Category: media

“The guild agreed last week to take proposals to unionize animation and reality TV writers — demands that contributed to December’s abrupt collapse — off the table. That left new-media compensation as the major hurdle to overcome.”

The top five English-language broadcasters were down a collective 21% in adults 18-49 vs. the corresponding week of a year ago, according to Nielsen. (In most weeks earlier this season, that falloff was closer to 10%.)

“SAG muddied the picture Tuesday by blasting the DGA’s two-week-old tentative deal, prompting an immediate rebuke of SAG’s leaders by DGA president Michael Apted. SAG’s dismissal of the DGA deal may dash hopes that the directors pact would serve as a template for a WGA deal and get the scribes back to work in the next few weeks.”

“We also have to admire the MPAA’s arrogance. The MPAA now asserts that college students account for 15 percent rather than 44 percent of the P2P piracy affecting the motion picture industry. However the press release says nothing — not a word — about the source of the other ’85 percent’ of the P2P piracy that affects the industry’s revenues, the activities of “civilians” who use consumer broadband services.”

Oscar-nominated films are often small, dark and unintended for mass audiences; they’re about art, after all, not commerce. But that’s especially true of this year’s crop, which has little mainstream buzz and among the lowest box-office totals in recent years.

Murder-musical Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street has cut into the UK and Ireland film box office, taking the top spot on its opening weekend.

“Sundance films, present and past, simply do not register in the online pirate world–unless they are one of the few that have already made it big (like Clerks or Little Miss Sunshine). This proves two things: When it comes to content piracy, obscurity, not security, is the best defense. It also demonstrates that movie pirates are fundamentally parasitic, not predatory.”

The partnerships will “allow access to media that were heretofore prohibitively expensive or completely unavailable to cultural institutions and arts educational facilities in this country.”

“The nationally televised ceremony played like a subdued labor rally, reminding TV viewers and producers alike that Hollywood’s most powerful union is poised to take on the studios too. Since movie and television directors recently reached a tentative deal with producers, and the Writers Guild of America’s walkout is seemingly winding down, the future for show business labor relations could soon rest with SAG’s 120,000 members.”

“No Country for Old Men” solidified its Academy Awards prospects Sunday by taking overall cast honors alongside Javier Bardem’s supporting-actor prize at the Screen Actors Guild Awards, which may stand as the highlight of Hollywood’s film-honors season if the writers strike undermines the Oscars.