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RIP: Picturehouse, Warner Independent
Today's big disappointing news is the dissolution of two specialty film houses that had really begun to make their mark: Warner Independent and Picturehouse.
WIP had distributed In the Valley of Elah, Good Night, and Good Luck, and A Scanner Darkly, among others, in its four-year existence. Picturehouse, meanwhile, was riding high over the past couple of years with Pan's Labyrinth, King of Kong, and the recent Best Foreign Language Film nominee, Mongol, all on its label.
Variety reports that Warner Bros. is shutting both divisions down in order to cut costs. Just a thought, here: Don't take gambles like Beowulf and 10,000 B.C. That's sure to save you some money.
The announcement, which will lay off a reported 70 jobs within the two companies, is an aftershock of Warner picking up the pieces of New Line, minus about another 500 jobs, and making that brand its lower budget production outlet.
Said Warner President Alan Horn of the changes, "With New Line now a key part of Warner Bros., we're able to handle films across the entire spectrum of genres and budgets without overlapping production, marketing and distribution infrastructures."
"After much painstaking analysis, this was a difficult decision to make, but it reflects the reality of a changing marketplace and our need to prudently run our businesses with increased efficiencies," said the man whose company lost about $60 million on The Invasion.
This is incredibly sad news. Picturehouse and WIP, while not knocking it out of the park as often as Fox Searchlight has, were good at offering different choices, and those choices won't be made by the new Warner Bros./New Line team. Hopefully, the people who helped put those two companies on the map and lost their jobs - through no fault of their own - will land on their feet with other companies willing to take risks for the sake of good storytelling.
WIP had distributed In the Valley of Elah, Good Night, and Good Luck, and A Scanner Darkly, among others, in its four-year existence. Picturehouse, meanwhile, was riding high over the past couple of years with Pan's Labyrinth, King of Kong, and the recent Best Foreign Language Film nominee, Mongol, all on its label.
Variety reports that Warner Bros. is shutting both divisions down in order to cut costs. Just a thought, here: Don't take gambles like Beowulf and 10,000 B.C. That's sure to save you some money.
The announcement, which will lay off a reported 70 jobs within the two companies, is an aftershock of Warner picking up the pieces of New Line, minus about another 500 jobs, and making that brand its lower budget production outlet.
Said Warner President Alan Horn of the changes, "With New Line now a key part of Warner Bros., we're able to handle films across the entire spectrum of genres and budgets without overlapping production, marketing and distribution infrastructures."
"After much painstaking analysis, this was a difficult decision to make, but it reflects the reality of a changing marketplace and our need to prudently run our businesses with increased efficiencies," said the man whose company lost about $60 million on The Invasion.
This is incredibly sad news. Picturehouse and WIP, while not knocking it out of the park as often as Fox Searchlight has, were good at offering different choices, and those choices won't be made by the new Warner Bros./New Line team. Hopefully, the people who helped put those two companies on the map and lost their jobs - through no fault of their own - will land on their feet with other companies willing to take risks for the sake of good storytelling.
Colin Boyd
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