The 20 Most Exciting Movies of Summer 2023: ‘Barbie,’ ‘Oppenheimer,’ and More

This year has already brought us a number of big blockbuster movies—from Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 to The Super Mario Bros. Movie—and we’re not even halfway through the calendar yet. As summer approaches, get ready for some of the most exciting titles of the year.

Certainly you’ve heard of buzzy titles like Barbie and Oppenheimer (which release on the same day in July). But did you know that A24 is releasing a freaky horror movie about a phantom hand? Or that Wes Anderson is coming out with an alien sci-fi film? It’s also a fantastic summer for animation, which will see the release of a new Pixar flick, another entry in the Spiderverse series, and an exciting new installment of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.

The MCU is taking a moment to catch its breath this summer until The Marvels releases in November, but if you’re looking for superheroes, there are some outside of the multiverse coming to the big screen. There’s Spiderverse, of course, but then there’s also Blue Beetle. Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny feels a little bit like a superhero situation, too, or even Mission: Impossible—if you see Harrison Ford and Tom Cruise as the action legends they are.

From Flamin’ Hot Cheetos to sexually-charged talking dogs, here are the biggest titles to look forward to this summer.

The Little Mermaid — May 26

Disney’s live-action adaptation of one of their most beloved animated films has been contentious for all the wrong reasons. (Halle Bailey being cast as Ariel is a stroke of genius, the CGI team putting Flounder on the South Beach Diet is not!). But despite all of the unwarranted controversy, The Little Mermaid is due to be a major theatrical draw, bringing together nostalgic parents who now have kids of their own to share the classic story with. The new songs might not hit quite as hard, and the movie is stuffed to the gills and a bit overlong, but there is something for everyone to admire in the film, which is less of a retelling and more of an awe-inspiring expansion. —Coleman Spilde

Past Lives — June 2

Celine Song’s directorial debut blew Sundance away earlier this year, wowing audiences with a stunning portrayal of the effect a first love has on the rest of one’s life. Nora (Greta Lee) and Hae Sung (Teo Yoo) were childhood sweethearts—but when Nora’s family immigrated from South Korea to America, they lost touch. After reconnecting and falling apart once more, Nora and Hae Sung get one more chance to see what might have been—if Nora didn’t marry a New York writer, which prevents them from having any further connection. —Fletcher Peters

Spider-Man: Across the Spiderverse — June 2

The sequel to 2018’s fan-favorite animated Spidey flick arrives after a long wait—but this is just the first half of the two-part sequel. Miles Morales is thrust into another multiverse-traversing journey, tasked with preventing the universes from utter destruction. This adventure reunites him with his myriad arachnid-infused counterparts, yet not all of them are so happy to see teenage Miles. Expect action and some serious emotional stakes this time around too. —Allegra Frank

Flamin’ Hot — June 9

The true story behind the creation of the Flamin’ Hot Cheetos is surprisingly controversial. This film portrays a popular urban legend, about the man who dreamed up the beloved snack while working at the Cheetos’ factory. While there are plenty of skeptics as to whether Richard Montañez, a janitor, actually whipped up the spicier cheese puff on the job, this story of a person of color outsmarting the white corporate world seems compellingly inspirational. It’s also Eva Longoria’s directorial debut, making it more intriguing. —AF

Elemental — June 16

Whether it be toys, fish, cars, bugs, or human emotions and our eternal souls: you name it, Pixar has animated it to heart-wrenching effect. Next up, the studio is crafting an unlikely love story out of the four earthly elements: Water, fire, land, and air. Set in Element City, where the elements coexist in the same ecosystem, Ember (Leah Lewis), a fire resident, and Wade (Mamoudou Athie), a water resident, become a pair of star-crossed lovers, to the dismay of their families, who think it’ll never work. Think a Romeo & Juliet spin, but with more third-degree burns instead of daggers. —CS

