Mr. Video (Photo: STV)

Welcome to the first edition of The Reeler's Business Digest, a briefing of essential industry tidbits that I am hoping will join the blog as a regular feature in the weeks and months ahead. By "regular," I guess I really mean "whenever it occurs to me," but that doesn't augur inconsistency--that just means I have to do a better job of combing through all these RSS feeds.

So, anyway, let's see:

--Variety reports that The Weinstein Company is pacting with California-based distributor Genius Products to facilitiate TWC's home-video releases. The Weinsteins will control 70 percent of the new venture, while Genius (which already handles Sundance Channel and Wellspring titles) will be required to send a biohazard crew to Weinstein HQ monthly to remove mouldering films from a shelf in a room 300 feet below Hudson Street. This is what they call a "win-win" in Hollywood; in Tribeca, it is called housecleaning.

--Disney CEO/theater-killa Robert Iger is back in the news rattling his saber about closing theatrical-DVD-TV release windows. This time, as the Wall Street Journal notes (via Cinematical), he may as well be coughing SARS directly onto the John Fithian posse: "We'll have a conversation with theater owners to see whether we can move them more peacefully ... but I think in the end, it's going to have to be more by force than through negotiation or diplomacy." Iger adds a couple of war metaphors, a few numbers and basically pisses farther and longer than he ever has in the past. The Journal, meanwhile, with its third or fourth Iger-related piece in the last few months, should just give the guy a blog and be done with it.

--Shock of shocks: Lions Gate was over-hyped. The little "anti-studio" that had everything going for it, could do no wrong and was wiping its imperial ass with $100 bills has begun lighting more $100 bills on fire to kill the stench of its own shit. Blaming Usher's fizzled In The Mix, "falling library margins" and whatever else his publicist could sctratch together after LGF stock plunged 11.4 percent, president Jon Feltheimer told analysts, "We are definitely in a challenging time for our industry, but...we are poised to take a great leap forward with new formats and new electronic delivery platforms, which will deliver higher margin revenue." Well put, cap'n--this is nothing a multi-picture deal with LL Cool J and 1.2 million Dirty Dancing DVD's cannot fix. Think of it as an "anti-clusterfuck"--they will be juuuuuust fine, thank you.

The plane! The plane! (Photo: GreenCine Daily)

GreenCine Daily's David Hudson caused a little bit of a stir yesterday afternoon, illuminating an interesting parallel between Kiyoshi Kurosawa's 2001 film Pulse and the trailer for Dimension Films' upcoming remake. Without getting too much into the PR symbiosis at hand (which just sounds like publicists being publicists), Hudson noted that the Dimension trailer appears to lift and alter Kurosawa's original, stunning plane crash scene for its own end.

While there is no question the shots are Kurosawa's, there was some concern that this might be a little more skulduggerous rip-off than American distributor Magnolia Pictures might be comfortable with. Alas, Magnolia chief Eamonn Bowles told The Reeler this morning that Dimension had the go-ahead to use the original sequence in its trailer.

"Is it scandalous? No," Bowles told me. "Is it weird? Yes. You don't usually see the same shot used in a different film, but that was something [Dimension] had come to us about. And we said yes. There isn't anything scandalous about it at all. ... It's flattering that a larger-budget, wide-release American film would end up using the money shot from the modestly budgeted Japanese original."

So there you have it. Now we can go back to collecting wagers for our other controversy, the When Will Craig Brewer Be Paid? office pool. Send your dates posthaste.

Dear John... Hustle & Flow director Craig Brewer with producer Stephanie Allain earlier this year in New York (Photo: STV)

The hell with it--I am calling this a New York cinema story by virtue of my alluding to its inevitability four months ago: Director Craig Brewer and producer John Singleton are officially at odds over the profits from their work on Hustle & Flow. But as L.A. Times go-getter Rachel Abramowitz reported over the holiday, the issue is not whether or not Paramount--whom Singleton virtually accused of stealing after a piracy scandal last summer--has actually paid Singleton what it owes him. The issue is whether or not Singleton plans to pay Brewer and his colleagues:

Singleton is contractually obligated to share his profits from the $9-million sale with the creative team, said Brewer's attorney Mark Litwak. "Paramount did pay the vast majority of the money eight months ago. Craig worked for modest wages, to say the least, and he was promised a very reasonable and customary share of the back end. The issue has been raised repeatedly with John over the last six months, and frankly a lot of people are furious with John. I find it amazing that so much of the goodwill that John had generated by going into his own pocket to get the movie made — a lot of that goodwill has been lost now that he hasn't paid."

