Summer’s heating up with the fall festivals in bloom, with IndieWire off to Venice, Telluride, and Toronto in the coming weeks to assess the new films that will define the fall.
But everyone in the industry has thoughts (or a take) on the latest developments in the stalled Paramount-Warner Bros. merger amid an antitrust lawsuit mounted by 12 Democratic state attorneys general. Exhibition chains including Cinemark, AMC, and Regal have capitulated to David Ellison’s vision, offering their support for the merger despite fears they will have fewer movies to show — even though he’s promising 30 a year from the new mega studio, tied to a projected $30 billion in production spend. For context, in 2025, Warner Bros. spent around $20 billion, with around $15 billion from Paramount.
Consolidation is ahead, as indicated by a new L.A. County study that projects the loss of 4,500 film and TV jobs and a $1.26 billion loss in wages. The merger threatens to push production further abroad amid an already ongoing exodus, as well as to other states with cushy tax incentives. Paramount Skydance CEO Ellison is threatening to move operations out of Los Angeles and California if the deal doesn’t happen.
Elsewhere on the podcast, we catch up on David Robert Mitchell’s “The End of Oak Street,” which has pulled disappointing box office numbers since opening a week ago. But they’re better than tracking initially suggested, especially given that Warner Bros. hasn’t been promoting the crowd-pleasing, knowingly goofy dinosaur disaster movie. Meanwhile, as we previously wrote, Matthew McConaughey-starrer “The Rivals of Amziah King” wasn’t the sleeper hit Black Bear may have hoped for; Anne Thompson finally caught the film, which Ryan first saw back at SXSW 2025.
On the side of recommendations, while co-host Ryan Lattanzio urges you to stay away from “Insidious: Out of the Further,” co-host Anne Thompson hopes audiences catch up on David Lowery’s “Mother Mary,” featuring a spectacular Anne Hathaway performance and now streaming on HBO Max.
Listen to the “Screen Talk” episode below or on your preferred podcast platform.
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