Asteroid City — June 16

No one can do Wes Anderson like Wes Anderson—certainly not those abhorrent and garish AI-prompted trailers going around Twitter, which understand neither the charm nor the intent of the director’s style. Anderson returns this summer to prove that with his latest film, seeped in his signature style, and just as typically loaded with stars. Asteroid City finds the townspeople of the titular hovel, already the sight of an asteroid landing hundreds of years prior, marveling at a new extraterrestrial event: an alien invasion. It’s the perfect film to match our times. If some little green men marched off a flying saucer today, surely a good portion of us would respond with sardonic cynicism, too. —CS

No Hard Feelings — June 23

Real comedy is back, baby! Somewhere in the mid-2010s, we broke away from the horned up sex farces like Easy A and Superbad that brought us together for raunchy laughs, and traded them for a slew of prestige films. Well, Jennifer Lawrence is done with all of that, spitting in the face of reputable cinema to lead a comedy all about a woman hired by a newly legal teens’ parents, to get their son to break out of his shell. No Hard Feelings promises plenty of cursing, more euphemisms than you can count, and glorious debauchery all around. Huzzah! —CS

Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny — June 30

Harrison Ford returns as our beloved Indiana Jones in The Dial of Destiny, which sees James Mangold taking over Steven Spielberg’s classic Lucasfilm adventure saga. Joined by ally Phoebe Waller-Bridge and foe Mads Mikkelsen, Indy sets off to save yet another artifact from landing in the wrong hands. He’s fought Nazis, cults, and even Sean Connery—who played his father—so what can’t Indiana Jones do? With the whip and that classic theme song, he’ll probably be unstoppable once more in this new chapter. —FP

Joy Ride — July 7

Stephanie Hsu follows up her Oscar-nominated turn in Everything Everywhere All at Once with this road trip comedy, which premiered at SXSW in March to strong reviews. Hsu plays the friend of Ashley Park, who plays Audrey, a transracial adoptee in search of her birth mother. Along with her cousin and two best friends (including Hsu), Audrey heads to China to find her roots—but gets into tons of over-the-top, uproarious, very R-rated antics along the way. —AF

Mission: Impossible — Dead Reckoning Part One — July 11

After several delays, the seventh Mission: Impossible film arrives this summer. As is the style at this time, it’s the first part of a two-part story. But after the series’ five-year break following 2018’s widely acclaimed Mission: Impossible — Fallout, fans will take the new global super-spy action wherever they can get it. And as always: Cruise — he’s doing his own stunts. —AF

Theater Camp — July 14

Were you a theater kid? I was. I remember feeling my stomach sink every moment a cast list was pinned to the school’s bulletin board, the passive aggressiveness of friends auditioning for similar roles, and the ultimate bliss that followed each performance. Theater Camp aims to recreate that feeling, but in a classic Christopher Guest mockumentary format. Actors Ben Platt (Pitch Perfect) and Molly Gordon (Booksmart), who also directs, star as two stuck-up theater camp alumni who have taken over production and brought it nearly to hell. —FP

Oppenheimer — July 21

Christopher Nolan’s highly anticipated drama Oppenheimer has been on everyone’s minds for two reasons: its three-hour runtime, and its courage in going up against the biggest movie of the summer (next on our list). But based on its trailer, Oppenheimer looks to be up to the challenge, with a searing lead performance from Cillian Murphy, who plays J. Robert Oppenheimer, the physicist who became known as the “father of the atomic bomb.” Murphy wears his character’s sallow expression like a glove as he contests with the sins of his creations. And though we know how history plays out, seeing how Nolan connects a not-so-distant past to our current climate will be one of the most unsettling experiences of the year. (And not just because it’ll be hard to hold that large Diet Coke for 180 minutes). —CS

Barbie — July 21

Hot Girl Summer returns, and this year, it’s neon-colored. Margot Robbie plays a real-life version of the fantastically plastic icon, decked out in as much pink as possible. She’s joined by several other Barbies, played by everyone from Dua Lipa to Kate McKinnon. And there will be plenty of Kens too, including Ryan Gosling and Simu Liu. The sumptuous first teaser doesn’t offer much in the way of actual story, but no matter: Greta Gerwig’s never hit a bum note yet, and her third directorial effort looks to be as uniquely lovable as we’d hope. —AF

