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.

Since General Electric (NYSE: GE) is reeling from the financial crisis that's currently gripping Wall Street, there's no doubt that a little Hollywood magic might be in order, something to take its corporate mind off reality for at least a little while.

Well, according to The Hollywood Reporter, that might happen. Steven Spielberg needs to move his DreamWorks company over to a new studio, and it looks like NBC Universal is at the front of the pack in the race to secure his business.

The pairing of Spielberg and Universal would be logically sound. He certainly had a better time over at that lot than he did at Viacom's (NYSE: VIA) Paramount. There is, however, one other studio that is in the running. The article seems to imply that Disney (NYSE: DIS) has a shot with Spielberg as well, although the way I read it, the Mouse is a distant second in the contest. Disney wouldn't be a good fit. As much as CEO Bob Iger would love to hold meetings with the most famous director in Hollywood (and the world, for that matter), a DreamWorks distribution deal just doesn't make sense since the company is really into getting a lot of bang for its capital buck.

Earlier in the month, I caught an interesting article from on Reuters about Disney (NYSE: DIS) and its movie division. The president of Disney Studios, Alan Bergman, speaking at a conference, stated that profit margins have jumped five-fold at the studio. The reasons behind this success include an aggressive attack on costs and a streamlined film slate. Instead of releasing a whole boatload of features, why not focus on Disney-branded flicks? That's what Disney has been doing, making bigger bets on a smaller number of projects. Things have been going so well that Bergman said that it was conceivable that the Mouse might not need to seek partnerships with funding entities to spread a portion of the risk. What this means is that, instead of offering up a percentage of celluloid profits to a funding corporation in exchange for an investment in the budgets, Disney will just pay for its movies itself and not transfer any risk. There's an obvious reason for this: Disney then gets to retain all profits instead of sharing them.

Well, it should be stated that Disney has not said that it will definitely do this. According to the article, Bergman just mentioned that it's possible that Disney could do this if it wanted to. My opinion? End outside financing. Hey, if I want to go and make a film, I'm going to have to use other people's money, I have no choice. But Disney? The company is big enough to not need any help in financing. The problem here is that human nature comes into play. When a studio division is doing poorly, then co-financing seems attractive. When a studio division is firing on all cylinders, then becoming risk-averse doesn't appear so fetching. Well, I think any media company producing films these days should really stop and try to understand the movie business for what it is. It's always going to be a risk. Doesn't matter if you have a huge star in a picture or not. It might fail either way. But when the windfall comes, when that big hit is found, you want to own 100% of the profits. This not only goes for Disney, but it applies to others such as Viacom (NYSE: VIA), General Electric's (NYSE: GE) Universal, and Time Warner (NYSE: TWX).

Time Warner Inc. (NYSE: TWX) will be more conservative in the number of movies it produces in a 12-month period, according to this piece at The Wall Street Journal. As movies are becoming so expensive these days, and studios are becoming increasingly averse to taking on risk in the fickle world of celluloid, the thinking is that fewer investments in theatrical projects will concentrate funds on only the best concepts. These concepts will, in theory, be tentpole productions like The Dark Knight, ones that have enormous franchise potential to spawn sequels and merchandise windfalls and that oftentimes will be based on valuable source material, such as iconic comic-book characters. Sounds great, right?

Only problem is, it's wrong. I've argued this point in the past, and I'm here to argue it again. There's no question that studios such as The Walt Disney Company (NYSE: DIS), Viacom, Inc. (NYSE: VIA), News Corporation (NYSE: NWS), General Electric Company (NYSE: GE)'s Universal, and Sony Corporation (ADR) (NYSE: SNE) put precious capital at risk every single time they greenlight a project. But there's a huge illogicality at work here. Why would you want to put out less concepts as opposed to more? If the movie industry is such a gamble, wouldn't it be prudent to send more pictures to the marketplace?

Lions Gate Entertainment's (NYSE: LGF) stock rose nearly 5% in after-hours trading on Friday after the movie studio issued its Q1 report. In fact, the stock hit $11 per share. What drove this reaction? Well, Wall Street was figuring on a loss for the company, somewhere around $0.05 per share, according to the AP. However, management fooled everyone by delivering a $0.06 per-share profit. Last year's Q1 saw a net loss of $0.45 per share. The top line was also awesome, rising 50% to $298.5 million. This also went beyond expectations.

These numbers are impressive to a certain extent. Management reported a nice backlog of revenues derived from movie projects that should be recognized in later quarters. There was a lower amount of expensed-costs related to distribution, an element that helped things out a great deal.

Cash flow, however, was an entirely different matter altogether. Lions Gate reported a much wider use of the green stuff this quarter. In fact, the metric more than doubled to nearly $150 million. Changes in working capital affected the cash flow, including increased investments in content productions and a larger booking of participations and residuals. Negative free cash flow also expanded, coming in at roughly $110 million this quarter versus $82 million one year ago.

It's the Fourth of July weekend, and movie studios want to capture as much money for their films as possible, even if they've already been in the theaters for several weeks. No matter what, though, Sony (NYSE: SNE)'s Hancock, starring the always excellent Will Smith, is set to be the financial superhero of the weekend. Already, as of this writing, the film has taken in about $24 million through Wednesday, according to Boxofficemojo. The movie had some showings on Tuesday before its official debut in the middle of the week. It was number one on Wednesday, followed by Disney (NYSE: DIS)'s Wall-E. The robot flick so far has a total tally of around $86 million.

