The Super Bowl is as good event as any to launch films about professional sports, and two such upcoming films from MGM set for this Spring are using the opportunity – though neither has anything to do with American football.
First up Michael B. Jordan makes his directorial debut with “Creed III” – the first film in the “Rocky” franchise without its creator, Sylvester Stallone, involved. The new film sees a time jump of five years ahead with Adonis Creed (Jordan) at a pivotal time well into his professional career.
He ends up facing off against a recently released from prison childhood friend named Damian Anderson (Jonathan Majors) in the ring. Tessa Thompson, Wood Harris, Florian Munteanu, and Felicia Rashad reprise their roles from earlier entries.
Selenis Leyva, Thaddeus J. Mixson, Spence Moore II, Mila Davis-Kent, and Canelo Álvarez also star in “Creed III” which is set to hit cinemas on March 3rd.
Also out is a TV spot for the Ben Affleck-directed and Matt Damon-led sports merchandising drama “Air” which is set to release on April 5th.
The story centers on real-life shoe salesman Sonny Vaccaro (Damon) and how he led Nike in its pursuit of then mostly unknown basketball phenom Michael Jordan – it was an endorsement deal that ended up changing sport and fashion forever and turned Nike into one of the biggest corporate names on the planet.
Affleck plays Nike founder Phil Knight, Viola Davis is Jordan’s mother, whilst Jason Bateman, Chris Messina, Matthew Maher, Marlon Wayans, Jay Mohr, Julius Tennon and Chris Tucker round out the cast. Affleck helms from a screenplay by Alex Convery.
The project will have a wide release on over 3,000 screens domestically along with an exclusive theatrical window ahead of an Amazon Prime Video release later in the year. Affleck and Damon are producing along with Peter Guber and Jason Michael Berman for Amazon Studios and Skydance Sports.
