Culture 3 min read By Morgan Griffin
A24 takes fantasy epic Elden Ring to AFM as biggest standalone market project
A24's video game adaptation Elden Ring is heading to the American Film Market with a budget reportedly between $175 million and $200 million, and Amazon has joined the project starring Kit Connor.
A24’s fantasy adaptation of the video game Elden Ring is heading to the American Film Market, where it will be offered as the biggest-budget standalone project ever put on sale at a film or television market. Deadline reported the news exclusively, citing sources who put the budget between $175 million and $200 million, with the higher figure considered closer to the mark.
That figure would place the project beyond previous tentpole productions that have been shopped at industry marketplaces. Market presentations are typically where sellers and distributors pitch films to international buyers before they are finished, so the decision to bring a project of this scale to the American Film Market signals how seriously its backers are approaching international sales. The market, held each year in Santa Monica, California, draws buyers, sellers and financiers from around the world, and presenting a project there suggests the partners are seeking pre-sales and financing before the film is completed.
Amazon has also come aboard the film, which stars Kit Connor. The involvement of a major streaming and studio player alongside A24, the independent company known for distinctive genre and auteur-driven films, marks a notable partnership for a property drawn from one of the most closely watched action role-playing games in recent years. The Deadline report frames the sale as the headline fact of the market, and the combination of a studio-scale budget and two very different financing partners is what sets the project apart from other titles being shopped there.
Elden Ring, developed by FromSoftware and released in 2022, became a global hit with critics and players. Its dark, sprawling fantasy world has given the adaptation a large built-in audience, and that existing fan base is a central reason buyers are likely to take the project seriously. Video game adaptations have long struggled to win over critics, but a recent wave of high-profile projects has encouraged studios to invest heavily in them, and this film will be measured against that record.
The scale of the budget also raises the stakes for how the film will be sold. At $175 million to $200 million, the project would need strong international pre-sales to share the financial risk, which is precisely the work a market like the American Film Market is designed to do. Whether buyers respond with the same enthusiasm as the fan community will determine how the financing comes together in the months ahead.
For now, the reported budget, the presence of Amazon and the casting of Kit Connor define the project as one of the most ambitious bets in the current independent-plus-streamer financing landscape. Its progress through the market will indicate how buyers view the appetite for large-scale fantasy built on game intellectual property.
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