Good morning: In today's edition of The Industry, we look at:
It Was Just an Accident, The Magnificent Seven and Spotlight.
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I sat down to interview Jafar Panahi, director of Cannes Palme d’Or winner It Was Just an Accident. The film is now nominated for two Academy Awards: Best International Film and Best Original Screenplay.
It Was Just an Accident follows a ragtag group of former prisoners (above) who undergo a moral reckoning as they decide whether to get even with Eghbal, the man they suspect is their torturer.
In the first half they blindfold him, robbing him of agency, but the film concludes with a 20-minute static long take on Eghbal, who finally tells his story.
Panahi, via a translator, explained:
“As a filmmaker I had to give everyone the same chance… This is the outlook of the socially engaged cinema. That it does not try to condemn individuals or human beings. It is trying to say that, because of the circumstances, individuals turn into certain behaviors.”
While these two sides do everything they can to oppose each other, Panahi continually reinforces that they are on even moral ground.
My favorite example of this emerged by accident.
At the beginning of the movie, Eghbal runs over a dog, and we see a shot of fear in his eyes. In a subsequent scene, Vahid, part of our ragtag group, watches a dog cross a busy street with such care that we imagine he is trying to protect the dog with his gaze.
Panahi explained:
“It was as if a dog was presenting itself as a witness to be asking to film right there. Based on what happened on the street, we changed the shot listing, and we took some shots of Vahid looking at the dog in the same way Eghbal was looking at the dog.”
Panahi’s cinema uses the idea of accidents to bind oppositional forces together, challenging each side to see themselves in the other. Because for the world to move forward, and without bile, we must find common ground.
For More:
Our interview with Palme d’Or winner Jafar Panahi.
THE INDUSTRY TLDR
Apple lands Austin Butler–led Lance Armstrong biopic (dir: Edward Berger).
Paramount Skydance Q4: $573M loss on $8.15B revenue (+2%).
IMAX posts best-ever annual revenue: $410M (+16%).
Peacock developing a TV reimagining of Bride Wars starring Emma Roberts.
Apple taps Rental Family director Hikari for Foster the Snowman.
David F. Sandberg to direct Paramount’s horror-comedy A Little Slice of Hell.
Fox’s The Interrogator adds Daw Dworkin + Jay Beattie as showrunners.
Netflix’s feature adaptation of comic Astronaut Down is produced by Sam Esmail.
Hulu orders animated comedy Swap Meet.
MGM+’s The Magnificent Seven series remake stars Matt Dillon.
Yellowjackets adds Molly Ringwald and June Squibb.
Jack Johnson leads Dan Goor/Luke Del Tredici’s NBC pilot.
Tale of Two Cities series starring Kit Harington sells to a trio of distributors.
Tom McCarthy (dir: Spotlight) casts Paul Rudd, Evan Peters, and Paul Giamatti.
Yesterday’s correct answer: Severus Snape was the character voiced by Riz Ahmed.
63% got it right.
THE INDUSTRY NEWS
Apple wins rights to the Austin Butler/Edward Berger, Lance Armstrong biopic.
Butler + Berger are comparing this to F1 and The Wolf of Wall Street. The secret sauce here is that Lance has signed over his life rights!
But look no further than Oscar-winning best doc Icarus (2017, trailer), the wildest sports doping documentary of all time, and you can see what the Lance biopic has the chance to be insane.
This is produced by former Netflix boss Scott Stuber. And written by Zach Baylin (King Richard, The Order). We like all the elements here.
Two Quarterly breakdowns:
Paramount Skydance Corporation Q4 2025 earnings:
$573M loss
vs. $224M loss last year
$8.15bn revenue
↑2%
$4.7bn TV/Media revenue
↓ 5%
$1.26bn Filmed Entertainment
↑16%
$119M Filmed Entertainment net loss
Due to decline in theatrical revenue
Paramount streaming was the sunny spot as its DTC division keeps reporting healthy gains:
$158M loss
Down from $286M loss last year
$1.84bn Subscription revenue
↑ 17%
78.9M subs
↑ 1M for the quarter
No mention of their bid of $31/share for WBD.
IMAX Q4 2025 solidified their best ever full year revenue of $410M, up 16%. We broke down their Q4 numbers and how they stacked up against last year:
$336M global box office
↑ 62%
$125.2M revenue
↑ 35%
$57.1M adjusted EBITDA
↑ 53%
The top earner:
$112M from Avatar: Fire and Ash
↓ from Oppenheimer’s $183M
Richard Gelfond, IMAX CEO said:
“We exceeded virtually every target for box office and financial performance for the year and expect to deliver a record $1.4 billion in global box office in 2026.”
