With 2012 winding down, most cinema-related discussion around this time deals with chronicling our respective favorite films of the year and various awards talk, but its time to take a glimpse into late next year. Sony Pictures has announced today that they’ll be releasing George Clooney‘s next film, following up his hit The Ides of March, on the prime date of December 20th, 2013.

Titled The Monuments Men, the film has a stellar cast already, with Clooney, Matt Damon, Daniel Craig, Bill Murray, Cate Blanchett, Jean Dujardin, John Goodman, Hugh Bonneville, and Bob Balaban in place. A based-on-true-events story, as scripted by the director and his frequent partner Grant Heslov, the film focuses on an Allied group — a titular sort, comprised of both curators and soldiers — who allocated efforts toward the rescuing of art stolen (and to be destroyed) by Hitler‘s Third Reich. With a  fall festival premiere expected, it will face off against Tom Hanks‘ Saving Mr. Banks and Fox’s Walking with Dinosaurs.

In other release news, Sony Classics have set a batch of dates for their 2012 festival hold-overs. First up, their documentary The Gatekeepers will begin a platform run on February 1st, 2013, while the Gael Garcia Bernal drama No (which we reviewed at Cannes) is set to open two weeks later on February 15th. Then on April 5th, next to The Brass Teapot, The Heat, Jurassic Park 3D and Olympus Has Fallen, the studio will release Robert Redford‘s political thriller The Company You Keep (our TIFF review here).

Three weeks after that will see the release of Ramin Bahrani‘s At Any Price on April 26th, alongside The Big Wedding and Michael Bay’s Pain and Gain. Starring Zac Efron and Dennis Quaid, read our TIFF review here for the drama. We’ve also got news on Susanne Bier’s Pierce Brosnan-starring Love is All You Need, as it’s been given a May 3rd date, where it will face off against Iron Man 3.

Last, but most certainly not least, after exclusively revealing an April release date was in mind, Terrence Malick‘s To the Wonder has been given an exact slot of April 12th, where it will face off against the baseball drama 42, the Evil Dead remake, Tom Cruise‘s Oblivion, as well as Scary Movie 5. Check out our review of the Ben Affleck and Olga Kurylenko-starring project from TIFF here. [FilmNation/BoM]

Which film are you most anticipating?