English Entertainment
HBO to start beaming in Shanghai
MUMBAI: Pay channel users in Shanghai will be able to receive the US-based movie channel HBO from 1 January, 2005.
This comes in the wake of the cooperation between CCTV, HBO and Shanghai Oriental Cable Network, which will give viewers about 50 films each month.
According to a media report, HBO Asia will begin broadcasting three films a day to Chinese households from 1 January via a nationwide digital television network.
Local digital service providers in more than 70 cities have signed up to carry the “First Theater” channel, said China Digital Television spokeswoman Yang Jihong. “We want to spread the use of digital TV, so we want to have good content. How widespread this service depends on how many people sign up,” Yang was quoted in the report as saying.
The movies shown would be picked from among titles considered “appropriate for Chinese viewers.” Shanghai’s Oriental Cable Television Network has signed up more than 30,000 households for the digital service and expects to have more than 50,000 by the end of the year, the Shanghai Morning Post reported.
This deal comes in the midst of the gradual liberalisation of China’s once tightly controlled television market that is allowing foreign broadcasts into ever-growing parts of the country. China Digital Television launched six subscription-based digital channels in August, which include two channels for sports, one each for movies and TV series, and one each for documentaries and music.
English Entertainment
Ellison takes his Paramount-Warner Bros case straight to theater owners
The Skydance chief goes to CinemaCon with promises and a skeptical crowd waiting
CALIFORNIA: David Ellison strode into a room packed with thousands of cinema owners and executives at CinemaCon in Las Vegas on Thursday and did something rather bold: he looked them in the eye and asked them to trust him.
The chief executive of Paramount Skydance vowed that his company would release a minimum of 30 films a year if regulators greenlight its proposed $110 billion acquisition of Warner Bros Discovery, a deal that has made theater owners deeply, and loudly, nervous.
“I wanted to look every single one of you in the eye and give you my word,” Ellison told the crowd. “Once we combine with Warner Bros, we are going to make a minimum of 30 films annually across both studios.”
It was a confident pitch. Whether it landed is another matter. Cinema operators have already called on regulators to block the deal, and scepticism in the room was hardly concealed.
Ellison pushed back by pointing to recent form. Paramount, born from the merger of Paramount Global and Skydance Media last August, plans to release 15 films this year, nearly double the eight it put out in 2025. Progress, he argued, was already underway.
He also threw theater owners a bone they have long been chasing: all films, he pledged, would run exclusively in cinemas for a minimum of 45 days, drawing applause from a crowd that has spent years fighting for exactly that commitment across the industry.
“People can speculate all they want,” Ellison said, “but I am standing here today telling you personally that you can count on our complete commitment. And we’ll show you we mean it.”
Fine words. The regulators, however, will have the last one.
