What Happens in Vegas: THR’s Hot List of the Buzziest Movies at AFM

Producers and distributors heading to Las Vegas for this year’s American Film Market, which runs Nov. 5-10, are betting big that indie action is primed for a comeback.

The AFM was built on action movies — the leading independent film bazaar launched in 1981 at the start of a decade defined by the cinematic stylings of Sylvester Stallone and Arnold Schwarzenegger, Steven Segal, Chuck Norris and Jean-Claude Van Damme. But in recent markets, with the headline-grabbing success of breakouts like Neon’s Longlegs and Cineverse’s Terrifier 3, action has taken a backseat to horror.

There will be scares-a-plenty at AFM 2024, but many of the market’s buzziest projects sit squarely in the action space. Even a few that don’t star Liam Neeson, Gerard Butler, Jason Statham or Nic Cage. How buyers respond to this new generation of would-be action stars — Daisy Ridley, Amber Midthunder, Alan Ritchson — will determine who will be toting the guns on the AFM posters of the future.

But the AFM isn’t just about genre movies. The Hollywood Reporter‘s annual hot list of the most interesting sales titles on offer features a little something for everyone, from art-house dramas with Zendaya, Robert Pattinson and Jessica Chastain, to an adult animated musical featuring singing sperm.

Alpha Gang

DIRECTORS David and Nathan Zellner
STARS Cate Blanchett, Dave Bautista, Steven Yeun, Zoë Kravitz, Léa Seydoux, Riley Keough, Channing Tatum
BUZZ The Zellner Brothers’ follow-up to their wacky Bigfoot comedy Sasquatch Sunset was already a hot title at the Cannes market when MK2 kicked off pre-sales with only the pitch — a twisted take on the 1950s alien invasion movie featuring extraterrestrials disguised as a 1950s leather-clad biker gang — and double Oscar winner Blanchett on board. Coming into AFM, Alpha Gang has upped the ante with an all-star supporting cast.
SALES MK2, CAA Media Finance

Assassination

DIRECTOR Barry Levinson
STARS Jessica Chastain, Brendan Fraser, Bryan Cranston, Al Pacino
BUZZ Wag the Dog director Levinson helms the A-list cast in this David Mamet-penned mystery thriller with a new angle on the JFK assassination conspiracy, following Dorothy Kilgallen (Chastain), America’s first female crime reporter, who questions if Lee Harvey Oswald acted alone.
SALES Concord Studios

Break the Cycle

DIRECTOR Devonte Brown
STARS Cuba Gooding Jr., Vivica A. Fox, Loretta Devine
BUZZ The first project from ex-NBA player Jarnell Stokes’ Stoked Bros Media, and part of a three-film slate being co-produced and co-financed with German group ORWO, will test the current global appetite for indie urban thrillers with a story of two brothers — one striving for the NBA and the other entangled in street crime.
SALES ORWO

By Any Means

DIRECTOR Elegance Bratton
STARS Mark Wahlberg, Sterling K. Brown
BUZZ Period drama can be a tough sell at AFM but this based-on-a-true story tale has a significant genre edge, with the story of a mafia hitman (Wahlberg), hired off the books by the FBI who partners with a young Black special agent (Brown) to hunt down the murderers of civil rights leaders in 1966 Mississippi.
SALES North.Five.Six, WME Independent, CAA Media Finance

Chariot

DIRECTOR Steve Pink
STARS Kit Harington, Billy Magnussen
BUZZ An out-there comedy from the Hot Tub Time Machine helmer whose plot — an oversized jockey seeking redemption teams up with a Centaur to compete in the Grand National — just might be weird enough to work with global buyers.
SALES The Exchange

Cleaner

DIRECTOR Martin Campbell
STARS Daisy Ridley, Clive Owen, Taz Skylar
BUZZ Straight-up action with a social conscience from Casino Royale helmer Campbell, with Star Wars alum Ridley playing an ex-soldier turned window cleaner who goes Die Hard when radical activists hijack an energy company’s swanky gala in the skyscraper she’s squeegeeing. Ninety stories up she has to save the hostages while also bringing the corrupt energy moguls to justice.
SALES Anton Corp

Day Drinker

DIRECTOR Marc Webb
STARS Johnny Depp, Penélope Cruz
BUZZ Pirates of the Caribbean co-stars Depp and Cruz re-team for this action thriller from Amazing Spider-Man director Webb and John Wick producers Basil Iwanyk and Erica Lee. A project that will test the market for a mainstream Depp comeback after his forays into international period indies like Jeanne du Barry, in which he co-starred, and Modi: Three Days on the Wing of Madness, which he directed.
SALES Lionsgate

