Ryan Gosling Astronaut, Emma Stone Alien
Good morning: In today's edition of The Industry, we look at:
Gosling. Stone. Kilmer.
Let’s go!
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Universal has a big slate this year. At CinemaCon, Donna Langley, chairperson of NBCUniversal Entertainment and Studios, shared:
“Since 2021, Universal has had more top five hits at the global box office than any other studio and the highest average rating for its films on Rotten Tomatoes.”
The studio has 20+ films on its slate this year alone.
Here’s what got a trailer or sneak peek:
Jurassic World Rebirth - starring Scarlett Johansson - Release date: Jul. 2nd
Nobody 2 - starring Bob Odenkirk - first look poster - Release date: Aug. 15
Jordan Peele’s Him - poster (above) - Release date: Sept. 19
Wicked 2 - Release date: Nov. 22
Focus Features:
Wes Anderson’s The Phoenician Scheme - Release date May 30
Downton Abbey: The Grand Finale - Release date Sept 15
Yorgos Lanthimos’ Bugonia - Starring Emma Stone as a possible alien and Jesse Plemons - Release date: Nov 7
Blumhouse:
SOULM8TE (M3GAN Spinoff) Murderous romantic bot - Release date Jan 2026
The Black Phone 2 - starring Ethan Hawke - Release date Oct. 17
Five Nights at Freddy’s 2 -starring Wayne Knight - trailer - Release date Dec 5
Dreamworks:
The Bad Guys 2 - new trailer - Release date Aug 1st
Gabby’s Dollhouse, starring Kristen Wiig - Release date Sept. 26th, 2025.
How to Train Your Dragon 2 - Live action - teaser trailer - Release date June 11 2027
They also teased the return of Daniel Day-Lewis and called Christopher Nolan’s The Odyssey:
“A visionary, once-in-a-generation cinematic masterpiece that Homer himself would quite likely be proud of.”
Luckily, we won’t have to wait 20 years for that one.
THE INDUSTRY TLDR
Amazon drops a bundle of new announcements at CinemaCon.
Apple TV+’s The Fountain of Youth (dir: Guy Ritchie), starring Natalie Portman, has a trailer.
Ice Cube will write and star in a new Friday movie for Warner Bros.
Star Trek: Strange New Worlds returns this summer with a retro-styled third season.
Fox has renewed The Simpsons, Family Guy, Bob’s Burgers, and American Dad!
Hulu is developing a new satirical comedy, Group Chat.
South Park returns for season 27.
Apple/A24 dramedy mystery series The Husbands starring Juno Temple has been greenlit.
TIFF’s Sketch was acquired by Angel Studios.
Sundance darling, Magic Farm, starring Chloë Sevigny, has a trailer.
Ron Howard’s survival thriller Eden, starring Jude Law is acquired by Vertical.
First, look at the Vietnam dinosaur movie Primitive War.
THE INDUSTRY NEWS
Natalie Portman’s National Treasure. Apple TV+ has just dropped a trailer for an action-adventure film, The Fountain of Youth, reminiscent of National Treasure. It follows brother and sister Natalie Portman and John Krasinski with their ragtag team as they search for the Fountain of Youth, trapeezing across countries and roaming through pyramids. It’s sure to be a fun time. Guy Ritchie directs. Premiering May 23rd on Apple TV+.
Amazon is upping its theatrical game. Promising 15 features/year in theaters by 2027 at Cinemacon this year.
No news on their new Bond film, but they dropped a bunch of trailers for their new releases:
Luca Guadagnino’s After the Hunt - starring Julia Roberts - Release date: October 10
Crime 101 - starring Halle Berry, Chris Hemsworth and Mark Ruffalo - release date 2025
Mercy - starring Chris Pratt, who plays a detective who has to convince an AI program he created that he didn’t kill his wife - Release date Jan. 23, 2026
Three Bags Full: A Sheep Detective Movie - starring Hugh Jackman - Release date: Feb 20th 2026
Project Hail Mary - starring Ryan Gosling as a lame astronaut - Release date: March 20, 2026.
