Argo

How can no one have turned this true espionage story into a big-screen thriller already? In 1980 the CIA and the Canadian government conspired to rescue six American diplomats hidden in private homes after the student takeover of the U.S. embassy in Tehran. Their cover was a movie production unit shooting Iranian locations for a sci-fi epic called “Argo,” the fictitious office for which was assembled in LA by makeup legend John Chambers (the original Planet of the Apes), who had a clandestine career helping the Agency with disguises. The new movie is Ben Affleck’s third directorial effort, after the gripping Gone Baby Gone (2007) and The Town (2010); he plays Tony Mendez, who masterminded the effort, and the cast includes Bryan Cranston, Kyle Chandler, Alan Arkin, Clea DuVall, Chris Messina, and John Goodman (as Chambers). The story has plenty of action, and the weird meta-movie element is inherently rich; according to Mendez, before the fake production company was shut down in 1980, it received 25 scripts, including one from Steven Spielberg. Opens October 12. —J.R. Jones

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Holy Motors

Leos Carax (The Lovers on the Bridge, Pola X) is one of France’s true visionary filmmakers, having developed a unique form of cinematic poetry from elements of silent comedy, fantasy epics, and his own life. This digitally shot drama marks his first feature in 13 years, and I’ll be interested to see how Carax, who’s long displayed an affinity for early cinema, will engage with 21st-century moviemaking (he first tried his hand at digital cinema with his contribution to the 2008 omnibus film Tokyo). The loose narrative, reportedly his most abstract yet, follows an actor named Monsieur Oscar (played by the acrobatic Denis Lavant, Carax’s perennial alter ego) as he drifts from one identity to another over the course of a single night; the eclectic supporting cast includes Michel Piccoli, Eva Mendes, and pop star Kylie Minogue. If the movie’s Cannes premiere is any indication, Holy Motors is sure to polarize viewers. Opens November 9 at Music Box. —Ben Sachs

Killing Them Softly

With only two films—Chopper (2000), a pitch-black comedy about a career criminal, and the slick western The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford (2007)—Australian director Andrew Dominik has built quite a reputation for himself. He returns to theaters this fall with Killing Them Softly, a throwback to the gritty crime dramas of John Flynn (The Outfit, Rolling Thunder) and Don Siegel (Dirty Harry, Charley Varrick). Adapted from the George V. Higgins novel Cogan’s Trade (1974), the new movie stars Brad Pitt as a professional enforcer investigating a heist that’s occurred during a high-stakes, mob-affiliated poker game. Dominik sets his film in 2008, smack dab in the middle of election season and on the eve of the financial crisis, and though the contemporary setting may provide a familiar milieu, the character archetypes are all vintage 70s: Ray Liotta is a maniacal mob figure, Richard Jenkins a crooked attorney, and James Gandolfini an aging, boozy assassin. Genre enthusiasts are sure to line up for this one. Opens October 19. —Drew Hunt

Seven Psychopaths

“An eye for an eye leaves the whole world blind,” Christopher Walken reminds Sam Rockwell in a trailer for this crime comedy by Martin McDonagh. “No, it doesn’t,” Rockwell counters. “There’ll be one guy left with one eye. How’s the last blind guy gonna take out the eye of the last guy left?” That’s the sort of cracked humor I expect from McDonagh, the celebrated Irish playwright (The Pillowman) turned filmmaker (In Bruges). Colin Farrell plays an Irish screenwriter in LA whose low-rent buddies Walken and Rockwell swipe a Shih Tzu that belongs to vengeful local gangster Woody Harrelson. The poster for Seven Psychopaths—a lineup of the stars (Walken, Rockwell, Farrell, Harrelson, Abbie Cornish, Olga Kurylenko, and Tom Waits) in high-attitude poses—makes this look more like a Guy Ritchie comedy than the philosophical, often melancholy In Bruges. But much of that film’s wisdom derived from placing the Irish protagonists in historic Belgium; born and raised in London, McDonagh is a displaced Irishman himself, and Seven Psychopaths gives him a new, potentially fruitful landscape to prowl around. Opens October 12. —J.R. Jones

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