The Drama

DIRECTOR Kristoffer Borgli
STARS Zendaya, Robert Pattinson, Mamoudou Athie, Alana Haim
BUZZ The plot of The Drama is shrouded in mystery, but the idea of Zendaya and Robert Pattinson in a film from Dream Scenario director Kristoffer Borgli should be sufficient to pique the interest of speciality buyers worldwide.
SALES A24

Dreams

DIRECTOR Michel Franco
STARS Jessica Chastain, Rupert Friend, Isaac Hernández
BUZZ A pure art-house play, Dreams comes with the above-the-line rep of Mexican helmer Franco, fresh off his Venice Festival winner Memory, reteaming with the film’s star Chastain, who here plays a wealthy socialite who embarks on a romance with a Mexican ballet dancer (Hernández).
SALES The Match Factory, Gersh

Eye for an Eye

DIRECTOR Colin Tilley
STARS Whitney Peak, S. Epatha Merkerson, Golda Rosheuvel, Finn Bennett
BUZZ The feature debut of top music video director Tilley promises the visual flare to complement its Gen Z-friendly cast to appeal to high-end horror buyers, with a tale of a tormented soul who exacts revenge on bullies in the Florida swamplands.
SALES HanWay, WME

Fairytale in New York

DIRECTOR Jalmari Helander
STARS Ke Huy Quan
BUZZ A holiday actioner to stuff the Die Hard-sized hole in every indie distributor’s stocking, this adrenaline pumper sees the Everything Everywhere All At Once star playing a New York cabbie forced to face down a gang of thugs to retrieve a stolen gift and reconnect with his estranged son on Christmas Eve.
SALES Lionsgate

Faster Than Horses

DIRECTOR James Erskine
STARS Ansel Elgort
BUZZ A twist on the survival thriller genre with Baby Driver and Tokyo Vice star Elgort playing a runner in the grueling Marathon des Sables ultramarathon across the Sahara Desert who gets engulfed in a sandstorm. Survival expert Bear Grylls is producing.
SALES Upgrade Productions, CAA Media Finance

Hammer Down

DIRECTOR Simon Hatt
STARS Idris Elba
BUZZ A straight-down-the-middle action movie to feed the global machine from the James Gunn-mentored Hatt (a co-producer on Suicide Squad) which sees Elba as a big rig truck driver with no qualms about delivering “packages” for shady customers. Until, on the day he brings his daughter along for a ride, his truck is attacked by a group of criminals determined to steal his illicit load.
SALES Black Bear

The Housekeeper

DIRECTOR Richard Eyre
STARS Uma Thurman, Phoebe Dynevor, Anthony Hopkins
BUZZ A top-shelf period drama of the sort theatrical buyers, particularly in Europe, are hungry for, this 1930s-set feature from Notes on a Scandal and Iris director Eyre imagines a fictionalized origin story for Daphne du Maurier’s novel Rebecca in which the young novelist (played by Dynevor) enters into a heated tangled love affair with a Polish housekeeper (Thurman) who works for the wealthy and widowed Lord DeWithers (Hopkins).
SALES Embankment Films, CAA Media Finance

I Love Boosters

DIRECTOR Boots Riley
STARS Eiza González, Poppy Liu,, Taylour Paige, Will Poulter
BUZZ Art-house buyers will be scoping out Riley’s hotly anticipated feature follow-up to 2018 cross-over hit Sorry to Bother You, which follows a ring of enterprising shoplifters — aka boosters — who take aim at a cutthroat fashion maven.
SALES Neon

John Cranko

DIRECTOR Joachim A. Lang
STARS Sam Riley
BUZZ The artist biopic, with its built-in audience of fans and clear marketing hooks, remains an indie film favorite. Beta is looking to score with this cinematic, dance-infused tribute to virtuoso choreographer John Cranko (Control star Sam Riley), who, after being prosecuted for homosexuality in the U.K., fled to Stuttgart, where he became a pop star of the dance world.
SALES Beta Cinema

Kill the Jockey

DIRECTOR Luis Ortega
STARS Nahuel Pérez Biscayart, Ursula Corberó
BUZZ One for the weird crowd, this surreal comedy-thriller from Argentinian director Luis Ortega follows a jockey (BPM star Nahuel Pérez Biscayart) who discovers his feminine side after a devastating accident. The film is too oddball for the multiplex but its deft genre mash-up — switching lanes from pulpy gangster movie to gender confusion drama to full-on farce — could appeal to adventurous art-house house buyers.
SALES Protagonist Pictures

Kraken

DIRECTOR Pål Øie
BUZZ Norway, as shown in Netflix hit Troll, knows its way around a creature feature. This new monster movie, from Dark Water director Pål Øie, is targeting the midnight madness crowd and ancillary markets with its combo of Scandinavian folklore and modern ecological concerns in a story of a marine biologist who uncovers a dark secret deep beneath the surface of a fjord.
SALES TrustNordisk

