Mister Smith unveils footage of The Fifth Estate

David Garrett’s new sales powerhouse Mister Smith Entertainment presented for the first time at CineEurope this morning, representing the international rights to the slates of DreamWorks and Constantin. (Mister Smith has a slew of output deals for the companies with key independent distributors across Europe, and is showcasing the product here to European exhibitors)

Mister Smith, launched by former Summit executive Garrett just over a year ago, has offices in London, Paris and Los Angeles.

DreamWorks’ Steven Spielberg and Stacey Snider introduced their slate with a videotaped message and Spielberg said “Mister Smith has delivered….by aligning us with the best foreign distributors.”

The presentation included about 15 minutes of footage from Bill Condon’s Wikileaks film The Fifth Estate,starring Benedict Cumberbatch as Julian Assange. The company also showed the world premiere of the new trailer for Delivery Man, the family comedy starring Vince Vaughn that Ken Scott directs as the English-language remake of his French Canadian hit Starbuck. Garrett noted that the film had been testing very well in the US, where it launches Nov 22.

Mister Smith also showed behind-the-scenes footage from the making of Need For Speed, which is based on the hugely successful Electronic Arts game and counts Ford as a partner. Aaron Paul stars for director Scott Waugh, who himself comes from a family of stunt drivers.  Garrett noted that all the driving stunts in the film are real, not created with CGI. It will release in 2014 and is planned as the start of a new franchise. Waugh said in his video message: “This movie eeds to be accurate and authentic to car racing culture.” He added that Aaron Paul reminded him of “the next Steve McQueen.”

From Constantin, Garrett welcomed actor Jamie Campbell Bower on stage in Barcelona to introduce a trailer and scene from The Mortal Instruments: City of Bones. The series of young adult books by Cassandra Clare have sold more than 22 million copies. Harold Zwart directs the film, which Sony Screen Gems launches in the US on Aug 21. Lily Collins stars alongside Campbell Bower, who noted that the cast would go on a seven-territory promotional tour for the first film before starting to shoot the second.

Disney previews new Thor, Captain America films

On Wednesday afternoon, Disney’s CineEurope presentation was led by a never-before-seen production featurette for Thor: The Dark World. As with The Avengers, the film will launch in Europe before the US (it starts rolling out in October). Alan Taylor (Game of Thrones) directs and Chris Hemsworth again stars as Thor.

The studio also showed footage and behind-the-scenes footage from Captain America The Winter Soldier, which launches in spring 2014. Production artwork was revealed for new sidekick Falcon, played by Anthony Mackie. Director Joe Russo said in a taped interview: “It’s going to be much grittier than any Marvel movie to date.”

The studio is of course also working on Star Wars Episode 7 to launch in 2015, with Michael Arndt (Toy Story 3) now writing the script.

A scene from Saving Mr Banks starring Tom Hanks and Emma Thompson was also revealed. The film, about the author of Mary Poppins negotiating with Walt Disney on the film version, is expected to be an awards-season contender, it launches in December.

Muppets Most Wanted had an intro from Kermit to introduce a sneak peak that shows the Muppets travelling around Europe. The human cast includes Ricky Gervais, Tina Fey and Ty Burrell. Oscar winner Bret McKenzie returns to handle the music.

Disney also screened a behind-the-scenes featurette for Maleficent starring Angelina Jolie, which launches in summer 2014.

From Pixar, the slate includes The Good Dinosaur, Pixar’s 15th film which will launch in summer 2014, and Pete Docter’s next film Inside Out, still in very early production, about the emotions inside a young girl’s head.

DisneyToon offers Planes (which screened in full at CineEurope), Tinker Bell & The Pirate Fairy and Frozen, which was previewed with several scenes.

The studio screened The Lone Ranger this morning for exhibitors.

Sony touts Captain Phillips, Smurfs 2

Sony’s presentation on Wednesday evening showed trailers for White House Down, Grown Ups 2 (with a cast now including Taylor Lautner), Insidious Chapter 2 and Carrie. Extra footage was shown from 2 Guns andCloudy With a Chance of Meatballs 2 and Sony also offered a scene from This Is The End, which is already on release in the US.

Captain Phillips, the Paul Greengrass-Tom Hanks project about Somali pirates hijacking a ship, was touted with an extended trailer.

The studio showed a 2D trailer of its 3D epic Stalingrad by Fedor Bondarchuk, and also previwed a handful of scenes from The Smurfs 2 as well as for Elysium.

Footage from Morgan Spurlock’s One Direction This Is Us showed interviews with the band members and their families plus concert footage and life on the road.

Sony confirmed that in 2014 and beyond its slate will include:

• a reimagining of Robocop to star The Killing’s US star Joel Kinnaman, Samuel L Jackson and Gary Oldman;
• The Equalizer starring Denzel Washington;
• Annie starring Quvenzhané Wallis and Jamie Foxx;
• Sex Tape starring Cameron Diaz and Jason Segel;
• a Nazi-fighting thriller starring Brad Pitt and Shia LeBeouf directed by David Ayers;
• 21 Jump Street 2.

The Amazing Spider-Man 2 will launch in 2014 with Jamie Foxx joining the cast as villain Electro. The project has just started shooting. Sony has also confirmed the next Spider-Man instalments for June 2016 and May 2018.

Harkness goes for the fold

In other news from CienEurope’s closing day, cinema screen manufacturer Harkness Screens has launched its Foldable Perlux digital screens. These are manufactured at its European plant in Amilly, France. These screens can be folded instead of rolled.

Tony Dilley, head of international sales at Harkness Screens said: “With the costs of packaging and transportation continuing to rise across Europe, we recognised a need to assist our customers in managing budgets.   

“Adding  foldable options of our Perlux® Digital 140, 180 and 220 products to our range means that we now have white gain screens available in a format that will help dramatically lower packing and transportation costs compared to traditional screen distribution. 

“Aligned to the cost savings, these screens, which ship inside a box are much more easily manoeuvrable into the auditorium making the installation process potentially less awkward and expensive.”