By David Poland poland@moviecitynews.com
Circle Of Jerk
The News Releases/BREAKING NEWS Of The Day:
Clooney and Heslov land at Sony – The crazy thing is that much of the media seems to have missed that Clooney (and Soderbergh), who produced via the now deceased Section Eight which was primarily responsible for the birth of the also deceased Warner Independent Pictures, has been out of Warners for a while already.
Since Michael Clayton, Clooney has not had a film at WB. Leatherheads (U), Burn After Reading (Focus), Up in the Air (DW), Men Who Stare At Goats (Overture), The Fantastic Mr Fox (Fox), and A Very Private Gentleman (Focus). Soderbergh’s only film at WB since Ocean’s 13 is The Informant, a $21 million Matt Damon film coming this fall, a leftover from Section Eight… but he’s basically been out for years already.
Paramount Seeks DVD Production Business Share With Others – It may seem like a big deal, but it really, really isn’t. It’s the same idea as the Paramount/MGM/Lionsgate pay-tv venture that never got off the ground. It’s like all the distribution deals that Paramount has, which have created big grosses for media stories and a dangerous combination of light profits on massive hits and a decimated production business (which has NO movies scheduled to start before next year).
This is not a deal to merge libraries or anything like that. It is an effort to save money on infrastructure, just as studios that distribute through Fox or WB do… and not actually a bad idea at all, though I don’t know the hard numbers.
Firings at Paramount – All inevitable. I’m not sure why people are so surprised.
What would be SHOCKING is other Par firings that are being rumored today around town. Some of these choices, if they turn out to be real, would be suicidal, as they go right to the heart of the some of the very few parts of Paramount that actually work right now.
Go on and be David Finke/Nikki Poland for a day, let those rumors fly, and share with your dedicated loyal followers…
Do I hear Marketing or Distribution anyone?
What would be SHOCKING is other Par firings that are being rumored today around town. Some of these choices, if they turn out to be real, would be suicidal, as they go right to the heart of the some of the very few parts of Paramount that actually work right now.