IMAX also had a massive uptick in 2025 due to the wild success of the Chinese film Ne Zha 2, earning IMAX $190M.
Tidbits:
Emma Roberts (Scream Queens) is trading vows for vengeance in Bride Wars, Peacock’s series version, where this time, the battlefield isn’t the altar, it’s the wedding industry itself. From New Regency (Apple TV’s Prime Target) and Emmy winning producer Sascha Rothchild (Netflix’s GLOW) writing, the series is centered on a big city wedding planner (Roberts) who is challenged to work with an opinionated small town local planner on the same wedding. There is no word yet on who will portray Roberts’ onscreen rival.
Apple loves Rental Family. They must have adored the Brendan Fraser pick, because they just hired the director, Hikari for Foster the Snowman. That story centers on a family who adopts a magical snowman for 72hrs… until he presumably melts. Seems like this will share the joy as Rental Family, and the idea of watching the synthetic blend with the real. Produced by Kevin Walsh’s The Walsh Company (Napoleon, The Instigators). Peter Huyck (The Studio) will write and EP.
David F. Sandberg will direct A Little Slice of Hell for Paramount. He’s fresh off directing Sony’s Until Dawn (2025) and will also direct Amazon MGM’s new Amityville Horror film. Scripted by Greg Weidman and Geoff Tock (underrated: In the Shadow of the Moon). The film centers on two supermarket employees who encounter a literal customer from Hell. Both Until Dawn and In the Shadow of the Moon share an interesting time travel cerebral quality that should make this horror tilt into sci-fi.
Fox’s new series The Interrogator brings on Dan Dworkin and Jay Beattie as showrunners. The 12-episode spy drama is created by and stars Stephen Fry. The series follows former MI6 agent Conrad Henry, whose intellect and behavioral tactics crack cases that others cannot. Dworkin and Beattie have written and Co-EP’d Criminal Minds together so this fits their style. But with Fry involved it should be more fun. Set for the 2026–2027 season.
Into the Esmail verse. Netflix is making the feature film version of Astronaut Down, a comic that sees an astronaut get launched into an alternate reality to save the world. Sam Esmail and his production company Esmail Corp will produce. Of course, their last project was Netflix’s Leave the World Behind, which feels like an alt title for this project. Esmail is great at creating large-scale shifts in how we view our base reality. Just think about the shot of the cargo ship heading straight to the beach. The script is being written by F. Scott Frazier (xXx: Return of Xander Cage).
Mini Tidbits:
Five Books Adaptations, including a time travel romance Apple Original, a dark comedy from Searchlight and an unlikely satire.
11 State Attorney Generals have sent a letter to US Attorney General Pam Bondi to express their concerns over Netflix’s Acquisition of WBD. Read their concerns here.
Black Swan mid 2020s nostalgia is real. We’ve gotten Vertical’s Joika (2023), Lionsgate’s From the World of John Wick: Ballerina (2024) and now Prime’s Pretty Lethal (2026). Watch ballerinas kick some ass here (trailer). Uma Thurman co-stars. Premiering at SXSW.
Cable giant Charter Communications names Nick Jeffery as its new COO. Formerly the president of Frontier Communications, at Charter he’ll lead marketing and sales operations expanding their U.S. reach. Jeffery will not begin his role until September.
Hulu’s newest animated comedy series is titled Swap Meet from writer Isaac Gonzalez (Welcome to the Family), Sony Pictures Television, and 20th Animation. The series follows a down-on-his-luck teen boy who works with his aunt’s blue-collar family at the Eastgate Swap Meet with an infinite amount of goods, services, and colorful characters.
WGA West is threatening to cancel the WGA Awards. This is because WGA West’s employees are striking against the guild itself. They’re trying to unionize, which may also hinder negotiations between WGA West and its writer members as their contract with the studios expires on May 1.
Zootopia 2 is the highest-grossing Hollywood animated film of all time. Now, it’s also the top domestic release of 2025 with $424.2M. Note domestically it didn’t pull in as much as Inside Out 2 ($653M), Moana 2 ($460.4M) or Frozen 2 ($477.4M).
