 | |
| Industry | Entertainment |
|---|---|
| Founded | May 1947 |
| Founder |
|
| Defunct | June 1961 |
| Fate | Bankruptcy |
| Headquarters | , United Kingdom |
| Products | Motion pictures |
Eros Films was a British film distribution and, later, production company, in operation from May 1947 to June 1961. It was founded by three brothers: Philip, Sydney, and Michael Hyams.
The Hyams' father was a Russian immigrant baker, who in association with architect George Coles financed the building of the Popular Cinema in 1912, located in Stepney, London. [1] The oldest brother Philip (born London 26 March 1894; died London 8 January 1997) began working at the theatre in 1912 and was joined in 1919 by his younger brother Sydney. The two started a chain of cinemas that they then sold to Gaumont British in 1928; they began anew, creating another theatre chain. They linked again with Gaumont in 1935 to form Gaumont Super Cinemas, adding their brother Michael.
During the years of the Great Depression, the brothers attracted crowds by booking double bills, live variety acts, and talent shows. [2] They sold again to Gaumont in 1944, due to reduced patronage during the London Blitz.
In 1947, the brothers formed Eros Films, located at 111 Wardour Street, London, which was possibly named after the statue at Piccadilly Circus. Eros distributed American films but also financed and distributed British films made by independents; several British producers recalled that major British production units did not wish to distribute the films of minor British studios. [3] Robert S. Baker of Tempean Films recalled that Eros distributed 20 to 30 of their films, usually shown as second features with popular American films, which Eros had acquired for UK distribution. [4]
In the 1950s, Michael Hyams emigrated to the United States, where he became vice president of American British TV Movies Inc. [5] The company distributed Eros' British productions to the American television market like Colonel March of Scotland Yard , Scotland Yard and a number of Eros-produced feature films.
Eros co-produced British films such as The Man Who Watched Trains Go By (1954), The Sea Shall Not Have Them (1955), [4] and the American giant monster film Behemoth, the Sea Monster (1959), insisting the film have the same type of monster as The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms. [6]
The company produced one film by themselves, the British World War II film Battle of the V-1 (1958).
Irving Allen and Albert R. Broccoli's Warwick Films had previously had a successful financing and distribution arrangement with Columbia Pictures, but there was occasionally friction between the two organisations. Allen thought they would increase their profits by creating their own distribution company to release films of a more highbrow nature than their successful action films. The two acquired Eros [7] from the Hyams brothers in 1959, though the brothers remained on the board. [8] Eros distributed Allen and Broccoli's The Trials of Oscar Wilde and Johnny Nobody , but both films failed at the box office.
The number of creditors and amounts owed by Eros led to the firm's bankruptcy in June 1961. [9]
The first film was shot in the United Kingdom as well as early colour films. While film production reached an all-time high in 1936, the "golden age" of British cinema is usually thought to have occurred in the 1940s, during which the directors David Lean, Michael Powell, and Carol Reed produced their most critically acclaimed works. Many British actors have accrued critical success and worldwide recognition, such as Audrey Hepburn, Olivia de Havilland, Vivien Leigh, Glynis Johns, Maggie Smith, Laurence Olivier, Michael Caine, Sean Connery, Ian Mckellen, Joan Collins, Judi Dench, Julie Andrews, Daniel Day-Lewis, Gary Oldman, Emma Thompson, Anthony Hopkins and Kate Winslet. Some of the films with the largest ever box office returns have been made in the United Kingdom, including the fourth and fifth highest-grossing film franchises.
Hammer Film Productions Ltd. is a British film production company based in London. Founded in 1934, the company is best known for a series of Gothic horror and fantasy films made from the mid-1950s until the 1970s. Many of these involve classic horror characters such as Baron Victor Frankenstein, Count Dracula, and the Mummy, which Hammer reintroduced to audiences by filming them in vivid colour for the first time. Hammer also produced science fiction, thrillers, film noir and comedies, as well as, in later years, television series.
The Gaumont Film Company, often shortened to Gaumont, is a French film studio headquartered in Neuilly-sur-Seine, France. Founded by the engineer-turned-inventor Léon Gaumont (1864–1946) in 1895, it is the oldest extant film company in the world, established before other studios such as Pathé, Titanus (1904), Nordisk Film (1906), Universal, Paramount, and Nikkatsu.
