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  Yahya Abdul-Mateen II stars as Anthony McCoy, a visual artist who moves into the gentrified Cabrini-Green neighborhood in Chicago. [credit: YouTube/Universal Pictures ]

With thought-provoking films like Get Out and Us , writer/director Jordan Peele has already cemented his status as a master of smart, socially relevant modern horror. His influence is even broader as a producer, bringing fresh voices, directorial visions, and diverse perspectives to a genre badly in need of all three. His latest production is Candyman , director Nia DaCosta 's imaginative sequel (of sorts) to the 1992 horror classic, Candyman . This is only DaCosta's second feature film, yet she handles the material with deft assurance, transforming the singular slasher known as Candyman into an ageless malevolence whose curse reverberates through time.

(Spoilers for the 1992 film below; mostly mild spoilers for the new film.)

As I've written previously , the original 1992 Candyman was based on the Clive Barker short story " The Forbidden ." The film starred Virginia Madsen as a Chicago graduate student in sociology/semiotics whose thesis deals with urban legends. She hears about a series of brutal murders in the Cabrini-Green public housing project. The killer is rumored to be the ghost of a late 19th-century artist named Daniel Robitaille (Tony Todd) who was lynched because he fathered an illegitimate child with a white woman. The mob cut off his right hand and smeared him with honey to attract bees to sting him to death before burning his corpse and scattering his ashes over what is now the project's grounds.

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  Daniel Craig is back for one last stint as James Bond/007. [credit: YouTube/MGM ]

One of the first major films to be postponed due to the pandemic was No Time to Die , Daniel Craig's final outing as 007. Originally slated for an April 2020 release, the film was first postponed until November 2020 and then delayed again until April 2021. While some theaters remain closed around the world, MGM is sticking with its latest release dates: a world premiere at Royal Albert Hall in London on September 28, 2021, followed by a general release on September 30 in the UK and October 8 in the US. And the studio has released one last trailer to remind audiences that yes, this premiere is finally happening.

(Spoilers for the 2015 film Spectre below.)

As we've reported previously, this 25th installment in the franchise is co-produced by MGM and Eon Productions, with United Artists and Universal serving as distributors in North America and internationally, respectively. Directed by Cary Joji Fukunaga ( True Detective , Beast of No Nation ), the film takes place about five years after the capture of Spectre 's archvillain Ernst Stavro Blofeld (Christoph Waltz), a criminal mastermind and head of the organization SPECTRE. (Ian Fleming's original character inspired Dr. Evil and his cat, Mr. Bigglesworth, in the Austin Powers film series.)

An ambitious young knight of King Arthur's Round Table makes an ill-advised bargain and embarks on a personal quest in the new trailer for The Green Knight , a forthcoming film by director David Lowery ( Pete's Dragon , A Ghost Story ) adapted from the famous 14th-century medieval poem, Sir Gawain and the Green Knight . Originally meant to debut at the 2020 SXSW festival, with a May 2020 theatrical release, the film was shelved in the face of the global pandemic. With theaters slowly reopening around the country (and the world), The Green Knight is finally being released this summer.

(Spoilers for the 14th-century medieval poem below.)

The original poem falls into the chivalric romance genre, relating a well-known story from Arthurian legend. (I highly recommend J.R.R. Tolkien's translation from 1925 or Simon Armitage's 2008 translation, recently revised .) On New Year's Day, King Arthur and the knights of the Round Table gather at Camelot to feast and exchange gifts. A mysterious Green Knight disrupts the festivities and proposes a different kind of exchange: any one of the knights may strike him with one blow with his axe; in return, the Green Knight will come back in a year to return the blow. Sir Gawain, the youngest of the knights and nephew to Arthur, accepts the challenge and beheads the Green Knight. Everyone is shocked when the Green Knight picks up his severed head. He says Gawain must meet him at the Green Chapel one year hence to receive a similar blow, per their bargain.

The Netflix French original series Lupin proved to be an unexpected hit when it debuted earlier this year, purportedly racking up views in 70 million households in its first month. And there's good news for those frustrated by part 1's cliffhanger ending: we'll soon find out what happens next, as Netflix just dropped a full trailer and release date for part 2 of the saga. Alas, the trailer is dubbed in English— quelle horreur !—which means we miss out on star Omar Sy's dulcet tones. (Dear Netflix: it's OK to have subtitled trailers for your foreign fare. In fact, it's far, far preferable to bad dubbing.)

(Some spoilers for part 1 below.)

As I've written previously , Arsène Lupin is the creation of Maurice Leblanc , who based the character partly on a French burglar/anarchist . Relentlessly pursued by a detective named Ganimard, Lupin is captured stealing a woman's jewels while on board a ship. Although he is imprisoned, he ultimately escapes before standing trial and goes on to pull off many other colorful heists.

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  Lewis Tan stars as Cole Young. [credit: YouTube/Warner Bros. ]

Warner Bros. has released the red-band trailer for its forthcoming Mortal Kombat reboot, which had long languished in development hell. A Russian-dubbed version of the trailer initially leaked on reddit, according to Eurogamer , before being pulled . It's basically a nonstop, blood-soaked fighting fest, featuring all the fan favorites from the popular video game franchise .

(Some spoilers for the games and earlier films below.)

Midway Games released the first Mortal Kombat game in 1992, which proved hugely influential for many a teenager who frequented video arcades during that era. There have been 11 main games and multiple spinoffs in the franchise thus far, all set in a fictional universe of eight different realms. The greatest warriors from the various realms must compete in a series of Mortal Kombat tournaments to conquer other realms.