The "mid-budget original film is dead" narrative took another meaningful hit this week.
Deadline reports that Sony has acquired worldwide rights to Skeletons - a creature feature starring Brie Larson, produced by J.J. Abrams, and directed by JT Mollner - in a deal worth $25 million or more. The sale was struck at the European Film Market in Berlin, the annual marketplace that runs alongside the Berlinale and functions as one of the key proving grounds for international pre-sales.
That last part matters. A pre-sale at EFM is not a studio greenlighting a project in development - it is a distributor paying real money for a film that has already been made, or is close enough to completion that they can assess what they're buying. When Sony writes a $25 million check at EFM, they have seen enough of Skeletons to believe it is worth that investment. That is a meaningful vote of confidence in the actual film, not a speculative brand bet.
For Larson, the project represents a deliberate pivot into genre territory. Her post-Marvel career choices have been varied - she returned for The Marvels, which was a commercial disappointment by franchise standards, and has otherwise been selective. A creature feature produced by Abrams is a smart move for an actor looking to demonstrate range outside the superhero industrial complex. Horror and sci-fi genre films are also, notably, among the most reliable theatrical performers: they create the kind of event-movie tension that drives audiences to theaters rather than waiting for the streaming drop.
The Abrams attachment carries its own signal. Bad Robot has a proven track record of genre execution at commercial scale - the Cloverfield franchise, the Mission: Impossible revivals, and a long list of monster-adjacent productions that know exactly what they're doing. Mollner's previous work, Outlaws & Angels, showed an instinct for atmospheric tension that fits the bill.
$25 million for an original, non-IP creature feature is not nothing. It is the kind of number that used to be routine and has become increasingly rare in an era when every greenlight seems to require a pre-existing brand. The fact that Skeletons commanded that figure on the strength of its talent and concept alone is exactly the kind of news the original-film-is-dead crowd needs to hear more often.
