Dennis Toth's thought-provoking musings on film-finance led The Spectrum's blog editor to ask him some questions that have been on her mind around Oscar time…Q: How does film financing most directly affect what we see or don't see in local cinemas? What kinds of things...
As the weekend success of the new Friday the 13th has demonstrated, you seemingly can't go wrong with a horror film. Well, sort of.Despite its $45.2 million dollar take at the box office, the film will redoubtably drop like a rock from here on out....
As reported in Tuesday's edition of Variety, Mickey Mouse has taken a hard dive. OK, the king rodent is not exactly lying flat on the mat, but he is reeling toward the ropes (presumably with some cartoon stars circling around his head). Net income has...
"The Academy will never vote for the comedy crap you make. They only vote for the arty crap."This blunt assessment of the Oscars® by the old Columbia Pictures mogul Harry Cohen was later proven wrong. At the time, he was arguing with the director Frank...
The more things change, the more they seem the same. As the January 12 edition of The New York Times reminded us, Hollywood is in a race for digital 3-D movies in a feverish hope that the new system will beat out bad memories of...
Courtesy of Box Office Mojo, we now have the official (more or less) tally of the year's top ten films. What does this top ten list tell us?The Dark Knight -- $530.8 million (estimated budget $185 million)Iron Man -- $318.3 million (estimated budget...
With Warner Brothers' recent decision to cut their ties with the production of low budget films, 2008 is widely seen as the year that independent filmmaking died. However, this obituary may be a tad premature. The truth of the situation is that Hollywood's love affair...
Tunisian asset manager Finaud Capital Management is preparing a $150 million film securitization. The Maghreb Media Buyout Bridge Fund aims to give independent filmmakers more access to funding, minimize investor risk and encourage film production in the Maghreb region, which includes Tunisia, Algeria, Morocco, Libya...
Over the past few months, the financial battleground in Hollywood has been shifting under our feet as fast as a California Earthquake.Film studio bosses are engaged in a struggle to eliminate the residuals now paid to screenwriters over the life of the production. The residuals...