Movie rental giant Netflix (NFLX) made some news of note yesterday. First, as my colleague Jon Ogg noted, the stock dropped on concerns that Blockbuster is going to introduce a kiosk plan.

The other major news is that the company's Chief Financial Officer Barry McCarthy is going to step down effective Friday. McCarthy made the decision in order to pursue "broader executive opportunities" outside the company. Taking over for McCarthy is David Wells, who was the vice president of financial planning and analysis. Wells was responsible for strategic planning, forecasting, and financial analysis.

While I'm not necessarily going to say you can't still buy Netflix (NFLX), I will say that I just can't get myself to send in an order at current levels. During Wednesday's after-hours session, the shares gained 9%, reaching $167.33 in reaction to the latest quarterly report. That's not far from the 52-week high of $174.40. I'm not sure where the stock will end up during Thursday's regular session, but I doubt I'll be changing my mind about the online movie-rental business.

The chart does look good, though, doesn't it? Some of the sections may be rocky, but for the most part, the equity has been extremely resilient and a great buy on pullbacks. And with the 52-week low set at $47.56, you know that a lot of the true believers have made some good money (at least on paper).

Early Thursday morning, Blockbuster (BLOKA) announced that it filed for voluntary Chapter 11 bankruptcy petitions. The move comes after an agreement with bondholders to recapitalize the movie and game rental chain.

According to the company, the filing in the U.S. Bankruptcy Court of the Southern District of New York applies to the company and its domestic subsidiaries, but not to the non-U.S. operations or the group's franchisees. Reportedly, the group has agreed on a deal with bondholders to swap secured notes for equity in a reorganized Blockbuster.

TheStreet.com ran an article stating that Blockbuster (BBI) may be forced into bankruptcy if its cash flow doesn't improve and it can't restructure debt. According to the article, BBI's debt has been as high as $1 billion. In a filing with the SEC, BBI stated: "These factors raise substantial doubt about our ability to continue as a going concern."

The company currently faces $855.9 million in debt and is in talks with Hollywood studios in hopes of reducing BBI's DVD costs. The company also stated that increased competition from the likes of Netflix (NFLX) and Redbox has severely hurt its market share.

Following Wednesday's market close, Netflix (NFLX) reported its fourth quarter numbers, and the stock soared 13% higher in after-hours trading when the company posted better-than-expected numbers for the quarter.

The company had a great quarter, with profit rising by an impressive 36%. While the fourth quarter earnings were dramatic, what really had the stock moving after hours was the upbeat forecast for 2010.

I am in a bit of a quandary. You see, I love those paranormal shows like Ghost Hunters, Paranormal State, Most Haunted, and Ghost Adventures. This genre has taken over programming in a majority of the bigger cable channels and it is now trying to take the movie world by storm.

Don't get me wrong, movies about ghosties and ghoulies are nothing new, but a little independent movie company has decided to hop on the ghost bandwagon by making a film called Paranormal Activity. It was made for just $11,000 over a week -- yes, a week. Well, if you have heard any of the buzz about this film, you know that it is set to take movie viewers by storm.

Could this be the next logical step in the video war between Blockbuster (NYSE: BBI) and Netflix (NASDAQ: NFLX)?

A report contends that Netflix will soon offer its "Watch Instantly" video-streaming feature for the iPhone and the iPod Touch, as well as the Nintendo Wii gaming console. Netflix already allows subscribers to manage their movie queue and search for movies via their iPhones, so watching their choices on the smartphone would be the next logical step.

Walt Disney (NYSE: DIS) reported its fiscal third quarter earnings Thursday afternoon and, as expected, it was a tough quarter for the entertainment conglomerate.

We noted in our earnings preview that analysts were expecting to see lower profit, and that is exactly what Disney did this afternoon, reporting a 26% dip in quarterly profit.

The company matched analyst estimates by posting 51 cents per share for its fiscal third quarter ended June 30.

Game and toy maker Hasbro (NYSE: HAS) had its chance to impress Wall Street with its second quarter results Monday morning, and the company indeed did not disappoint, posting stronger than expected earnings.

Spurred by strong sales of G.I. Joe and Transformers toys, the company reported a 5% jump in profit with earnings of 26 cents per share. Going into today's earnings report analysts had expected earnings of just 23 cents per share.

I found an interesting article in this morning's New York Post examining the poor performance of NBC Universal's Universal Studios of late. In fact, Jeff Zucker of NBC -- a part of General Electric (NYSE: GE) -- is "so concerned" about the unit's performance that he sent his chief financial officer to Hollywood for a month in order to "get more educated on the studio." Before I give my opinion on how to fix the studio (and you know I have one), let's take a look at how good the year has been.

