Godzilla is already the King of the Monsters — and on Tuesday morning, Japan’s most famous kaiju stomped all over CinemaCon. GKIDS Films opened the event’s second day with a first look at Godzila Minus Zero, director Takashi Yamazaki’s follow-up to 2023’s global hit Godzilla Minus One. The filmmaker brought a pint-sized Godzilla with him onstage to thank theater owners with making the original a success story in the U.S. as well as internationally.
And Godzilla Minus One didn’t just succeed commercially; it also made history by becoming the first Japanese-language film to win the Best Visual Effects statuette at the 2024 Oscars, beating out such made-in-Hollywood blockbusters as Marvel’s Guardians of the Galaxy, Vol. 3 and Tom Cruise’s Mission: Impossible: Dead Reckoning. In order to raise the giant lizard’s game for the second installment, Yamazaki took a page from Christopher Nolan and filmed the new movie with Imax cameras — another first for Japanese cinema.
“This film is going to be a direct sequel to Godzilla Minus One,” the filmmaker revealed of Godzilla Minus Zero, adding that the main characters — Kōichi Shikishima (Ryunosuke Kamiki) and Noriko Ōishi (Minami Hamabe) — from the previous installment will be back as well.
“In the previous film, postwar Japan was driven down to minus by Godzilla’s attack,” Yamazaki continued. “People struggled to rise again and move towards the future. But in this film, an even deeper despair will be visited upon Japan and the Shikishima family. When. faced with overwhelming force, how wil people fight back? The journey from Minus to Zero will not be an easy one.”
Godzilla Minus Zero comes to U.S. screens on Nov. 6, but a first-look teaser for the film revealed that the title character is crossing the Pacific, too. The final shot teases Godzilla approaching the Statue of Liberty, suggesting that post-World War II America is about to get its own kaiju invasion. Based on the beyond-enthused reaction in the room, U.S. audiences are ready to roll out the red carpet for our conquering monster royalty.
Neon brings Cannes to 2027 Oscar race
Godzilla is a tough act to follow, but fortunately the morning’s second presenter, Neon, knows a thing or two about how to turn international and indie fare into Oscar frontrunners. The distribution company has previously managed Bong Joon Ho’s Parasite and Sean Baker’s Anora to Best Picture victories, and it scored 18 nominations — making it the industry’s second-most-nominated studio — during the 2026 awards cycle courtesy of global titles like Sentimental Value, It Was Just an Accident and The Secret Agent. (It should be noted that Neon went 1-for-18 on Oscar night, though, only picking up the Best International Feature statuette for Sentimental Value.)
A regular presence at the Cannes Film Festival, Neon confirmed that it will be releasing several of the most hotly anticipated Croisette premieres in 2026, including one title that they just acquired last week. That would be Hope, a South Korean feature from director Na Hong-jin described onstage as a “pulse-pounding sci-fi action thriller,” and starring Michael Fassbender and Alicia Vikander alongside Korean stars Hwang Jung-min and Zo In-sung.
Bowing in Cannes as one of the films vying for the Palme d’Or, Hope is closer to a rip-roaring action movie like The Host or Godzilla Minus One than a social commentary-laden thriller like Parasite. The trailer set viewers down in a remote village close to the DMZ separating North and South Korea that’s being ravaged by a creature from the skies. Scheduled to premiere in the summer in its native land, Hope is likely going to be a fall release in the U.S.
On the prestige side of the Cannes scale, Neon has the rights to Fjord, the latest feature from Palme d’Or winning Romanian director, Cristian Mungiu. Starring recent Oscar nominees Renate Reinsve and Sebastian Stan, the drama is an early favorite in the race for the festival’s top prize. And the company is also releasing All of a Sudden, the latest feature from Japanese auteur Ryusuke Hamaguchi. Filmed in Paris, the movie follows a nursing home director (Virginie Efira) who befriends a playwright (Tao Okamoto) with a terminal illness. Hamaguchi made history in 2022 by becoming the third Japanese director to score a Best Director nomination and the first to helm a Best Picture nominee, making All of a Sudden a movie that demands attention in Cannes and beyond.
Sticking closer to home, Neon brought out director Boots Riley and LaKeith Stanfield to spotlight the rip-roaring satire I Love Boosters, which premiered at SXSW last month. “I’m doing my best work in this film, and I’m lucky enough to believe I have LaKeith doing the best work in this film as well,” the filmmaker said, tracing the origins of the film back to 2006 when he wrote a song about the fringes of the fashion world that takes center stage in the movie. “What I’m trying to do is take people through these visceral experiences. I want people to feel like this is an amusement park ride.”
A specially cut CinemaCon clip reels showed off the film’s stylized production values with eye-catching set design, costuming and hair and make-up that could make Boosters an out of the box crafts contender. “People are already dressing in monochrome outfits,” Riley said, relaying what he’s seen from I Love Boosters‘ ongoing college screening road tour. And it’s clear that supporting player Demi Moore is leaning into her outsized villain role as the fashion company icon that Keke Palmer’s Robin Hood-like booster crew target. It’s a performance that may just have the style and substance to vault her back into the Oscar race.
One awards wild card is Neon’s December release, A Place in Hell, the sophomore feature from writer-director Chloe Domont, who made a big splash at Sundance’s 2023 edition with the financial world thriller Fair Play. That erotically charged movie was acquired by Netflix and vanished into the streamer’s algorithm before it could score any Oscar traction, despite acclaimed performances by stars Alden Ehrenreich and Phoebe Dynevor.
A Place in Hell finds Domont leaving Wall Street behind for a legal thriller that has an All About Eve twist. Michelle Williams plays a high-powered lawyer who is particularly skilled at torpedoing #MeToo cases. But as the expectant mother prepares to take maternity leave, she discovers that her boss (Danny Huston) plans to bring in a newer, younger legal eagle (Daisy Edgar-Jones) who he sees as a rising star. Faster than you can say “Margo Channing,” Williams decides to make the new girl’s life hell… only to learn that Edgar-Jones is equally cunning. “If you think you can push me out of the way, then I would advise you to take a bigger swing,” the Twisters star warns her co-lead at one point during the teaser trailer.
A five-time Oscar nominee, Williams bring Glenn Close-in-Fatal Attraction energy to the teaser trailer that played for the CinemaCon crowd — a role that netted Close her own Best Actress nomination in 1988. While Neon seems to be positioning A Place in Hell as a Housemaid-style box office breakout for the holiday season, don’t count out the affection the industry has for the Brokeback Mountain star. Maybe there will be a place for Williams in the 2026 Oscar race.
