Image Entertainment

About Image Entertainment

Image Entertainment is a major independent home entertainment distribution company. It was founded in 1981 and handles digital media distribution of television programs, public domain and copyrighted feature films, music content, foreign cinema, special interest titles and much more. As of 2008 Image entertainement has released over 2500 exclusive titles to DVD and over 200 exclusive audio titles.

Image Entertainment was founded at the beginning of the LaserDisc era as an outlet to distribute product for that format and taking advantage of its key features, including sound and picture quality that surpassed VHS and Beta. Some of their first major releases were music concerts. Adult movie titles were also a large part of their early output. That division was split off into a separate company, LaserDisc Entertainment, after Image began distributing Disney/Buena Vista titles in the early 1990s. Disney wouldn't have agreed to the deal unless they dropped it. As Image Entertainment expanded and became more established, it managed to successfully secure output deals with major studios, such as 20th Century Fox and Universal, for distributing their LaserDisc product.

Even though the LaserDisc format waned in popularity, Image continued to establish itself as a major home video distributor and a primary leader in LaserDisc product. It also started its own monthly print magazine of upcoming LaserDisc titles. When the LaserDisc format gave way to DVD, Image restructered and focused on DVD releases. Since the advent of DVD, Image has managed to score two major acquisitions for home video: the entire CBS series of the original Twilight Zone and the John Ritter/Markie Post series Hearts Afire. Rights to the latter series were awarded by the John Ritter estate. Image has also released LaserDisc/DVD editions of public domain films, such as A Farewell to Arms and the 1937 version of A Star Is Born.
Today, Image continues to release a wide variety of programs (from television series to feature films to recent concerts) that are better suited for the emerging DVD format, including the O Entertainment Thumbs! franchise. Image competes with Anchor Bay Entertainment in releasing many horror films in the public domain. This results in many editions of the same films.
On March 29, 2007, it was announced that Image Entertainment had entered into a definitive agreement to be sold to investor group BTP Acquisition Company, LLC for approximately $132 million. On February 5, 2008, after several extensions, the agreement was recinded.

Lions Gate has on several occasions tried to create a hostile takeover of Image, even going so far as to try and remove current members of the Image board with members that would favor Lions Gate takeover attempts. Despite their failed takeover attempts Lions Gate still remains a large shareholder in Image. Image also currently controls the distribution of Criterion Collection releases, considered to be some of the most highly regarded DVD releases available.

Website: www.image-entertainment.com