Coleen Hoover’s Verity - starring Josh Hartnett, Anne Hathaway - Release date: May 15th 2026
They also showed off a BTS Masters of the Universe sizzle reel, which included the sets, the props, the actors looking jacked, and Idris Elba in costume.
Tidbits:
Ice Cube is officially on board to write and star in a new Friday movie, Last Friday, for Warner Bros. and New Line Cinema. This will be the fourth film in the classic comedy franchise, with the last film, Friday After Next (2002, trailer), released over 20 years ago. No word on production dates.
Star Trek: Strange New Worlds returns this summer with a retro-styled third season featuring classic cinematography, murder mysteries, and guest star Patton Oswalt. It's fun to see this series honor its roots and have some fun with the IP. The show has already been renewed for season four. Trailer here.
Fox has renewed The Simpsons, Family Guy, Bob’s Burgers, and American Dad! for four more seasons each, extending them through the 2028-29 season. American Dad! also returns to Fox after a stint on TBS. It's not super common for multiple shows to all get the same extension, but Fox is really fighting to keep its crown as the network known for good, fun adult animation.
Hulu is developing a new satirical comedy titled Group Chat with Power’s La La Anthony, starring and producing alongside Kim Kardashian. Under a first-look deal, Kardashian recently signed with 20th Television, and this is her first project in development. The show is being written and EP’d by Black-ish creator Kenya Barris and revolves around five successful women in their 40s who despite appearing to have conquered LA they have loads of secrets and drama all exposed in the… group chat.
Mini Tidbit:
South Park returns July 9 for season 27 on Comedy Central, promising ketamine jokes, government chaos, and a lot of plane crashes. South Park feeds off of our real life events the more insane the better, it looks like it's pretty well fed. Check out this fake out teaser.
How do you say Tudum in Swedish? Netflix has launched a multilingual and subtitle feature for TV (tutorial). This is analogous to the online experience.
Amy Pascal (Former Chairwoman of Sony Pictures), has signed a multi-year first look deal with Amazon MGM for her narrative features under her production company Pascal Pictures. She recently closed a deal with Amazon MGM to produce the upcoming James Bond film.
Brandon Finkelstein is leaving CAA to join Creative Engine Entertainment (Yellowjackets) as VP of Production and Development. He’ll help expand the company under its first-look deal with Fifth Season.
Benny Safdie’s The Smashing Machine, starring Dwayne Johnson as MMA fighter Mark Kerr, premieres October 3 for A24.
THE ACTOR SPOTLIGHT
Val Kilmer, rest in peace. The legendary actor who played everyone from Iceman to Batman passed away at 65.
Kilmer had a profound ability to increase and diffuse tension in a scene because he was unpredictable. Watch Iceman (Kilmer) be just as dangerous as Tom Cruise’s Maverick in Top Gun (1986, scene). Ultimately, Iceman would be Kilmer’s final role, appearing in Top Gun: Maverick (2022). He tells Cruise not to give up, displaying a heartfelt power between two friends that can jump four decades and not miss a beat (clip).
Of course, it is impossible not to mention his turn as Batman in the wonderfully campy Batman Forever (clip). He’s also sensational as Doc Holiday in Tombstone (1993), tactfully avoiding a shootout with his patented intense good humor (clip).
Kilmer starred alongside De Niro and Pacino in the quintessential heist movie Heat (1995) with director Michael Mann paying tribute:
“I always marvelled at the range, the brilliant variability within the powerful current of Val’s possessing and expressing character.”
But Kilmer’s best performance was the unruly poet rockstar who set the screen on fire with his performance as The Doors' troubled lead singer Jim Morrison in Oliver Stone’s The Doors (trailer).
For a chronicle of Kilmer’s energy, good humor, shining charisma, and passion, check out A24’s doc Val (trailer).
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An Apple/A24 collaboration with Juno Temple as the lead? Sign me up!