Renewals:
HBO’s Industry (for S5, final season)
Trailers:
Sony / Crunchyroll’s That Time I Got Reincarnated as a Slime
Release: May 1
AMC Theatres’ Newborn
Director: Nate Parker (The Birth of a Nation)
Cast: David Oyelowo
Release: Apr 10
Release dates:
A24’s Undertone
Early Release: March 9 - 100 Dolby Cinemas
Netflix’s The Boroughs
Cast: Alfred Molina, Alfre Woodard
Prod: Duffer Brothers
Release date: May 21
HBO Max’s Song of the Samurai
Just acquired
Release: May 9
Tubi’s The Slipper Still Fits (Bball doc)
Release: March 6
Shoot Dates:
10-11 (Spanish-language soccer drama)
Cast: Paz Vega, Carlos Bardem
Director: Alfonso Quijada
Production is shooting in Guatemala; Spain leg begins Mar 8
THE ACTOR SPOTLIGHT
MGM+’s Magnificent Seven series remake finds its gunslinging leader in Matt Dillon.
The Crash (2004) actor will saddle up as the stoic, black-clad Chris Adams who calmly guides his fellow gifted but ruthless mercenaries in protecting a once-peaceful Quaker village from an encroaching land baron.
Adams isn’t a talker, but more of a presence. Dillon has made a career of playing outsiders (literally) and anti-heroes, from the calculated but internally unraveling heroin addict in Drugstore Cowboy (1989, scene) to his incredibly underrated performance in The House That Jack Built (2018, trailer) as a coldly introspective serial killer.
His quiet but undeniable command of any space makes him uniquely equipped to play a man like Adams, whose authority comes not from his volume but his stillness and control. Previously played by Oscar winner Yul Brynner (The King and I) in the 1960 version (trailer), Dillon’s casting is the first of the seven.
Production on the series will begin this June.
Not your typical action star, Lulu Wilson has just wrapped on The Last Temptation of Becky, the third film in the Becky franchise.
Led by Wilson, Kate Siegel (The Fall of the House of Usher) is also reprising her role as Agent Montana, alongside franchise newcomers Neil Patrick Harris and Brandon Flynn (13 Reasons Why). The third film is described as “the biggest, bloodiest, and most unhinged” with Wilson’s Becky now working as a field agent for the CIA.
Becky (2020) trailer.
Tidbits:
Showtime’s Yellowjackets adds two classic actresses to join the upcoming fourth and final season. Molly Ringwald (Sixteen Candles) will play (the only other redhead) Van’s mom and June Squibb (Thelma), whose role is unknown, has been added as a recurring cast member. The survival drama will close out sometime before the end of the year.
Jack Johnson will star in Brooklyn Nine-Nine co-creators Dan Goor and Luke Del Tredici new single-camera sitcom given a pilot order from NBC. Not too different from their previous series, the untitled project is a workplace comedy set in the world of private investigators. Johnson’s character is “smart, cynical and heartbroken, but trying to pretend he’s not.” Definitely on brand for Johnson.
Mini Tidbits:
Spanish and English language indie Flowers Para Los Muertos adds The Chi’s Yolanda Ross in a leading role. The black comedy thriller follows a professional photographer whose new real estate agent (Ross) has a shady past with her estranged gay husband.
Lauren Chapin, the actress behind youngest kid, Kitten Anderson on CBS’ Father Knows Best (1954-60), has died after a five year battle with cancer. She steadily worked as a child actress, leaving the industry not long after the long-running family sitcom concluded.
FESTIVALS
Park Chan-wook has been chosen of as the Jury president of Cannes 2026. His films include No Other Choice (2025), Decision to Leave (2022) and the insane Oldboy (2004).
Cannes stated:
“Park Chan-wook’s inventiveness, visual mastery, and penchant for capturing the multiple impulses of women and men with strange destinies have given contemporary cinema some truly memorable moments.”
No Other Choice was one of the best movies of last year and we’re thrilled. Cannes had more to say on this here.
Mini Tidbit:
London TV Screenings. Two projects sell, including one with Kit Harington.
CPH:DOX competition title The Sandbox gets world rights acquired by Together Films (In Camera) ahead of its premiere next month. With survivor testimonies, The Sandbox is focused on the involvement of AI and militarization in modern border control.
INDIE FILMMAKER SPOTLIGHT / INTERNATIONAL NEWS
From I Saw the TV Glow’s director Jane Schoenbrun, Mubi’s highly anticipated Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma trailer is here, and it’s quintessential Schoenbrun.
Featuring Gillian Anderson (The X-Files) and Hacks’ Hannah Einbinder, the short trailer for the meta-slasher is overflowing with their signature, surrealist visuals, vibrant coloring, eerie narration, and even more kids staring at TVs.
The trailer watches like a Lynch-Cronenberg crossover…
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