Sony and Neon's CinemaCon Report Cards: Plenty of 'Spider-Man' But No 'Zelda,' NWR, Takashi Miike, Or Beatles

It’s Wednesday morning in Las Vegas. Do you know where your pet tiger is?

After listening to Modest Mouse, Explosions in the Sky, Arcade Fire, Interpol, and Stellastarr* on the drive from L.A. to Vegas, I checked into my room at the Flamingo because I didn’t register for a room at Caesar’s Palace in time to use the CinemaCon discount. Womp womp!

The hallways here smell like cigarettes, and thanks to a new law that recently went into effect, there has been construction at 6:30 a.m. both mornings, but besides that, I’m hanging in there and doing just fine. I’ve been hanging with my right-hand man, Jamie Williams, as well as my podcast co-host, John Rocha, and it was great to finally meet Andrew and Jacob from Discussing Film at last night’s swanky Lionsgate party.

I got a late start on the road on Monday, so I missed the indie presentations from Studiocanal, Sony Pictures Classics, and Angel Studios. The Sony Classics slate should probably be rolled into Big Sony’s presentation next year, though, as the separation makes no sense. Focus Features offers up its slate during Universal’s presentation each year, so what’s the difference, really?

I have no clue what went on during the Sony Classics presentation, but the studio is behind I Swear, which hits theaters next weekend and is the best film I’ve seen all year.

Faith-based Angel Studios, which is as smart as any distributor out there these days, has Young Washington, a new movie about a young George Washington that I can’t imagine will be very good, despite having major names like Andy Serkis and Ben Kingsley involved. I’d much rather see a movie about Shane Gillis’ idea of George Washington as a freakishly tall nutcase with horse teeth, or perhaps just a straight-up horror movie called George Slashington, in which a slasher on horseback kills people while wearing a powdered wig.

Finally, Studiocanal made some headlines, announcing reboots of Escape From New York (meh) and The Howling (ripe), and pushing Danny Boyle’s Ink to 2027. That film stars Guy Pearce as media mogul Rupert Murdoch, and I’m told that the footage was genuinely impressive, so I’m bummed to have missed it. Perhaps it’ll be an Oscar contender next year, but with its new date, it has officially been removed from this year’s race.

In this newsletter, you’ll read my thoughts on Sony and Neon’s CinemaCon presentations, and I’m going to try to have my Warner Bros. report card up before Universal’s presentation in a couple of hours. But no promises!

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