Warner Bros. Closes Doors on Warner Independent and Picturehouse
May 9, 2008

In an increasingly competitive film market, Warner Bros. announced that it has officially has closed the doors on both Warner Independent and Picturehouse. After recently acquiring New Line Cinema, Warner insiders say that continuing with Warner Independent and Picturehouse didn’t make financial sense given the high overhead of running two specialty divisions. As The Hollywood Reporter reports, the decision to close both units was made a week ago, and while options were explored to see if maintaining both in some capacity were explored, the final pronouncement caught many company employees – in all divisions – off-guard.

While HR reveals that some Picturehouse employees will remain, it was unclear about the future of the company’s top man, Picturehouse President Bob Berney, who some say will likely go on to start his own distribution company. On the Warner Independent side, President Polly Cohen will be staying with Warner Bros. in an as-yet-to-be-determined role while some WI employees will keep their jobs for now.

According to The Hollywood Reporter, the current schedule of Warner Independent and Picturehouse movies set for release will continue as planned, "'Warners will release WIP and Picturehouse's movies up until the fall. Titles on the Picturehouse side include "Mongol" (June 6), "Kit Kittredge: An American Girl" (in limited release June 20 and wide release July 2) and "The Women" (Sept. 12). Warner Independent's upcoming releases include "Towelhead" (Aug, 8) and "Slumdog Millionaire" (in limited release starting Nov. 7).’”