OPENING FRIDAY, DEC. 4

Armored
When young armored car guard Ty Hackett (Columbus Short) has trouble making ends meet, he asks for more shifts. Instead, he gets a dangerous offer from fellow guards: help them steal their own shipment of $42 million. Cochrane (Matt Dillon) promises that no one will get hurt, but things don't always go as planned. Lawrence Fishburne and Jean Reno also star as members of the team.

Brothers
Danish army officer Sam (Tobey Maguire) is presumed dead when his helicopter crashes deep in Afghanistan during a peacekeeping mission. Back at home, his brother Tommy (Jake Gyllenhaal) grows close to Sam's family, especially to his wife Grace (Natalie Portman). When Sam returns home after rescue from captivity, things are not what they were when he left, and the good news of his survival quickly puts brothers at odds.

OPENING FRIDAY, DEC. 11

Invictus
This is the inspiring true story of the 1995 South African World Cup rugby team. Nelson Mandela (Morgan Freeman) teams up with player Francois Pienaar (Matt Damon), leading the team to victory and reuniting the nation after the fall of Apartheid. Directed by Clint Eastwood and based on the John Carlin book Playing the Enemy: Nelson Mandela and the Game that Changed a Nation.

The Lovely Bones
In Peter Jackson's adaptation of the same-name novel by Alice Sebold, a 14-year-old girl (Saoirse Ronan) is raped and murdered by her neighbor (Stanley Tucci). She then watches from a heaven-like place, "the in-between," as her family grieves and her murderer prepares to strike again. She must weigh her desire for vengeance against her desire for her family to recover from their loss.

OPENING FRIDAY, DEC. 18

Avatar
In James Cameron's 3D sci-fi epic, Jake Sully (Sam Worthington) is an ex-Marine who was paralyzed from the waist down in combat on Earth. Now, he's headed to a lush, jungle-covered moon called Pandora, home to a variety of incredible life forms. Because of his paralysis, Sully is selected to participate in the Avatar program, which will enable him to walk again, as a member of Pandora's native humanoid race, the Na'vi. Their civilization is primitive compared to what humans have on Earth, but when humans encroach too deep into their unspoiled forests for valuable minerals, they use their 10-foot stature, superior physical abilities and warrior skills to defend their threatened existence. Sully, as one of the Na'vi, is torn between Earth's military-industrial efforts and the love he has found with a young Na'vi called Neytiri (Zoe Saldaña).

OPENING FRIDAY, DEC. 25

Sherlock Holmes
Robert Downey Jr. stars as the famous sleuth in director Guy Ritchie's dynamic portrayal of Arthur Conan Doyle's classic characters. Alongside his trusted colleague, John Watson (Jude Law), Holmes must stop a plot by the murderous cult leader Lord Blackwood (Mark Strong) to destroy England.

The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus
The immortal, thousand-year-old Doctor Parnassus (Christopher Plummer) is the leader a traveling theatre troupe, the pinnacle of which is a magical mirror through which audience members may explore their own imaginations. But, this mirror and his immortality came at a price: Doctor Parnassus made a deal with the Devil (Tom Waits), who now comes to collect the arrangement, targeting the doctor's young daughter (Lily Cole). The late Heath Ledger filmed the first part of the movie as Tony, a mysterious outsider who navigates surreal landscapes in attempt to save the doctor's daughter. Johnny Depp, Colin Farrell, and Jude Law portray transformations of his character, filmed after the young actor's death in 2008.

Up in the Air
For Ryan Bingham (George Clooney), moving is living. With almost 10 million frequent-flyer miles to his name, this corporate downsizing expert ("career transition counselor") lives life on the move, numbing himself with sex, booze and drugs, completely at home on the road. But just when he's met Natalie (Anna Kendrick), the frequent-flying woman of his dreams, his company decides to ground him at headquarters in Omaha, Nebraska. Adapted from the same-name novel by Walter Kim.