Boxoffice-November.2001

Magic Cinemas and its 95 screens. Such
deals, though not quite commonplace,
have been a consistent part of overall
growth patterns for more than a
decade. But next came what appeared
to be the big one: Regal's purchase of
the massive 643-screen Cobb Theatres
circuit, taking Regal's total screen
count past the 2.000 mark.
In any normal year the Regal/Cobb
combine would have been exhibition's
biggest merger story.
But, even as that
deal was announced, a rumor began to
circulate: Sony-owned Loews was negotiating
to merge with Cineplex Odeon in
a unique arrangement that would insulate
the parent company from Cineplex's
crippling debt load, while at the same
time creating the largest exhibition chain
in history: As 1997 came to a close, that
rumor became fact.
There is something in the American
character that blanches at deals of such
unimaginable size. Look at "Star Wars":
The most popular movie myth of all
times pits a ragtag assemblage of renegade
roughnecks against an evil empire
defined almost completely in terms of
overwhelming scale. With size comes
power and it is undeniable that an
increasingly smaller number of megacircuits
either are now or soon will be exercising
an unprecedented amount of
clout over what American audiences go
to see—a clout that will be theirs even if
they don't wish to have it, simply by dint
of sheer numbers.
There is as yet no reason to view this
development as anything other than
virtue rewarded, the inevitable outcome
of the labors of a handful of ambitious
businesspeople who are recreating the
exhibition industry in our time. But big
companies can also represent big targets,
as Microsoft's ongoing antitrust difficulties
clearly demonstrate; while my producer
acquaintance's biases as a man
who owes his career to the original consent
decree must be taken into account,
his murmuring of the word "antitrust"
can also be taken as a word to the wise
in a time where megacircuits for which
there is no precedent start to define
themselves and take shape.
In a noteworthy sidebar to the
Loews-Cineplex merger, visionary Sony-Loews
executives Barrie and Jim
Loeks chose to return to their roots at
the tiny Loeks-Star circuit rather than
run the newly formed Sony megacircuit—a
task which, it's easy to speculate,
might seem less than appealing to
executives with a direct, hands-on
management style. What the next
decade of exhibition history may tell us
is which was the more historically significant
gesture: the deal that created
the largest megacircuit the world has
ever known, or the decision by the two
people who could have reasonably
expected to run ii that, sometimes, less
is more. — December 1 997 mm
nudie cuties, among others. All were
strange but vital to the future of movies.
Mostly all were profitable.
parody of "Prometheus Bound," satirizing
Arnold Schwazenegger.
"The book is 336 pages long, and if
"One of the important messages of
the documentary is that whether or
not you like the fact that American
movies are more violent and sexual
than they were in the 1940s, this era
was ground zero for films," Greene
that represents a quarter of my film
writing I would be surprised." Greene
confesses while still canvassing the
patio for a second light. "I am a very
fast writer, and BOXOFFICE had a lot
of need, as did the Village View, so
says. "Also, this is where the teenage you just get into the habit of being
preoccupation that still exists in able to bang things out."
American movies began. Low-budget After receiving an undergraduate
movies like American Pie' and degree in English, Greene worked as a
'Legally Blonde,' which will be some
and pop music journalist for
political
of the most profitable movies in several years before being accepted into
recent times, really originated with USC's graduate film program. In the
Roger Corman, Sam Arkoff
and those people. Hollywood
learned it from them."
"Schlock!", after showings at
various film festivals around the
country, was recently picked-up
for video distribution and is
being sold to European television.
The film has been a labor
of love for Greene for years. He
wrote, directed, narrated, edited,
produced and wrote a song
for the film—all the while writing
hundreds of articles and
reviews for various media outlets
around the country.
Many of these articles,
written
for BOXOFFICE, LA. Village
View, Medio and ABC-
NEWS.com, as well as several
brand-new essays appear in
Greene's book "Hollywood Migraine."
The title refers to a literal
headache Greene experienced
after an excruciating loud screening of intervening years. Greene dabbled in
"Last Action Hero" in an experimental acting and technical post-production
digital sound process. "It was, I
thought, a symbolic moment for a lot
of what went wrong in the '90s,"
Greene says with a smirk.
"The book and 'Schlock!' are both
attacks on our current film culture," he
says, with a second cigarette already in
hand. "What the movie says is that
these guys who you want to revile and
sweep under the rug are everything
thing that you are. One of the things
that the book is about ultimately is
that these gigantic multi-national corporations
run by MBAs— judging by
what they put out—are either hypocrites
who put out movies that they
themselves would never want to see or
have no affection for the form."
The book is a collection of A-list
director and celebrity interviews culled
from many years at BOXOFFICE, combined
with various musings on the
power and culture of celebrity, a long
multi-part meditation on the destructive
potential of the Walt Disney
Company, a minute-by-minute account
of the rise of independent cinema
in the '90s as well as an obligatory
for a time, before reconnecting to his
journalistic roots and serving as editor
of BOXOFFICE from 1993 to 1997.
As a longtime writer and social crit-
Greene was seemingly well-suited
ic,
for life in the realm of documentaries,
a medium not too dissimilar from
journalism in that a keen focus is on
uncovering fact and exposing, rather
than celebrating, fiction.
"In journalism, if you are lucky, you
get paid to tell the truth." Greene says.
"Certainly there is a level of politics
involved with journalism, but when
you are actually there in front of the
keyboard, you get to really reach into
your head and say what you think.
That's the beautiful thing about it."
The interview with BOXOFFICE
over, Greene is off to work on
his next film project and to continue
in his role as programming advisor
to the Silver Lake Film festival.
which was held last September but
not before bumming a ride to a convenient
store for more cigarettes. "They
keep me going." he says. mm
52 BOXOFFICE