Just a quick one: Sony has confirmed the release date of the fourth Spider-Man film, which will be quietly sneaking into cinemas on May 6th 2011. Sony has also confirmed that, as with the previous films in the franchise, there’ll be an IMAX-format release rolling out on the same day.

Spider-Man 4 is thus set to be the opening film of one of Hollywood’s most packed summers to date. Currently, summer 2011 is looking something like this:

6 May: Spider-Man 4

20 May: Thor

26 May: The Hangover 2

3 June: Kung Fu Panda: The Kaboom Of Doom

17 June: Green Lantern

24 June: Cars 2

1 July: Transformers 3 (announced by Paramount, but there’s some doubt as to whether the film will now arrive in 2011 or 2012)

1 July: Battleship (based on the board game, directed by Hancock’s Peter Berg)

15 July: Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part II

22 July: The First Avenger: Captain America

29 July: The Smurfs

On top of those, Pirates Of The Caribbean 4: On Stranger Tides is definitely arriving in the middle of the summer somewhere (looking at the schedule, either a late May or early July release date seems probable). And there’s also talk of Universal scheduling the fourth Bourne movie in there somewhere too, as well as the sequel to Wanted, which is currently slated for summer 2011.

The scary thing is this is still some distance away from the finished calendar, and we suspect that there are one or two big films yet to be slotted in. It’s unlikely we’ll see a Batman sequel for 2011 – although we can still hope – but would you rule out the fifth Indiana Jones movie arriving?

Might be worth finding a cinema that sells one of those unlimited monthly passes...