Haunted Mansion — July 28

This is the second film based on the beloved Disney Parks ride, and it comes with a much more star-studded cast than Eddie Murphy’s version from the early 2000s. This time, Owen Wilson is joined by Lakeith Stanfield, Jamie Lee Curtis, and Jared Leto, in this story of a group of humans going up against some goofy ghosts and ghouls. —AF

Talk to Me — July 28

A24 has quite a reputation with horror movies. Directors like Ari Aster, Robert Eggers, and Ti West have found massive success with the distribution company, which has also released titles like Bodies Bodies Bodies and In Fabric. Could Talk to Me be A24’s next big success? The Australian supernatural horror movie follows a group of friends who seize control of an embalmed hand (ah!) and become addicted to using it for tricks (yikes!), until they push things too far and big new terrors haunt them (no thanks!). The film premiered at Sundance earlier this year, and some audience members say they still sleep with their lights on. (Kidding. Or am I?) —FP

Meg 2: The Trench — Aug. 4

Turn off all the noise around you and listen closely. If you tune everything out, you can hear the chants of the shark fans, growing louder by the day: “Meg! Meg! Meg!” Well, maybe that’s just me, but the sequel to 2018’s The Meg is, without a doubt, the summer’s hottest B-movie. Meg 2 solves a major problem of The Meg, which was that there was simply not enough Meg! Meg is, of course, short for megalodon, the giant prehistoric shark that found its way out of a deep sea ocean trench into populated waters in the first film. Turns out, there are more megs! And this time, there are other prehistoric friends along for the ride too. A megalodon and an impossibly large squid? Sorry, but Barbie’s got some box office competition. —CS

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem — Aug. 4

Hear me out: Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles may not sound like the most glamorous franchise in the entertainment industry. As someone who plans on wearing hot pink in honor of Barbie this summer, I may not be the demographic you’d expect to see at Mutant Mayhem. But one trailer had me hooked. The animation looks as dazzling as Spider-Man: Across the Spiderverse, with an ensemble cast for the ages: Rose Byrne, Giancarlo Esposito, Jackie Chan, Paul Rudd, Seth Rogen, Ayo Edebiri, and more. I can’t believe I’m saying this, but count me in! —FP

Blue Beetle — Aug. 18

The DC Cinematic Universe continues to be an utter mess, for those who care about following along with the core storyline. This is one of the last movies in the pipeline developed before James Gunn and Peter Safran took over the studio last fall—which means it most likely doesn’t have any bearing on the future films based on the beloved comic book characters. But all of that canon nonsense is irrelevant to people who just want to watch a fun movie, which Blue Beetle very well could be. For one, it’s history-making, as the first superhero film with a Latino lead. And its titular superhero is extremely wacky: Jaime Reyes, who combines with a magical scarab and gains a powerful exoskeleton. —AF

Strays — Aug. 18

Strays might be an odd choice for a movie we’re anticipating for the summer, considering the trailer looks godawful. Now, I’m not looking forward to this in the same way I’m excited for Barbie or Oppenheimer. I’m gearing up for the worst movie of 2023. A la Ted, this raunchy flick follows a lovable beast (a pet dog) as he comes-of-age and gets horny. Sounds terrible. But I’m also looking forward to the deep sighs, the guttural groans, and the tears of cringe this movie will bring me. Heartbreak feels good in a place like this, right? —FP

Bottoms — Aug. 25

Bottoms reteams Shiva Baby director Emma Seligman with its star Rachel Sennott for a wild and outrageous romp through the world’s most hormonal high school. Sennott plays PJ, a young woman who teams up with her best friend, Josie (Ayo Edebiri), to start a young women’s fight club, that’s really just a way for them to try to get closer to their crushes. Bottoms juggles satire with straight comedy, and throws in a dash of bloody violence for a laugh-a-minute ride that has to be seen to be believed. Trust me, the SXSW premiere of the movie elicited just as many gasps as it did cackles. Bottoms is the perfect way to close out the summer on a high note, and be grateful that another year of high school isn’t ahead of you. —CS

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