‘Air’: Ben Affleck and Matt Damon’s Nike Movie’s Surprise Premiere Spoiled

Ben Affleck and Matt Damon’s new movie will make its world premiere very soon. According to Variety, the movie Air will screen to the public for the first time at SXSW as the festival’s closing night film on March 18. Variety says the SXSW website have TBA listed under the Closing Night Special Screening at Paramount Theatre at 6:30 p.m. local time. 

Air is set to be released in theatres on April 5. And as the official synopsis states, Air “reveals the unbelievable game-changing partnership between a then-rookie Michael Jordan and Nike’s fledgling basketball division which revolutionized the world of sports and contemporary culture with the Air Jordan brand. This moving story follows the career-defining gamble of an unconventional team with everything on the line, the uncompromising vision of a mother who knows the worth of her son’s immense talent, and the basketball phenom who would become the greatest of all time.”

Affleck and Damon are reuniting as Nike founder Phil Knight and Sonny Vaccaro, respectively. Viola Davis stars as Jordan’s mother while the rest of the cast features, Jason Bateman, Chris Messina, Chris Tucker and Julius Tennon. The Jordan character will not appear in the film. Affleck is directing the film, and the script is written by Alex Convery. Damon and Affleck are producers of the film along with David Ellison, Jesse Sisgold, Jon Weinbachby, Madison Ainley, Jeff Robinov, Peter Guber, and Jason Michael Berman. Executive producers are Dana Goldberg, Don Granger, Kevin Halloran, Michael Joe, Drew Vinton, John Graham, Peter E. Strauss and Jordan Moldo.

“Matt and I are very excited for audiences to see AIR and proud that it’s the first release from Artists Equity,” Affleck said in a statement back in January. “The movie was an extraordinary experience where we had the honor of working with some of the best cast and crew in the business, all of whom brought passion, persistence, and creativity to a collective effort at recreating a remarkable and aspirational story. 

“I appreciate and value Jen Salke’s faith in our ability to execute on and deliver a movie we are proud of, as well as her and Sue Kroll’s incredible ongoing support of the film. Amazon Studios, Skydance and Mandalay were all critical to getting this done, and the film couldn’t have been made without them.  We value the steps it took on each of their parts to make it happen and want to thank them. This was the best creative and personal experience of our lives and we look forward to many more like it.”