The 100 key films of 2013: Nos 91-100

Untitled Woody Allen project: There seems to be even less information than usual floating around about Woody Allen’s next film – other than that it’s aimed for release next year, and has the usual hightone ensemble. This time Cate Blanchett is the biggest name on the page (her first time in an Allen film), alongside Alec Baldwin (pictured here with Allen on the set of To Rome with Love). Other than that, we know it’s being shot in New York and San Francisco (Allen’s first American-set film since 2009’s ho-hum Whatever Works) and possibly involves a middle-aged man shrugging his shoulders at some point. Photograph: PR

Very Good Girls: A entire generation of twentysomethings could get properly hot and bothered over this one: Dakota Fanning and Elizabeth Olsen (pictured) team up as a pair of highschoolers determined to lose their virginity in the summer after graduation. (Sounds like the femme version of those 80s losin’-it teen movies.) But what’s this? They both get the hots for the same man! A street artist, no less, played by hunky Boyd Holbrook. Will friendship triumph over mere sex? Only one way to find out. Photograph: Groundswell Productions

Warm Bodies: Ah, Nicholas Hoult. Once the dorkiest kid on the planet (About a Boy), he’s now a chiselled-cheekboned slab of beefcake on the conveyor belt to the stars. Or something. 2013 will be a big year for Hoult: as well as Jack in Jack the Giant Slayer, he’s got this entertaining sounding zombie flick (after Shaun of the Dead, the second zomromcom?) Hoult plays a post-apocalypse zombie who falls for a human girl (Teresa Palmer, from I Am Number Four), triggering all sorts of neurotic teen existential angst. Twilight, with giggles, we assume. Photograph: Jonathan Wenk/Summit Entertainment

The Way, Way Back: Nat Faxon, and Jim Rash are the one time LA Groundlings who won an Oscar for their screenplay for Alexander Payne’s The Descendants, co-credited with Payne himself and based on Kaui Hart Hemmings’ novel. Now they’re striking out as joint directors of another knotty domestic comedy-drama, which they’ve written themselves. It’s a coming-of-age yarn set across one summer: teenager Liam James becomes friends with waterpark manager Sam Rockwell (both pictured above), while coping with mum Toni Collette and her boyfriend Steve Carrell. With indie chops galore this is – unsurprisingly – a Sundance debutante. Photograph: Sycamore Pictures

White House Down: An early-summer blockbuster in waiting from that master of disaster, Roland Emmerich. In the crosshairs is the US president’s official residence, but there’s no ID4 style alien melt-beam. Concerns this time round are rather more earthbound: Channing Tatum is an ace secret service goon who does his damnedest to save president Jamie Foxx when a paramilitary group takes over the White House. There might be one or two explosions. Photograph: Sony Pictures

The Wind Rises: Japanese animation maestro Hayao Miyazaki has his first feature film scheduled for release since 2008’s Ponyo on the Cliff by the Sea (pictured). The Wind Rises, with its title borrowing a quotation from Verlaine, is another unlikely sounding affair: an account of the life and work of Jiro Horikoshi, celebrated aeroplane designer and the man behind the deadly second world war Zero fighter. Miyazaki has already published a manga book about Horikoshi, so it’ll be interesting to see how his film handles this potentially controversial material. Photograph: PR

World War Z: Marc Forster might have presided over one of the less well-received entries in the 007 canon, Quantum of Solace, but he’s getting right back on the action horse. This much-hyped zombie-apocalypse pic stars Brad Pitt as a UN researcher trying to understand a recent human/zombie conflict. There have been a few script hiccups, apparently, which has seen the release pushed back till summer 2013, but hopes are still high for what has been described as the Bourne Identity of zombie flicks. Photograph: Paramount Pictures

The World's End: The third flavour in Edgar Wright, Simon Pegg and Nick Frost's 'Cornetto Trilogy' sees a gang of mates – including Pegg, Frost (both pictured), Martin Freeman, Eddie Marsan and Paddy Considine – attempt a pub crawl they failed to complete 20 years ago. Back then the penalty for failure was lost pride and a sore head, this time the fate of the world's at stake. Best stick to halves. Photograph: Jay Brooks/Guardian

You Are Here: It’s not quite his first film (that was 1996’s What Do You Do All Day?) but since then a lot of water has passed under the bridge for Mad Men creator Matt Weiner. Now he has his pick of Hollywood for his sophomore effort, a comedic road trip about two 30s-slacker pals who face up to a life-changing event when one of them inherits a load of money. With all of Hollywood to choose from Weiner has opted for Owen Wilson and Zach Galifianakis (pictured) as his leads, with Saturday Night Live’s Amy Poehler alongside. In someone else’s hands, this sounds like a nice little film. In Weiner’s, it’ll be an event. Photograph: Michael Schwartz/WireImage

Zero Dark Thirty: Kathryn Bigelow’s procedural drama about the decade-long hunt for Osama Bin Laden plays like 21st-century Moby Dick, with the Al-Qaida leader cast as the elusive white whale at the centre. Jessica Chastain is the CIA operative charting a network of terrorist couriers, while the narrative cruises from the waterboard years to the arrival of Obama and the final, climactic assault on Bin Laden’s compound. Bigelow won the best film and director Oscar for her last film, The Hurt Locker, back in 2009. She’ll fancy her chances this time around too.
Photograph: Allstar/Universal Pictures/Sportsphoto Ltd