American International Pictures is an American film production company owned by Amazon MGM Studios. In its original operating period, AIP was an independent film production and distribution company known for producing and releasing films from 1955 until 1980, a year after its acquisition by Filmways in 1979.
Joseph Arthur Rank, 1st Baron Rank was an English industrialist who was head and founder of the Rank Organisation.
The Rank Organisation, was a British entertainment conglomerate founded by industrialist J. Arthur Rank in April 1937, Rank also served as the company chairman. It quickly became the largest and most vertically integrated film company in the United Kingdom, owning production, distribution and exhibition facilities as well as manufacturing projection equipment and chairs. It also diversified into the manufacture of radios, TVs and photocopiers. The company name lasted until February 1996, when the name and some of the remaining assets were absorbed into the newly structured Rank Group plc. The company itself became a wholly owned subsidiary of Xerox and was renamed XRO Limited in 1997.
Eon Productions Limited is a British film production company that primarily produces the James Bond film series. The company is based in London's Piccadilly and also operates from Pinewood Studios in the UK.
Sir Michael Elias Balcon was an English film producer known for his leadership of Ealing Studios in West London from 1938 to 1955. Under his direction, the studio became one of the most important British film studios of the day. In an industry short of Hollywood-style moguls, Balcon emerged as a key figure, and an obdurately British one too, in his benevolent, somewhat headmasterly approach to the running of a creative organization. He is known for his leadership, and his guidance of young Alfred Hitchcock.
Pathé is a major film production and distribution company, owning a number of cinema chains through its subsidiary Pathé Cinémas and television networks across Europe.
Gaumont may refer to:
Sir John Woolf and his brother James Woolf were British film producers. John and James founded the production companies Romulus Films and Remus Films, which were active during the 1950s and 1960s, and the distribution company Independent Film Distributors, which was active 1950–59 and handled the UK distribution of films such as The African Queen and Gift Horse, as well as several films made by their two production companies.
Lumiere Pictures and Television, formerly known as EMI Films, Thorn EMI Screen Entertainment, and Weintraub Entertainment Group, and later UGC DA, and Canal+ Image International, was a British-French film, television, animation studio and distributor. A former subsidiary of the EMI conglomerate, the corporate name was not used throughout the entire period of EMI's involvement in the film industry, from 1969 to 1986, but the company's brief connection with Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer and Anglo-EMI, the division under Nat Cohen, and the later company as part of the Thorn EMI conglomerate are outlined here.
Associated British Picture Corporation (ABPC), originally British International Pictures (BIP), was a British film production, distribution and exhibition company active from 1927 until 1970 when it was absorbed into EMI. ABPC also owned approximately 500 cinemas in Britain by 1943, and in the 1950s and 60s owned a station on the ITV television network. The studio was partly owned by Warner Bros. from about 1940 until 1969; the American company also owned a stake in ABPC's distribution arm, Warner-Pathé, from 1958. It formed one half of a vertically integrated film industry duopoly in Britain with the Rank Organisation.
British Lion Films is a film production and distribution company active under several forms since 1919. Originally known as British Lion Film Corporation Ltd, it entered receivership on 1 June 1954. From 29 January 1955 to 1976, the company was known as British Lion Films Ltd, and was a pure distribution company.
The Gaumont-British Picture Corporation produced and distributed films and operated a cinema chain in the United Kingdom. It was established as an offshoot of the Gaumont Film Company of France.
Warwick Films was a film company founded by film producers Irving Allen and Albert R. Broccoli in London in 1951. The name was taken from the Warwick Hotel in New York where Broccoli and his wife were staying at the time of the final negotiations for the company's creation. Their films were released by Columbia Pictures.
Hell Below Zero is a 1954 British-American adventure film directed by Mark Robson and starring Alan Ladd, Joan Tetzel, Basil Sydney and Stanley Baker. It was written by Alec Coppel and Max Trell based on the 1949 novel The White South by Hammond Innes, and presents interesting footage of whaling fleets in action. It was the second of Ladd's films for Warwick Films.
Bryanston Films was a British film company formed by Michael Balcon and Maxwell Setton in mid-1959 following the collapse of Ealing Studios. Neither a production studio, nor a distributor, it released independent British films through British Lion Films In operation until 1963, it was intended to be an unofficial group of independent film producers.
The Ideal Film Company was a British film production and distribution company that operated between 1911 and 1934.