The Light Fantastic

DIRECTOR Chris Cottam
STARS Jeremy Irvine, Rupert Everett, Nathan Stewart-Jarrett, Layton Williams
BUZZ A grown-up take on Billy Elliot, this Brit comedy sees War Horse and Mamma Mia: Here We Go Again actor Irvine playing a gay firefighter who pursues his ballroom dancing dreams, coached by a staunchly traditional instructor, played by Everett.
SALES Cornerstone

Merciless

DIRECTOR Martin Villeneuve
STARS Jonathan Majors, Melanie Liburd, Henry Czerny
BUZZ Jonathan Majors’ first film role following his much-publicized trial and misdemeanor conviction will test the market waters for a comeback by the Loki and Creed III star. The supernatural revenge thriller from Martin “brother of Denis” Villeneuve sees Majors playing a CIA interrogator who is forced to defeat a malevolent force that has overtaken the woman he loves.
SALES K5 International

Monkey Hill

DIRECTOR Sarah Adina Smith
STARS Olivia Wilde, Gael García Bernal
BUZZ Post-Babygirl, the sexy psychological thriller is hotter than ever, suggesting buyers will be lining up for this new feature. Adapted from the Paul Theroux story of the same name, it has Wilde and Bernal playing white-collar criminals hiding out in indulgent luxury in India who unwisely venture beyond the hotel gates that protect them.
SALES Upgrade Productions, 2AM, WME Independent

Painter

DIRECTOR Garrett Warren
STARS Amber Midthunder, Alan Ritchson
BUZZ Arguably the purest action play at AFM this year, this project from John Wick screenwriter Derek Kolstad and stunt-coordinator-turned-director Warren (Logan, Road House) is being set up as a gender-flipped take on Taken, with Midthunder as a young woman with a particular set of skills who has to rescue her father after he is kidnapped.
SALES FilmNation Entertainment, CAA Media Finance

Pendulum

DIRECTOR Mark Heyman
STARS Joseph Gordon-Levitt
BUZZ An elevated genre play for theatrical buyers, this feature from Black Swan writer Mark Heyman (and produced by Darren Aronofsky) sees Gordon-Levitt playing Patrick, a man who travels with his wife to a new age retreat, hoping some unconventional spirituality will heal their trauma, only to be caught up in something far more terrifying.
SALES Black Bear, UTA Independent Film Group, CAA Media Finance, WME Independent

The Performance

DIRECTOR Shira Piven
STARS Jeremy Piven, Robert Carlyle, Adam Garcia, Steven Berkoff, Suzanne Shepherd
BUZZ A pick for upper-end arthouse distributors, this period drama, inspired by an Arthur Miller short story, sees Piven play Harold May, an American Jewish tap dancer in 1930s Berlin whose troupe is scouted to give an exclusive performance for Adolf Hitler.
SALES Alliance Media Partners

Spermageddon

DIRECTORS Tommy Wirkola, Rasmus A. Sivertsen
BUZZ Wirkola has gone from Dead Snow‘s zombie Nazis to singing semen in this raunchy, but surprisingly sweet, animated musical about two sperm cells vying to reach an egg. Set somewhere between a sex-ed film for teens and an X-rated episode of South Park, it could be a tough sell for traditional family buyers but its ballsy premise has the makings of a cult hit.
SALES Charades

Splitsville

DIRECTOR Michael Covino
STARS Dakota Johnson, Adria Arjona, Michael Covino, Kyle Marvin
BUZZ The new comedy from The Climb director Covino has a slick marketing hook, involving a man in a failing relationship who decides to solve matters by trying an open marriage, with disastrous results.
SALES Neon

Untitled Christy Martin

DIRECTOR David Michôd
STARS Sydney Sweeney, Ben Foster, Merritt Wever, Katy O’Brian, Ethan Embry, Jess Gabor, Chad L. Coleman
BUZZ The red-hot Sydney Sweeney pulls on the gloves and steps into the ring for this based-on-a-true story of the 1990s boxing champion Christy Martin.
SALES Black Bear, UTA Independent Film Group, AC Independent

Victorian Psycho

DIRECTOR Zachary Wigon
STARS Margaret Qualley
BUZZ A high-end psychological horror set to stand out from AFM’s ocean of schlock, this re-teaming of Qualley, with her Sanctuary director Wigon sees The Substance star playing a 19th-century psychopathic governess assigned to unsuspecting children in a remote gothic manor.
SALES Anton, UTA Independent Film Group, CAA Media Finance

This story appeared in the Oct. 30 issue of The Hollywood Reporter magazine. Click here to subscribe.