COMING SOON: The Oscar Slate

Is it just me, or did awards season come back around really quickly? It seems like just yesterday that "Birdman" was anointed with the Best Picture prize and now, a whole new batch of frontrunners have already emerged. From what we've seen already, "Inside Out" and "Mad Max: Fury Road" seem like they might have the support to go all the way and to a lesser extent, "Love and Mercy", "Ex Machina" and "The Diary of a Teenage Girl" are in the mix as well. But with many of the major prestige dramas to come, some of those early releases will inevitably fall to the wayside. With that in mind, here are the ones to watch out for this coming fall:

BLACK MASS (Sep 18)

Director: Scott Cooper
Starring: Johnny Depp, Benedict Cumberbatch, Dakota Johnson
Plot: The true story of Whitey Bulger, the brother of a state senator and the most infamous violent criminal in the history of South Boston, who became an FBI informant to take down a Mafia family invading his turf.

SICARIO (Sep 18)

Director: Denis Villeneuve
Starring: Emily Blunt, Josh Brolin, Benicio Del Toro
Plot: An idealistic FBI agent is enlisted by an elected government task force to aid in the escalating war against drugs at the border area between the U.S. and Mexico.

STEVE JOBS (Oct 9)

Director: Danny Boyle
Starring: Michael Fassbender, Kate Winslet, Seth Rogen
Plot: The true story of the life of visionary Apple CEO Steve Jobs.

BEASTS OF NO NATION (Oct 16)

Director: Cary Fukunaga
Starring: Idris Elba, Abraham Attah, Ama K. Abebrese
Plot: A drama based on the experiences of Agu, a child soldier fighting in the civil war of an unnamed African country.

BRIDGE OF SPIES (Oct 16)

Director: Steven Spielberg
Starring: Tom Hanks, Alan Alda, Amy Ryan
Plot: An American lawyer is recruited by the CIA during the Cold War to help rescue a pilot detained in the Soviet Union.

SUFFRAGETTE (Oct 23)

Director: Sarah Gavron
Starring: Carey Mulligan, Meryl Streep, Helena Bonham Carter
Plot: The foot soldiers of the early feminist movement, women who were forced underground to pursue a dangerous game of cat and mouse with an increasingly brutal State.

BROOKLYN (Nov 6)

Director: John Crowley
Starring: Saoirse Ronan, Julie Walters, Jim Broadbent
Plot: In 1950s Ireland and New York, young Ellis Lacey has to choose between two men and two countries.

SPOTLIGHT (Nov 6)

Director: Thomas McCarthy
Starring: Mark Ruffalo, Michael Keaton, Stanley Tucci
Plot: The true story of how the Boston Globe uncovered the massive scandal of child molestation and cover-up within the local Catholic Archdiocese, shaking the entire Catholic Church to its core.

BY THE SEA (Nov 13)

Director: Angelina Jolie
Starring: Brad Pitt, Angelina Jolie, Mélanie Laurent
Plot: Set in France during the mid-1970s, Vanessa, a former dancer, and her husband Roland, an American writer, travel the country together.

CAROL (Nov 20)

Director: Todd Haynes
Starring: Rooney Mara, Cate Blanchett, Sarah Paulson
Plot: Rooney Mara, Cate Blanchett, Sarah Paulson

THE DANISH GIRL (Nov 27)

Director: Tom Hooper
Starring: Eddie Redmayne, Alicia Vikander, Amber Heard
Plot: The remarkable love story inspired by the lives of artists Lili Elbe and Gerda Wegener. Lili and Gerda's marriage and work evolve as they navigate Lili's groundbreaking journey as a transgender pioneer.

I SAW THE LIGHT (Nov 27)
No trailer yet.
Director: Marc Abraham
Starring: Elizabeth Olsen, Tom Hiddleston, David Krumholtz
Plot: A biography of Hank Williams.

YOUTH (Dec 4)

Director: Paolo Sorrentino
Starring: Michael Caine, Harvey Keitel, Rachel Weisz
Plot: Fred and Mick, two old friends, are on vacation in an elegant hotel at the foot of the Alps.

IN THE HEART OF THE SEA (Dec 11)

Director: Ron Howard
Starring: Chris Hemsworth, Cillian Murphy, Brendan Gleeson
Plot: Based on the 1820 event, a whaling ship is preyed upon by a sperm whale, stranding its crew at sea for 90 days, thousands of miles from home.

THE HATEFUL EIGHT (Dec 25)

Director: Quentin Tarantino
Starring: Samuel L. Jackson, Tim Roth, Bruce Dern
Plot: In post-Civil War Wyoming, bounty hunters try to find shelter during a blizzard but get involved in a plot of betrayal and deception.

JOY (Dec 25)

Director: David O. Russell
Starring: Jennifer Lawrence, Bradley Cooper, Robert De Niro
Plot: Joy is the story of a family across four generations and the woman who rises to become founder and matriarch of a powerful family business dynasty.

THE REVENANT (Dec 25)

Director: Alejandro González Iñárritu
Starring: Tom Hardy, Leonardo DiCaprio, Domhnall Gleeson
Plot: In the 1820s, a frontiersman, Hugh Glass, sets out on a path of vengeance against those who left him for dead after a bear mauling.