Sony rallies big-screen hopes with 'Spider-Man', 'Ghostbusters'

CinemaCon -- which typically sees Hollywood studios bring glitzy stars and never-before-seen footage to a Las Vegas casino to woo theater bosses -- did not take place at all last year as the pandemic shuttered cinemas around the world.

But with nearly 90 percent of domestic theaters now back open, Sony Pictures used its opening night presentation slot at Caesars Palace to set the tone for a returning event that is determined to prove the future of the big screen.

Studio bosses showed a new trailer for its much-anticipated "Spider-Man: No Way Home" superhero sequel, before previewing "Ghostbusters: Afterlife" -- a heavily nostalgic follow-up to the 1984 supernatural comedy classic -- in full to a rapturous crowd.

"Over the last 19 months, there's been a lot of doom and gloom," said Josh Greenstein, president of Sony's motion pictures division.

"But we know movie theaters, and the theatrical movie experience, will triumph," he added.

The presentation also squeezed in brief footage of "Bullet Train" starring Brad Pitt, and future superhero fare including a sequel to "Venom," and "Morbius."

Clips from Denzel Washington's "A Journal for Jordan" and a movie adaptation of bestselling novel "Where the Crawdads Sing" produced by Reese Witherspoon were also shown, before a longer "Spider-Man" trailer teased how the film will tie in with other popular Marvel characters including Benedict Cumberbatch's "Doctor Strange."

Attendees then settled in for "Ghostbusters: After Life," introduced by its director Jason Reitman and his father Ivan, who directed the original. 

Plot details are under strict embargo, but the film, set almost four decades after the first movie, finds young descendants of the original's wise-cracking ghoul hunters picking up the mantle -- and vacuum backpack.