Of all the movies hitting the fall, the one that makes us feel the most ‘oh yeah, that’s apparently a movie that exists’ is “Only The Brave.” Telling the true (and suddenly and grimly topical after the devastating wildfires on the West Coast)story of the Yamell Hill Fire in June 2013, we can only imagine that one of the reasons it doesn’t stick in our heads is because it’s gone through about five title changes, it was originally called “No Exit,” then “Granite Mountain,” then “Granite Mountain Hotshots,” before circling all the way back round to something generic like “Only The Brave.”
Nevertheless, the film, about the Arizona fire that claimed the life of 19 firefighters four years back, has the kind of cast that you’d think we might recall — Josh Brolin, Miles Teller, Jeff Bridges, James Badge Dale, Taylor Kitsch, Jennifer Connelly, Geoff Stults, Ben Hardy, Scott Haze, Alex Russell and Andie MacDowell, among others. Or maybe it’s the fact that it looks so much like a movie helmed by Peter Berg, but is in actual fact directed by arch-stylist Joseph Kosinski, of “Tron: Legacy” and “Oblivion” fame (and soon to helm “Top Gun: Maverick” for Tom Cruise).
Anyway, a new trailer for the film has landed over at Yahoo Movies, and it continues to look totally solid but utterly unremarkable in a way that’s vaguely reminiscent of that movie about coastguards with Casey Affleck and Chris Pine that no one saw. But it’s the kind of red-meat, flyover-state movie that’s often underestimated by movie folk, so it could well prove to be something of a sleeper. Picked up from Lionsgate by Sony earlier in the year, and scripted by the impressive duo of Ken Nolan (“Black Hawk Down”) and Eric Warren Singer (“American Hustle”), “Only the Brave” will open on October 20th. Watch the trailer below.