Poor Marvel (NYSE: MVL) and its The Incredible Hulk project. Will anybody be interested in seeing the big green guy now that Hancock is in the marketplace? Indeed, Hulk took in less than a million bucks on Wednesday, and it ranked number seven for that day. Looks like the Hulk fever is winding down at the multiplex, and it looks like Marvel's stock has had its run for the time being. The stock closed on Thursday at $31.20, well away from the 52-week high of $37.41. I still hold Marvel shares, and although there are no big catalysts on the immediate horizon, I have a long-term outlook on the company. Still, the trader in me wishes that I had lightened up on the position back at the $37 level to book some gains.

Hancock should do well north of $100 million once the Fourth of July holiday period has passed. The marketing, in my opinion, is very compelling, and from what I know about the story, it's a smart idea that provides a nice balance to the frivolous plots of Iron Man and Hulk (I'm using the term "frivolous" here with affection). Sony's scored a hit, maybe even a new franchise (I haven't seen the film, so I can't say if a sequel is feasible or not within the confines of the concept), but it won't do much to move the company's stock. Those looking to play the Hollywood game might want to wait for Marvel to pull back further from current levels.

Disclosure: I own Disney and Marvel; positions can change at any time.

I didn't think Get Smart was going to come in at number one, but that's exactly what happened, according to Boxofficemojo. The film, distributed by Time Warner (NYSE: TWX), took in an estimated $39 million at domestic theaters. The film, quite frankly, looks horrible, and I don't get the fascination people have with Steve Carell's supposed "comedic talents." I don't really find him funny. Doesn't matter, though, because moviegoers have crowned Carell king of the box-office weekend whether I like it or not.

I'm actually more concerned with the race for second place between Marvel's (NYSE: MVL) The Incredible Hulk and DreamWorks Animation's (NYSE: DWA) Kung Fu Panda. Both are estimated as of this writing to have booked a little more than $21 million in ticket sales. I'm concerned about this because I own shares of Marvel, and I'm disappointed in the movie's box-office performance. As of now, the new Hulk has about $96 million in terms of total gross. The fact that it hasn't scored over $100 million by now, coupled with it experiencing a 60% drop for this weekend compared to its debut weekend, leaves me less than satisfied.

Viacom's (NYSE: VIA) The Love Guru bombed. Looks like you can't always count on stars to deliver the important opening-weekend audience. Are people getting sick of Mike Myers? (Jonathan Berr wondered the same thing.) He was only able to conjure up about $14 million for Viacom shareholders, bringing his film to a fourth-place debut. That's embarrassing for Myers, but unlike Steve Carell, he is genuinely funny (although maybe not so much in this particular film, it seems). News Corp.'s (NYSE: NWS) M. Night Shyamalan movie The Happening grossed around $10 million and came in fifth.

Viacom Inc.'s (NYSE: VIA) Paramount studios, which has scored big at the box office with "Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull" and "Iron Man," and Time Warner Inc.'s (NYSE: TWX) Warner Bros, which is behind "Speed Racer," can't win them all. For example, take "The Love Guru" and "Get Smart," which open this weekend.

Reviews for Paramount's "The Love Guru, which stars Mike Myers, are not just scathing, they are acidic. A.O. Scott of the New York Times said, "To say that the movie is not funny is merely to affirm the obvious... No, `The Love Guru' is downright antifunny, an experience that makes you wonder if you will ever laugh again." At the Los Angeles Times, Jan Stewart argued that the movie was filled with "low blows and elephantine misfires." Mike LaSalle of the San Francisco Chronicle is slightly kinder saying, "There are whole sections when watching the movie is like being locked in the mind of a 10-year-old boy."

Critics weren't much kinder to Warner Bros.' "Get Smart," a remake of the popular TV comedy from the 1960s. Newsweek's David Ansen dismissed it as distressingly generic, comments echoed by Claudia Puig of USA Today. To be sure, the movie has its fans, including Roger Ebert, who said Steve Carrell makes an "infectious Maxwell Smart."

I just came back from an advanced screening of Marvel Entertainments (NYSE: MVL) Incredible Hulk and it surpassed my expectations as did Iron Man before it.

The preview Wednesday night, two days ahead of the premier scheduled for Friday the 13th, is probably too scary for little tykes but it is a superb blend of movie technology magic and the passion of the cast and crew.

It's all in the eyes. Unlike the glib Tony Stark character in Iron Man, played fittingly by Robert Downey Jr., Edward Norton is the emotionally gamma ray charged green powerhouse that only roars, and must communicate his feeling though his eyes. This is the case when the Hulk's temper rages and when he is expressing his affection for Dr. Elizabeth Ross, played by to perfection by Liv Tyler.

All the drama on Wall Street these days -- from the credit crunch to the housing slump, everything from runs on the bank to rogue traders -- had the Hollywood Reporter wondering recently why Hollywood isn't cashing in on the fun. Given how well most of the serious Iraq War/War on Terror movies have done lately, perhaps moviemakers will be searching for greener pastures. Heck, Gordon Gekko is scheduled to make a reappearance next year in a Wall Street sequel tentatively called Money Never Sleeps.

Until then, with a little help from the Internet Movie Database, here is a list of some of Hollywood's best takes on Wall Street so far.

• American Psycho (2000). Christian Bale stars as a soulless investment banker with a taste for violence and kinky sex. Based on the bestselling book by Bret Easton Ellis.
• The Bank (2001). This award-winning Australian film is set in a corrupt corporate bank, and like Pi features a maverick mathematician who may have found a way to accurately predict stock market fluctuations. Stars Anthony LaPaglia.
• Barbarians at the Gate (1993). This Emmy-winning made-for-television movie is based on the leveraged buyout of RJR Nabisco in the 1980s. James Garner won a Golden Globe for his portrayal of the company's CEO.
• Boiler Room (2000). A college dropout joins a small brokerage house and discovers that his new career isn't all it's cracked up to be. This film has been compared to both Wall Street and Glengarry Glen Ross. Stars Giovanni Ribisi and Ben Affleck.