The English actress is set to star in The Husbands, a new dramedy mystery series recently greenlit by Apple TV+ based on Holly Gramazio’s best-selling novel. The eight episodes will be penned by Miriam Battye (Succession, Beef) with lead director Craig Gillespie (I, Tonya). After her impressive and critically acclaimed performance in the last season of FX’s Fargo (trailer) as a tenacious and badass mother, Temple has proven she can lead her own show.
The Husbands is expected to begin production this fall, shooting entirely in the U.K.
Tidbits:
The upcoming indie drama In Starland starring Sing Sing’s breakout star Clarence Maclin has added Marcus Scribner (Black-ish) and Maxwell Cunningham (Top Dog) in a story about the trials and tribulations of middle age. The film will mark the directorial debut of British actor-turned-filmmaker Ray Panthaki (The Serpent Queen). The feel-good, small-town drama is currently in pre-production.
Harvard was hard. High school was harder! Amazon Prime Video has dropped a first look image of Lexi Minetree as the young Elle Woods in Elle a Legally Blonde prequel series expected to premiere by the end of the year.
INDIE FILMMAKER SPOTLIGHT / INTERNATIONAL NEWS
There’s a long line of films where kids’ drawings become real.
This includes Blumhouse’s Imaginary (2024) and Focus Features’ Come Play (2020). But rare is the film that does it with such charm, like the TIFF Special Presentation’s Sketch, which just got picked up by Angel Studios.
Synopsis:
A single dad (Veep’s Tony Hale) is swept up in an insane adventure when his daughter’s comically dark drawings come to life and terrorize their small town.
Seth Worley, who makes his feature debut, stated:
“It’s Inside Out meets Jurassic Park. It challenges stigmas surrounding grief and explores childhood emotions, the darker places they can go, and how we live our lives in the wake of trauma.”
Angel Studios will release theatrically Aug 6th (trailer).
In their Cinemacon presentation yesterday they also announced:
Testament - trailer - Release date: Summer 2025
WW2 film Truth & Treason - trailer - Release date: Oct 17
Zero A.D. - trailer - Release date: Dec 19
Angel Studios’ films have grossed $360M in the last two years.
Sundance darling, Magic Farm, finally has a trailer: Chloë Sevigny stars in the satirical film directed by Amalia Ulman about an American documentary crew that descends on rural Argentina to expose pesticide dangers, only to create chaos while fabricating a viral music trend. The trailer has some of that early 2000s indie charm bursting at its seams, but the dark undercurrent strips it of anything twee. It could end up being a cult classic.
Ron Howard’s survival thriller Eden, starring Jude Law, Ana de Armas, and others, has been acquired by Vertical for U.S. release. Inspired by true events, the film follows three groups seeking paradise on the Galápagos Islands. It will be released in the US theatrically on August 22. International trailer here.
I love the smell of fresh Dinosaurs in the morning. That’s the vibe we’re getting from Primitive War about the leader of a Vietnam recon unit (Jeremy Piven) and his troops that try to find a missing platoon in the jungle and end up fighting dinosaurs. The trailer, impressively, shows real Vietnam grit, and the dinosaur CGI looks pretty solid. So grab your Born to Kill helmet and Colonel Kurtz popcorn bucket, throw up your hands like Willem Dafoe, and watch the trailer.
Tidbits:
Corazón Films (MX distribution for: John Wick 4 joins Talking to a Stranger, a Guadalajara-shot supernatural horror film by Adrián García Bogliano, starring Gigi Saul Guerrero in her first lead role. Co-produced with Mórbido and Prismaticos Films, it explores grief and haunting loss. Corazón handles global sales and distribution.
Saul Venit, BBC Studios’ long-serving COO Scripted, is departing after nearly 25 years. He played a key role in growing scripted content, notably at Lookout Point. Some duties will shift to Finance Director Ian McBain.
ON THIS DAY
1968. Planet of the Apes opens in the US.
See you Friday!
Written by Gabriel Miller, Spencer Carter, and Madelyn Menapace.
Editor: Gabriel Miller.
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