Paramount Pictures put on a show at CinemaCon Thursday morning. Not only did they have an opening number to celebrate “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem,” a surprise in-person appearance from “The Smurf Movie” star and producer Rihanna, but made some noise announcing “Transformers One,” the first animated “Transformers” movie in decades, as well as the expected sequel to “Smile.” And the studio brought more than just a new trailer for “Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One,” they screened 20 minutes from one of the summer’s most anticipated releases.
READ MORE: ‘Killers Of The Flower Moon’ New Images
Paramount Pictures chairman Brian Robbins shared that producer and star Tom Cruise, who couldn’t be there today (sure), wanted everyone to know the portion shown was specifically not from the beginning of the film. So, keep that in mind.
The sneak began with Grace (Hayley Atwell) seemingly arrested and appearing in front of an Italian police officer who has at least eight different passports with her photo on them. Grace plays coy, insisting she is just a school teacher from Briton on vacation. She’s soon escorted away to a library where Ethan Hunt (Cruise) is pretending to be someone in the police force meant to question her. A rogue agent, Grace reveals she was hired by someone to steal a key, a key that the film’s villain (Esai Morales, seems miscast) is desperate to get his hands on. While Morales’ character confronts the police officer we met previously, Grace and Hunt find themselves on the run from Morales’ character’s forces.
What insues is probably the most intentionally funny car chase – with Cruise involved at least – in the “Mission: Impossible” franchise to date. On the run from both Morales and what we assume is a CIA or IMF agent Jasper Briggs (Shea Wingham), Grace and Hunt try to drive multiple vehicles while handcuffed to each other. Things get even funnier when Hunt tracks down an IMF safe car which turns out to be a super tiny yellow Fiat. Hayley and Cruise have fantastic chemistry (when does Hayley not shine on screen?) and director Christopher McQuarrie is having a lot of fun in what could be just another car chase around Rome’s famed Colosseum.
The other footage that impressed during Paramount’s presentation was for the Michael Sarnoski-directed “A Quiet Place: Day One.” Introduced by producer and “A Quiet Place” helmer John Krasinski, the prequel footage finds Lupita Nyong’o on a New York City bus trying to take a nap. When the bus stops, an asteroid (or meteor) crashes through the back of it leaving a crater in the middle of Manhattan. Everyone on the city streets looks up and sees hundreds, maybe thousands of meteors falling in the sky. The aliens are coming to the greater New York City area and the residents don’t even know it. Eventually, the footage segues to Nyong’o’s character trying to escape the carnage including a run-in with another character who quickly realizes you need to be silent to avoid the alien monsters. It’s inherently a louder movie, but the tension was palpable even for a prequel.
Robbins also introduced the one and only Martin Scorcese, who was on hand to introduce the trailer for “Killers of the Flower Moon.” Debuting at the Cannes Film Festival in just a few weeks, Scorsese emphasized that the Apple Original Films production (Paramount is just a distributor) was meant for the “big screen.” The preview itself sets up the storyline and conflicts pretty succinctly. Leonardo DiCaprio plays Ernest Burkhard, a white man married to a Native American woman, Mollie (Lily Gladstone), on the Osage reservation in Oklahoma in the 1920s. Oil has been discovered on the tribe’s land and they are thriving because of it. When gangsters and ruthless businessmen arrive, murder and chaos ensue. Robert DeNiro plays the real-life historical figure William Hale, who will kill anyone to gain the oil rights he wants. Jesse Plemmons also appears as another historical figure, Tom White, an FBI agent investigating the murders. A mix of history, violence, and, well, organized crime, “Killers” appears right up Scorcese’s alley. The film may hinge, however, on the chemistry between DiCaprio and Gladstone’s characters.
Other films previewed included Krasinski’s family film “If” (its success may ride on Ryan Reynolds’ shoulders), “Transformers: Rise of Beasts” (aren’t we tired of this yet?), and “Bob Marley One Love” (Kingsley Ben-Adir is captivating as Marley), which looks like it “could” sneak into awards season as a late limited December release.