Singleton openly acknowledges he has not paid his partners, firing back that he spent extra money on a better mix than Paramount was willing to pay for and he resents "people making comments when everybody's life has been changed from Hustle & Flow. Everyone has a career now." Litwak, on the other hand, who literally wrote the book on independent dealmaking in Hollywood, sipped his latte and loaded his gun:

"The fact that Craig has not been paid is not acceptable. This has been repeatedly communicated to John and his attorneys. John said numerous times in the spring that payment was imminent. Then it was everybody was going to get paid by Thanksgiving. Now it's the next holiday coming up."

The best part about all of this (or the worst, if you are Brewer and co-producer Stephanie Allain) is that the creative crew behind Flow has a shiny new first-look deal at a verrrry troubled and verrrrry twitchy Paramount Pictures, which is watching production of Brewer's follow-up Black Snake Moan like a hawk. I imagine that the director threatening to sue the producer is not a tactic lifted verbatim from the Rebuild Your Imploding Studio Textbook.

But hey, let us look on the bright side: Maybe if Brewer videotapes all of this drama, he can at least serialize it and sell it to Bravo. What?!? Singleton has a piece of that, too? God damn it! This guy thought of everything!

RELATED:
Craig Brewer: Black, White and Rich All Over (June, 27, 2005)
Singleton Vows to Whup that Trick--But Which One? (July 26, 2005)

You have to know you can count on a guy named Nuts McDougal to bring you the latest movie and DVD scoops, and sure enough--he did not let us down this week. I mean, if it were not for Nuts, how would we have known the full scope of Warner Bros.' Sidney Lumet reissues planned for 2006?

On February 28, Warner Home Video releases two of director Sidney Lumet’s most explosive films from the 1970’s -- Network and Dog Day Afternoon -- both as Two-Disc Special Editions. Boasting the star power of Al Pacino, William Holden, Faye Dunaway, Peter Finch, Robert Duvall, John Cazale and more, and tackling the media mania of news and reality TV, thirty years later these films are just as exciting and relevant as they were when they were made. Bonus features include commentaries by Sidney Lumet and new making-of documentaries, including The Making of Dog Day Afternoon which features Academy Award® - winner Al Pacino.

Also available February 28 will be a special Controversial Classics Vol. 2:
The Power Of Media, a three title, six-disc collection which showcases these groundbreaking films about the power of the media and will include the two featured Lumet films along with the Two-Disc Special Edition of All the President’s Men (released February 21).

Oooooooh--"The Power of Media"! OK, so the guy is just handy with a press release. Nevertheless, thank God for Nuts, who, inadvertently or not, clues us in to the most likely Good Night, and Good Luck DVD release date as well. After all, Warners' full-page, Oscar-season ads will seem that much more resounding with Good Luck nestled up beside a box-set of Oscar-winning media classics (and do not forget that George Clooney will helm a live remake of Network next fall for CBS). Not that Clooney's film stands a chance against the Steven Spielberg's masterful-if-yet-unseen Munich, but still.

Also look for Dinah Shore's archival interview with Network scribe Paddy Chayefsky, and check Walter Cronkite's own cultural commentary in the accompanying making-of featurette. The kids are going to be all over it. Still, here is my Oscar-time prognostication: Lumet's Network commentary will be one for the ages--required listening/viewing in journalism and film schools around the country. You heard it here first. But I owe it all to Nuts.

Hahahahahahaha... ohhh, Lord. *sniff* Secretary! Kleenex! (Photo: STV)

What is that heavy, guttural noise churning up from Tribeca? Could it be? Did Harvey Weinstein arrive at the office today laughing his ass off?

Stung by the dismal box office returns for some Miramax movies along with a few underperforming DVDs, the Walt Disney Co. reported quarterly earnings Thursday that were 26% lower than the year-ago period.

The media conglomerate posted $379 million in net income in its fiscal fourth quarter thanks to solid gains at its television and theme parks divisions, though the results would have been healthier had Disney's movie studio not lost $313 million, reversing a $23 million profit from that unit a year ago. ...

That the studio lost money was no surprise given that it rushed to get lingering Miramax titles--including The Great Raid, The Brothers Grimm, The Underclassman and An Unfinished Life--out in theaters as it revamps that unit under new management. But the financial hit was a bit larger than Disney had forecast when it warned its movie division might lose $250 million-$300 million.

