1. The six big film companies
Louise Barnes

2. 1. Warner Bros. pictures
Warner Bros. Entertainment, Inc., also known as Warner Bros.
Pictures or simply Warner Bros. (though the name was occasionally
given in full form as Warner Brothers during the company's early
years), is an American producer of film, television, and music
entertainment.
One of the major film studios, it is a subsidiary of Time Warner, with
its headquarters in Burbank, California and New York. Warner
Bros. has several subsidiary companies, including Warner Bros.
Studios, Warner Bros. Pictures, Warner Bros. Interactive
Entertainment, Warner Bros. Television, Warner Bros. Animation,
Warner Home Video, New Line Cinema, TheWB.com, and DC
Entertainment. Warner owns half of The CW Television Network.
Warner Bros. is a member of the Motion Picture Association of
America (MPAA).

3. 2. Paramount pictures
Paramount Pictures Corporation is a film and television
production/distribution company, consistently ranked as one of the
largest (top-grossing) movie studios. It is a division of American
media conglomerate Viacom.
The company dates its beginnings to the 1912 founding date of the
Famous Players Film Company, one of the companies that merged
into Paramount Pictures (then known as Famous Players-Lasky
Corporation) in 1916. Paramount is the fourth oldest existing film
studio in the world behind Universal Studios, Pathé and Gaumont
Pictures. Also, it is the last major film studio still headquartered in
the Hollywood district of Los Angeles.
Paramount Pictures is a member of the Motion Picture Association of
America (MPAA).

4. 3. Walt Disney
Walt Disney Pictures is an American film studio owned by The Walt Disney
Company. It is also a subsidiary of the Walt Disney Studios and the main
production company for live-action feature films within the Walt Disney
Studios, based at the Walt Disney Studios.
Animated features produced by Walt Disney Animation Studios, Pixar
Animation Studios, DisneyToon Studios and Studio Ghibli (North America
distribution) are usually released by Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures
under the Walt Disney Pictures banner. Exceptions include Who Framed
Roger Rabbit and The Nightmare Before Christmas which were originally
released under Disney's Touchstone imprint, though the Roger Rabbit
theatrical shorts and re-releases of Nightmare have been under the Disney
banner.
Beginning in 2011, the studio's production logo and on-screen credit was
shortened to simply "Disney". However, a petition has started on
Change.org to change the logo and on-screen credit back to "Walt Disney
Pictures" on November 6, 2012.

5. 4. Columbia pictures
Columbia Pictures Industries, Inc. (CPII) is an American film production and distribution company.
Columbia Pictures now forms part of the Columbia TriStar Motion Picture Group, owned by Sony
Pictures Entertainment, a subsidiary of the Japanese conglomerate Sony. It is one of the leading film
companies in the world, a member of the so-called Big Six. It was one of the so-called Little Three among
the eight major film studios of Hollywood's Golden Age.
The studio, founded in 1918 as Cohn-Brandt-Cohn Film Sales by brothers Jack and Harry Cohn and Joe
Brandt, released its first feature film in August 1922. It adopted the Columbia Pictures name in 1924 and
went public two years later. The name is derived from "Columbia", a national personification of the
United States, which is used as the company's logo.
In its early years a minor player in Hollywood, Columbia began to grow in the late 1920s, spurred by a
successful association with director Frank Capra.
With Capra and others, Columbia became one of the primary homes of the screwball comedy. In the 1930s,
Columbia's major contract stars were Jean Arthur and Cary Grant (who was shared with RKO Pictures).
In the 1940s, Rita Hayworth became the studio's premier star and propelled their fortunes into the late
1950s. Rosalind Russell, Glenn Ford, and William Holden also became major stars at the studio.
In 1982, the studio was purchased by Coca-Cola; that same year it launched TriStar Pictures as a joint
venture with HBO and CBS. Five years later, Coca-Cola spun off Columbia, which merged with Tri-Star to
create Columbia Pictures Entertainment. After a brief period of independence with Coca-Cola
maintaining a financial interest, the combined studio was acquired by Japanese company, Sony in 1989

6. 5. Universal studios
Universal Studios (also known as Universal Pictures), is an American film studio, and one of the six major
movie studios. It is one of the longest-lived motion picture studios to be located outside of Hollywood. It
is a division of American media conglomerate NBCUniversal.
Founded in 1912 by Carl Laemmle, Mark Dintenfass, Charles Baumann, Adam Kessel, Pat Powers, William
Swanson, David Horsley, and Jules Brulatour, it is the oldest movie studio in the United States of
America. It is also the third oldest in the world that is still in continuous production; the first being
Gaumont Pictures, the second oldest is Pathé and the fourth oldest is Paramount Pictures. On May 11,
2004, the controlling stake in the company was sold by Vivendi Universal to General Electric, parent of
NBC. The resulting media super-conglomerate was renamed NBC Universal, while Universal Studios Inc.
remained the name of the production subsidiary. In addition to owning a sizable film library spanning the
earliest decades of cinema to more contemporary works, it also owns a sizable collection of TV shows
through its subsidiary NBCUniversal Television Distribution. It also acquired rights to several prominent
filmmakers' works originally released by other studios through its subsidiaries over the years. Selected
clips and footage shot by Universal Studios are available for purchase from the NBCUniversal Archives.
Its production studios are at 100 Universal City Plaza Drive in Universal City, California. Distribution and
other corporate offices are in New York City.
Universal Studios is a Member of the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA).

7. 6. 20th Century fox
Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation- also known as 20th Century Fox, 20th Century Fox
Pictures, styled as 20th century fox, or simply 20th or Fox— is one of the six major
American film studios as of 2011. Located in the Century City area of Los Angeles, just west
of Beverly Hills, the studio is a subsidiary of Rupert Murdoch’s News Corporation.
The company was founded on May 31, 1935, as the result of the merger of Fox Film
Corporation, founded by William Fox in 1915, and Twentieth Century Pictures, founded in
1933 by Darryl F. Zanuck, Joseph Schenck, Raymond Griffith and William Goetz.
Twentieth Century Fox's most popular film franchises include Star Wars, X-Men, Ice Age,
Rio, Die Hard, Predator, Alien, Planet of the Apes, Home Alone, plus famous TV shows
such as Batman, M*A*S*H, The X-Files, Cops, In Living Colour, Family Guy, American
Dad!, and 24. Among the most famous actresses to come out of this studio were Shirley
Temple, who was 20th Century Fox's first film star, Betty Grable, Gene Tierney, Marilyn
Monroe and Jayne Mansfield. The studio also contracted the first African-American cinema
star, Dorothy Dandridge.
20th Century Fox is a member of the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA).