Here Comes the Boom: A biology teacher (Kevin James) becomes a mixed martial arts fighter to raise funds and save the school’s music program — and discovers he’s pretty good at beating other guys up.

Seven Psychopaths: Martin McDonagh, writer-director of In Bruges, returns with this violent comedy about a screenwriter (Colin Farrell) whose wacky friends (Christopher Walken and Sam Rockwell) kidnap a gangster’s dog. There will be blood.

VHS: This anthology of found-footage horror movies directed by some of the genre’s most promising newcomers (including Ti West, David Bruckner and Adam Wingard) scared the bejesus out of audiences at the Sundance Film Festival.

OCT. 19

Alex Cross: Tyler Perry sets aside the Madea drag to play the detective of James Patterson’s best-selling novels, on the trail of a psychotic serial killer (Matthew Fox).

Killing Them Softly: Brad Pitt reunites with writer-director Andrew Dominik (The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford) for this violent drama about a mob enforcer investigating the heist hijinks that went down during a high-stakes poker game. James Gandolfini, Ray Liotta and Richard Jenkins are among the possible suspects.

Paranormal Activity 4: More spooky things go bump in the night at sudden moments.

Madrid 1987: Spanish director David Trueba explores generational and cultural differences with this witty two-character drama about a cranky newspaper reporter (the great José Sacristán) and a college student (María Valverde) who get locked inside a tiny bathroom.

OCT. 26

Chasing Mavericks: A surfer (Jonny Weston) embarks on a quest to ride the dangerous Northern California waves known as Mavericks.

Cloud Atlas: The fall’s most ambitious (and craziest, in a good way) film is an adaptation of David Mitchell’s seemingly unfilmable novel, with Tom Hanks, Halle Berry, Hugo Weaving, Susan Sarandon and Hugh Grant playing multiple roles in interlocking stories set during different time periods. Tom Tykwer ( Run Lola Run) and Larry and Lana Wachowski ( The Matrix) shared the directing duties.

Fun Size: Victoria Justice stars as a teen planning to attend a big Halloween bash when she’s asked by her parents to look after her little brother — who almost immediately disappears.

The Sessions: The Sundance crowd raved about this drama about a man in an iron lung (John Hawkes) who asks his priest (William H. Macy) and his therapist (Helen Hunt) to help him lose his virginity before he dies.

Silent Hill: Revelation 3D: After the death of her father, a girl is drawn into an alternate universe replete with monsters and spirits.

NOV. 2

A Late Quartet: A renowned string quartet (Philip Seymour Hoffman, Catherine Keener, Jeremy Northam and Christopher Walken) try to keep it together despite illness, death, egos and affairs.

Café de Flore: The stories of two seemingly unrelated characters — a single mother raising her son in the 1960s and a middle-aged DJ raising his family in the present-day — intersect in a beautiful and unexpected manner in the latest from Canadian director Jean-Marc Vallée ( C.R.A.Z.Y.)

Flight: Director Robert Zemeckis’ first live-action movie since 2000’s Cast Away stars Denzel Washington as an airline pilot whose past comes back to haunt him after he becomes a hero for saving the lives of his passengers during a disastrous flight.