Is Hollywood Just Paying 'Lip Service' to 35mm Filmmaking?

It's been a year of feel-good stories for fans of motion picture film. Quentin Tarantino converted the New Beverly revival house in Los Angeles to a 35mm-only screening venue. Christopher Nolan's Interstellar became the latest title to get a 15-perf IMAX release, and theaters showing IMAX, 70mm or 35mm film prints will be allowed to premiere it two days before digital-only venues. Most importantly, a small group of directors, including Tarantino and Nolan, was said to have convinced several studios to make purchasing commitments that would keep Kodak manufacturing film stock in the years to come.

But earlier this month, news broke that Kodak was set to eliminate 85 jobs, including 70 at its headquarters in Rochester, NY, where motion-picture film manufacturing takes place. According to George Conboy, chair of Rochester financial-services firm Brighton Securities, Kodak's film production is running about 90 percent below plan for the year. That's right—Conboy believes the company has produced only about 10 percent of the film stock that it had budgeted for in 2014.

What about that campaign to keep Kodak's film production lines running for several years, reportedly underwritten by purchase commitments from Warner Bros., Universal, Paramount, Disney, and The Weinstein Company? Conboy thinks its value has been exaggerated, citing a source inside Kodak's film manufacturing operations who he says told him that only Disney has signed such an agreement. "My opinion is that the studios are giving lip service to the availability of film for their more sensitive auteurs," Conboy tells StudioDaily.

Kodak doesn't have much to say about the matter one way or the other. "Because the contracts are still being finalized, we don't have any further detail to share with you at this time," Andrew Evenski, president and general manager of Kodak's Entertainment and Commercial Films Group told us, suggesting progress is still being made on those studio deals. "However, we do wish to thank the industry for its tremendous support of film as we look to the future of Kodak's traditional silver-halide portfolio."

And what of Conboy's alleged 90 percent shortfall in demand for film stock? Christopher Veronda, Kodak's manager of corporate communications, said, "There is always a great deal of speculation among financial analysts, and we don't comment on speculation."

Conboy believes that motion-picture film has become a "fine-art" process, creating a downbeat business reality that Kodak will have to deal with sooner rather than later, either selling the operations or shedding more personnel. "There is a business case for someone to make film to sell into this fine-art niche," he says. "I do not think that will continue to be Eastman Kodak."

The more likely scenario, Conboy says, is that Kodak will look to sell its existing film manufacturing operation to a smaller group, perhaps a private-equity firm. If that were to happen, Conboy expects that manufacturing would continue in the same location with the same employees. "For that to be possible, there would have to be someone out there who believes that enough motion-picture film revenue can be generated that it's worth paying up for that business," he said. "The only reason I can see for Kodak to keep that business would be if no other entity sees the potential to pay for it, thinking they could run it more profitably. But I don't think Kodak wants to be in the business in the long run, because there's not enough revenue there."

Kodak Cinema and Television: motion.kodak.com/motion/index.htm