) over three decades, from the Nazi era through life in divided Germany. The character was inspired by the painter Gerhard Richter.

PEOPLE’S REPUBLIC OF DESIRE Hao Wu’s documentary explores the nature of online fame by looking primarily at two livestreamers who became internet phenoms in China. It won the top documentary prize at South by Southwest.

THE POSSESSION OF HANNAH GRACE A woman (Shay Mitchell) working in a morgue has to deal with a body that’s been disfigured — and that may still be possessed.

SICILIAN GHOST STORY A girl who is in love with a missing boy — an abduction reportedly based on a real-life Mafia kidnapping — searches for him in this film from Fabio Grassadonia and Antonio Piazza (the festival favorite “Salvo”), who spin headlines into a tale of the fantastic.

UNITED SKATES Shown at Tribeca earlier this year, Dyana Winkler and Tina Brown’s documentary examines African-American roller-rink traditions across the country. As rinks close, their loss is slowly extinguishing a skating culture that fed into hip-hop.

THE CHARMER Milad Alami’s film — a suspense piece, of sorts — centers on an Iranian in Denmark who is seeking a woman to marry so that he can remain there. The clock is ticking.

TYREL At Sundance, Sebastián Silva’s movie drew comparisons to “Get Out.” Jason Mitchell plays a man who travels to upstate New York for a birthday party — and discovers that he’ll be the only African-American there for the whole weekend.

CLARA’S GHOST For her feature writing and directing debut, the comedy scion Bridey Elliott — the daughter of Chris Elliott and the granddaughter of Bob and Ray — casts her parents and her sister (Abby Elliott) in a movie about a dysfunctional family. Mom (Paula Niedert Elliott), in particular, has issues, which include interacting with a ghost.

THE GREAT PRETENDER A French playwright (Maëlle Poésy) writes about her fraught relationship, then falls in love with the lead actor (Keith Poulson), with whom the lead actress (Esther Garrel) is in love. The workhorse indie filmmaker Nathan Silver (“Thirst Street”) directed.

ASHER Ron Perlman plays an ex-Mossad agent who confronts demons from his past. Famke Janssen co-stars; Michael Caton-Jones (“Basic Instinct 2”) directed.

BACK ROADS The actor Alex Pettyfer (“I Am Number Four”) makes his directorial debut and stars as a young man raising his siblings; his mother (Juliette Lewis) is in prison for killing his father.

BE NATURAL: THE UNTOLD STORY OF ALICE GUY-BLACHÉ Jodie Foster narrates this documentary about the woman who is widely considered the first female filmmaker. She began directing movies in 1896.

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Julia Roberts and Lucas Hedges are a mother and addict son in “Ben Is Back.”Credit...Mark Schafer/LD Entertainment, Lionsgate, and Roadside Attractions

BEN IS BACK Peter Hedges, who already tackled Thanksgiving in “Pieces of April,” directs his son Lucas Hedges in the role of a 19-year-old drug addict who comes home for Christmas. His mother (Julia Roberts) fears he won’t restrain himself for long.

BERNIE THE DOLPHIN Two siblings hatch a plan to release a dolphin that once saved the sister’s life and is now in captivity.

DIVIDE AND CONQUER: THE STORY OF ROGER AILES Alexis Bloom (“Bright Lights: Starring Carrie Fisher and Debbie Reynolds”) directs this look at the career of Roger Ailes, the longtime chairman and chief executive of Fox News. The documentary examines how he shaped politics and journalism before he was ousted in 2016 after a sexual harassment scandal.

DUMPLIN’ Danielle Macdonald (“Patti Cake$”) plays a Texas teenager of size who signs up for a beauty pageant to make a point about double standards. Dolly Parton made original recordings for the soundtrack.

THE INVISIBLES Claus Räfle’s film focuses on four Jews who survived the Holocaust hiding in Berlin, the capital of the Nazi regime.

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With Jack Lowden, left, Saoirse Ronan is the title character in “Mary Queen of Scots.”Credit...Liam Daniel/Focus Features

MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS Saoirse Ronan is Mary Stuart, who as queen of Scotland laid claim to the English throne, occupied by Elizabeth I (Margot Robbie). No spoilers on which one was ultimately beheaded. The screenplay is by Beau Willimon, who knows a thing or two about these sorts of machinations from “House of Cards.” Josie Rourke directed.

THE PARTY’S JUST BEGINNING In a confident, thorny feature directorial debut, Karen Gillan (“Doctor Who,” “Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle”) stars as a self-destructive 24-year-old in Inverness, Scotland.

SWIMMING WITH MEN Rob Brydon (Steve Coogan’s sparring partner in the “Trip” movies) joins a group of synchronized swimmers who eventually decide to compete to be world champions.

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Natalie Portman goes pop in “Vox Lux.”Credit...Neon

VOX LUX The actor turned director Brady Corbet’s stylish and troubling movie sketches a tenuous parallel between a pop star’s rise and moments of headline-grabbing violence. Opening in 1999, it follows the creation — “genesis,” to use the term in the film — of a singer who as a teenager (Raffey Cassidy) survives a Columbine-like school shooting and then becomes a nationwide celebrity after performing at a memorial service. Once the movie jumps forward in time, she is played by Natalie Portman. Sia wrote the original songs; Jude Law and Stacy Martin also star.

BIRD BOX Based on the book by Josh Malerman, Susanne Bier’s film stars Sandra Bullock as a mother who must lead her children to safety — without being able to see. Trevante Rhodes, Sarah Paulson and John Malkovich also star.

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Boluwatife Treasure Bankole, left, and Zain Al Rafeea in Nadine Labaki’s “Capernaum.”Credit...Fares Sokhon/Sony Pictures Classics

CAPERNAUM In Nadine Labaki’s drama, which won a prize at Cannes, a 12-year-old is suing his parents in court in Lebanon. Through flashbacks to his childhood in the direst poverty, we find out why.

DEAD SOULS Wang Bing (“’Til Madness Do Us Part”) is known for making arduous but rewarding documentaries. “Dead Souls” — which runs more than eight hours — has already garnered comparisons to “Shoah.” The film presents the testimonies of a group of survivors of Chinese re-education camps, sent there in a 1957 purge by the Communist Party.

THE HOUSE THAT JACK BUILT Seven years after being declared persona non grata at Cannes, Lars von Trier returned to the festival this year to poke the organizers in the eye. Clearly designed to provoke outrage, the film stars Matt Dillon as a serial killer. His murder spree is presented as a sort of allegory for von Trier’s body of work, movies that detractors say revel in cruelty toward women (“Dancer in the Dark,” “Dogville”). Uma Thurman and Riley Keough play two of the victims.

THE INSUFFERABLE GROO That would be Stephen Groo, a quixotic, no-budget filmmaker who improbably cast Jack Black in a movie.

KHRUSTALYOV, MY CAR! A longtime favorite of champions of the Russian director Aleksei German (1938-2013), this bleak, vulgar and suffocating-by-design 1998 period piece is only now getting a formal release. A brain surgeon is caught up in a real-life purge of Jewish physicians — then returned to Moscow to attend Stalin on his deathbed.

LOTS OF KIDS, A MONKEY AND A CASTLE A Spanish matriarch saved — among other objects — two bones from her great-grandmother. Unfortunately, she also lost them. The search for the missing bones, and the deep dive into the family’s history that comes with it, is the subject of this lighthearted documentary.

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Hera Hilmar plays one of the urban denizens of “Mortal Engines.”Credit...Universal Pictures/Mrc

MORTAL ENGINES Peter Jackson, Fran Walsh and Philippa Boyens — the screenwriting team of “Lord of the Rings” — go seriously “Mad Max” with this adaptation of the first book in a series by Philip Reeve, which takes place in a dystopian world where major cities have wheels and pick on smaller cities. Basically, Earth has become “Monster Trucks.” Christian Rivers, a longtime storyboard and effects artist for Jackson, directed.

THE MULE The idea of Clint Eastwood, who is now 88, playing a drug courier may seem far-fetched, but it shouldn’t: This star’s second directorial feature this year — and first major acting role in six years — is based on a New York Times Magazine article about a real-life mule for the Sinaloa cartel. Nick Schenk, the screenwriter of Eastwood’s “Gran Torino,” did the script. Bradley Cooper co-stars.

NEVER-ENDING MAN: HAYAO MIYAZAKI This documentary focuses on the beloved and recently un-retired animator (“Spirited Away”) as he makes a short using computer-generated animation instead of his famous hand-drawn work.

THE QUAKE San Francisco? Los Angeles? Tokyo? Nope, Oslo: Kristoffer Joner (the bad guy who got punked by Wolf Blitzer in “Mission: Impossible — Fallout”) warns of impending spikes on the Richter scale in Norway.

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Peter Parker (Jake Johnson), Gwen Stacy (Hailee Steinfeld) and Miles Morales (Shameik Moore) are all Spidey in “Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse.”Credit...Sony Pictures Animation

SPIDER-MAN: INTO THE SPIDER-VERSE This umpteenth Spider-Man reboot actually tries something different: It’s animated, from a script by Phil Lord (who directed “The Lego Movie” with Christopher Miller), and it has a new angle: A teenager, Miles Morales (voiced by Shameik Moore), becomes a trainee Spider-Man under the tutelage of Peter Parker (Jake Johnson) This installment adds some diversity to the series — Morales is black and Latino — and there are multiple Spider-Persons, including Gwen Stacy (Hailee Steinfeld).

THAT WAY MADNESS LIES … Sandra Luckow directs a documentary that examines what it perceives as flaws in the mental-health care system, looking at it through the story of her brother, who refused treatment.