Will Ferrell's Land of the Lost cost $100 million to make, but it brought in $44 million through last Friday. It is this catastrophic flop that caught the attention of Zucker and has him wanting answers from studio boss Ron Meyer. A source noted, "It's really the first time [Zucker] is asking Ron to explain things," as Meyer basically had free rein to run the studio. Zucker now wants to know Meyer's process for greenlighting movies and determining production and marketing budgets.

Not long ago, I wrote about Google, Inc's (NASDAQ: GOOG) YouTube entering a deal with The Walt Disney company (NYSE: DIS) for some of the Mouse's short-form content. Now comes word that Sony Corporation (NYSE: SNE) is in talks with the video platform. Sony apparently wants to supply some feature-length content if a partnership can be struck.

Well, I think a deal will be struck, certainly. Sony obviously doesn't want to see a competitor like Disney getting all the YouTube action. Considering that YouTube is the name in online video, and that the majority of mainstream, casual web surfers know the brand and are comfortable in terms of using it, I can imagine that it doesn't take a genius to figure out that Sony needs to be in the YouTube business.

Netflix (NASDAQ: NFLX) reported earnings for Q4 on Monday after the bell, and according to Trey Thoelcke's recap article, the DVD rental company blew past expectations. Wall Street was looking for $0.34 per share on a top line of $354.2 million. Well, Netflix delivered $360 million in net sales and $0.38 per share on the bottom line. That was an increase of 19% and 65% for the top and bottom lines, respectively.

Call me impressed. These are great numbers. In fact, Netflix added a net 718,000 subscribers in Q4. Last year at this time, the company added a net 415,000 subscribers. Now, let's look at the cash flow. According to the earnings release, Netflix is doing fine here, too. Free cash flow for Q4 more than doubled to $51 million. Free cash flow for the year also doubled to more than $94 million.

So, I just read that Lions Gate Entertainment (NYSE: LGF) purchased TVGuide.com and TV Guide Network from Macrovision Solutions Corp. (NASDAQ: MVSN) for over $250 million. Here's the press release. The question I have is: Why would Lions Gate want to do this?

I know I'm going to be called pretty ignorant by some for even thinking to disagree with this move, but nevertheless, I disagree with this move. The reason is simple (to me, at least). If I were a shareholder of the company, I think I'd rather have management focus on creating content as opposed to spending a lot of money to buy up a platform. Sure, these TV Guide properties have a high level of brand equity and are indeed widely distributed. But a quarter of a billion dollars is a lot of money, a sum that could have been allocated toward new movie franchises and content acquisitions.

Does Lions Gate really want the hassle of integrating the TV Guide portfolio into its business? Won't that distract the company from focusing on its desire to build a great library of movies and television shows so that it can become an attractive buyout candidate someday? I mean, let me get specific for a second. Take the Saw franchise. That's getting a little long in the tooth, isn't it? I look at that quarter-billion bucks and see a bunch of seed money for a ton of new concepts. If only a few made it to Saw-level, then I can only imagine that it would help shareholder value.

For movie lovers, one of the things that matters almost as much as a movie story line, is the picture and sound quality. Up until recently, there was little question as to where you needed to go to get the best video possible for a movie -- your nearest Imax theater. But recently, Imax has been under pressure from advancements in 3D systems and digital projection.

What Imax really needs is to get as many big name blockbuster productions as possible into its lineup. The company, which currently has 320 theaters, got some good news today: Walt Disney (NYSE: DIS) will release five new movies in Imax format.

The first of the five new Disney Imax movies will feature one of the industry's largest stars, Jim Carrey. He will play in an Imax production of "A Christmas Carol," which will be directed by Robert Zemeckis, the director of the highly successful "Polar Express" back in 2004, and be released late next year.

When most investors are down on a stock they own, they get depressed and sell.

Not so for Carl Icahn. Since he first bought shares of Lions Gate Entertainment Corp. (NYSE: LGF) back in mid-2006, the stock has fallen from around $10 per share to the current price of just over $7. Now Icahn has doubled his stake in the film house to 9.2%. Lions Gate is best-known for hit movies including "Crash" and "Saw", along with TV shows such as "Weeds" and "Mad Men." Icahn may see tremendous value in the company's library of films.

Vice Chairman Michael Burns told (subscription required) The Wall Street Journal that "Mr. Icahn and Lions Gate seem to share a similar vision of the growing value of content as platforms increase delivery around the world."

It'll be interesting to see if Icahn gets active in this company. He has said that he views the company as underleveraged, but current market conditions may make it tough for the company to pursue some of Icahn's favorite value-creation strategies: borrowing money to buy back stock and/or pursuing a sale or merger.