"No surprise" is right, although the Hollywood Reporter also notes that the underachiving Dark Water and straight-to-DVD clusterfucks with actual titles like Lilo & Stitch 2: Stitch Has a Glitch also torpedoed the books. But even if Disney had dropped high eight figures on Baby 2: Baby's Got Rabies, no film nor exec could match the influence of a stone-cold killa like Harvey, whose driver probably had to change two flats this morning after all that shuddering laughter in the back seat. Thank God it's Friday, huh, buddy?

Bernard takes the Oath of... I Forget (Photo: High Times)

As you know from reading The Reeler's trenchant commentary on the subject, the subject of collapsing theatrical windows is one of the young century's defining cultural issues. A lot of ink and bandwidth have gone into debating the idea's pros and cons, but I sense the discussion may be winding down with Sony Classics boss Tom Bernard's recent leap into the opponents' vanguard.

According to Multichannel News (via Movie City Indie):

In a wrap on what others think of Mark Cuban's 2929 plan to '86 theatrical distribution windows ... the terse quote of the day comes from Sony Pictures Classics president Tom Bernard, "noting that indie product needs time to build... 'Collapsed windows are the worst thing that ever happened to specialized films. Polluting the theatrical window is doom.' "

When I was done laughing, I thought, "Jesus Christ, is this guy high?"

And then, of course, I thought, "Oh, wait."

First we had John Fithian throwing ninja stars over collapsing release windows, then we had M. Night Shyamalan taking a swipe at big bad Hollywood's greedy DVD marketing. Now it is anybody's guess who will stand up to the latest threat facing theatergoing as we know it: Cereal.

Damn right, I said cereal:

General Mills Inc. on Wednesday unveiled a new promotion in which the company will give away free movie downloads in its cereals, including Honey Nut Cheerios, Lucky Charms, Cinnamon Toast Crunch and Golden Grahams.

Customers will receive a $5 Movielink download code, which can be used to download a movie from the company's Web site. Movielink features thousands of movie titles from box office hits to independent films.

The good news for the Fithian cabal? The promotion ends in February. But come on, folks--there will be movies in your cereal. It can never really end, can it?

LGF execs Michael Burns and Jon Feltheimer ringing the "antibell" last year at the New York Stock Exchange (Photo: NYSE)

I have developed sort of a soft spot for Lions Gate Films, which unfortunately makes me as susceptible to its hyperbolic bullshit as I am to its budding hegemonic charm. And waking up to the news that my new buddy spent part of Monday in New York modeling its fall collection of euphemisms and random-sounding numbers does not make things any easier on me:

Billing itself as "the antistudio," Lions Gate has methodically built a business by exploiting such niches as horror, teen comedies and urban-artsy pics as well as cable TV dramas like The Dead Zone, fitness videos and Barbie products. ...

Lions Gate's (vice chairman Michael) Burns ... outlined how his company has maneuvered in just six years to own and control content in a world in which distribution platforms keep multiplying.

And the best, Burns suggested, is yet to come.

To his mind there are several more hot prospects on the Lions Gate roster: horror pic Hostel, which debuts Dec. 21 and that he called "really horrifying," and, bowing later in the winter, Akeelah and the Bee -- "the best movie we've ever done," Burns hazarded.

He also said the highly publicized dip in DVD sales that's afflicted the sector hasn't been much of a factor for his 8,000-title catalog.

"We still see a lot of upside from our library, which is bringing in $200 million in revenues annually. For a title like Dirty Dancing, we sell 100,000 DVDs a month," Burns said by way of illustration. ...

Asked if anything much changed with the new players on the indie film scene like the Weinstein Co. and HBO-New Line's Picturehouse, Burns said Lions Gate typically manages to land 80% of the titles it goes after -- and not (unlike some, apparently) by overpaying for buzz titles at film fests.

First of all, how great a nickname is "the antistudio"? We already know that LGF is big on "antimovies" like Beyond the Sea and The Punisher--some of which even make great money despite being relatively unwatchable--and that its lowball acquisitions strategy has resulted in the stunning "antideal" to buy its coveted Image Entertainment.

Setting all that aside, however, I think the real reason I have such a crush on Lions Gate stems from Burns' throwing around "antistatistics" like Dirty Dancing selling "100,000 DVD's a month," or that LGF "(lands) 80 percent of the titles it goes after." I mean, this is not Joe McCarthy waving a list of 205 communists in the State Department, but how does anybody quantify an 80 percent acquisitions success rate? Moreover, am I really supposed to believe LGF sells 100,000 copies of Dirty Dancing every month? Or 1.2 million per year? I think this is what Burns might call "antipossible."

Of course, that hype job on Hostel and Akeelah and the Bee is a pretty severe "antistudio" move, as well. Harvey Weinstein would never talk himself up like that in public.