MARY POPPINS RETURNS First Christopher Robin grew up. Now the children from “Mary Poppins” need revisiting from their old nanny, who has magically transformed into Emily Blunt. Lin Manuel-Miranda, playing a lamplighter, could probably sing a killer “Chim Chim Cher-ee.” Dick Van Dyke appears as well. Rob Marshall, whose track record with screen musicals includes “Chicago” and “Nine,” directed.

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Jason Momoa to the rescue in “Aquaman.”Credit...Warner Bros./DC Comics

AQUAMAN The DC Comics movie universe doubles back from “Justice League” to give Aquaman — half-human, half-scion of Atlantis — a movie of his own. Jason Momoa definitely has a bit of that Poseidon look going. With Amber Heard. James Wan directed.

AVICII: TRUE STORIES This documentary looks at the career of Tim Bergling, known professionally as Avicii, the Swedish electronic dance music producer, D.J. and songwriter who died at 28 in April of an apparent suicide.

BETWEEN WORLDS Nicolas Cage already starred in one bereavement-themed fantasia this year, “Mandy.” In this new movie, he tries to help a woman (Franka Potente) whose daughter is in a coma. The daughter wakes up, which would seem joyous — were she not also possessed by the spirit of the Cage character’s dead wife.

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Hailee Steinfeld and her car, er robot Bumblebee.Credit...Hasbro

BUMBLEBEE Has the “Transformers” series finally turned its attention to human characters? This spinoff involves a teenager (Hailee Steinfeld) who finds out that her beat-up VW bug transforms into the robot Bumblebee. Travis Knight (“Kubo and the Two Strings”) directed.

COLD WAR In luscious black-and-white, the Polish director Pawel Pawlikowski (“Ida”) tells a story of love and estrangement involving a singer (Joanna Kulig) and a pianist (Tomasz Kot), as they separate and reunite on both sides of the Iron Curtain over 15 years.

THE LAST RESORT This documentary looks back to the 1970s, when Miami Beach was (even more of) a haven for Jewish retirees, helped by the work of two photographers who captured the scene.

SECOND ACT Jennifer Lopez plays a woman who is hired for a high-powered Madison Avenue job after someone gives her online identity a makeover — with significant embellishments. Leah Remini, Vanessa Hudgens and Milo Ventimiglia co-star.

WELCOME TO MARWEN Making the case for Robert Zemeckis as an auteur, Dave Kehr, writing in The New York Times in 2000, noted that his recent films had “all focused, quite movingly, on a single theme — emotionally isolated characters who try to break out by inventing relationships with imaginary beings.” So it’s only logical that he would gravitate to the story of the outsider artist Mark Hogancamp (Steve Carell), who, having suffered brain damage in an assault, began making a model of a fictional World War II-era town and cast himself as a war hero. Leslie Mann and Janelle Monáe co-star in a production that also showcases the director’s digital wizardry.

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Felicity Jones as Ruth Bader Ginsburg in “On the Basis of Sex.”Credit...Jonathan Wenk/Focus Features

DESTROYER Nicole Kidman puts in an uncharacteristically dark turn as a Southern California detective who returns to investigating the gang she went undercover to infiltrate years earlier. It’s as much a character study as it is a crime movie. Sebastian Stan and Tatiana Maslany also star. Karyn Kusama directed.

HOLMES & WATSON Nope, it’s not another entry in the Robert Downey Jr. series. Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson are played by Will Ferrell and John C. Reilly, and any parody is intentional. With Ralph Fiennes as Moriarty and Rebecca Hall. Etan Cohen directed.

ON THE BASIS OF SEX Felicity Jones plays Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg in her years as a lawyer fighting gender discrimination, a battle chronicled earlier this year in the hit documentary “RBG.” Armie Hammer plays her husband, Marty Ginsburg. Mimi Leder directed. The screenplay is by the justice’s nephew Daniel Stiepleman.

VICE Christian Bale has gone to extreme lengths to vanish into roles before. And although he is not fat or bald, he will become those things as Dick Cheney, whom he plays in this biopic from Adam McKay. On the basis of the trailer, Bale does an uncanny impression of the former vice president’s voice and cadences. Expect irreverence alongside pointed political commentary from the director of “The Big Short.” The casting is poised somewhere between Oscar bait and choices made on a dare: Amy Adams as Lynne Cheney. Steve Carell as Donald Rumsfeld. Tyler Perry as Colin Powell. Sam Rockwell as George W. Bush.

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Christian Bale suits up as Dick Cheney.Credit...Greig Fraser/Annapurna Pictures

STAN & OLLIE Not to be confused with “Holmes & Watson,” this month’s other duo movie starring John C. Reilly, this biopic finds Laurel (Steve Coogan) and Hardy (Reilly) late in their careers, touring Britain with a stage show in 1953. Nina Arianda and Shirley Henderson play their wives.

Compiled with the assistance of Sara Aridi.

A version of this article appears in print on  , Section AR, Page 40 of the New York edition with the headline: Holiday Movies 2018: All Creatures Great and Small. Order Reprints | Today’s Paper | Subscribe

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