Cannon Films: Difference between revisions

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'''Cannon Films''' (also known as '''The Cannon Group, Inc.''' and '''Cannon Pictures''') was a film studio that has produced low-to medium-budget films from October 23, 1967 to 1993. The studio was formed by Dennis Friedland and Christopher C. Dewey. In 1979, Cannon was sold to Israeli cousins Menahem Golan and Yoram Globus, who had produced a few Israeli films such as ''Operation Thunderbolt'' (''Mivtsa Yonatan'', English translation: "''Operation Jonathan''") and the teen comedy ''Lemon Popsicle'' (''Eis am Steil'') before coming to the United States in 1979. During that year, they bought controlling interest in Cannon Films and forged a business model of buying "bottom-barrel" scripts and putting them into production. In 1989, Cannon was acquired by Giancarlo Parretti and was renamed as Pathé Communications (this company was not connected with [[Pathé (France)|Pathé]], although Parretti gave the company its name because he was going to purchase the latter studio, but was blocked by the French government). Parretti later acquired [[MGM/UA Communications Co.]] in 1990 and the two companies were merged to form "MGM-Pathé Communications Co.". Menahem Golan left the company to form a new studio, [[21st Century Film Corporation]]. In 1993, Cannon was folded into [[Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer]]. Most of the library of the American arm of Cannon Films is owned by MGM, who also owns home media, and international television rights. [[Warner Bros. Pictures|Warner Bros]]. owns the North American theatrical and home media rights to their co-productions with Cannon, such as ''Cobra'', ''Over the Top'', ''The Hanoi Hilton'', ''Bloodsport'', ''Masters of the Universe'', and ''Superman IV: The Quest for Peace'' (for which Warner Bros. also owns international home media rights). As of 2016, North American television rights to most of the Cannon library is owned by [[Paramount Pictures]], having acquired the rights after being purchased by [[Paramount Global|Viacom]] (now Paramount Global), who in turn, previously remained in charge of TV syndication for the Cannon library.

 

 

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'''Logo:''' Against a black background, a white multi-lined hexagon consisting of a "C" and an arrow pointing to the right is wiped in. Then, the "C" turns {{Font color|blue|blue}} and the arrow turns {{Font color|purple|purple}}, and the hexagon becomes solid, as well. It zooms out to the left, and the arrow splits off to the opposite side and leaves the text "THE CANNON GROUP, INCORPORATED" behind. Then, the "C" quickly meets up with the arrow and wipes the text away.

*On trailers, the hexagon zooms out from the center of the screen and fades to a dark blue color, but with the lines still present. The hexagon splits open in the middle, revealing "''COMING FROM'' '''''CANNON FILMS'''''", with "CANNON FILMS" in the corporate font. It then quickly closes.

*On early films, the logo was longer, with the "C" moving to the bottom of the screen to make room for text in a yellow, heavily condensed Eurostile font reading "CHRISTOPHER C.DEWEY and DENNIS FRIEDLAND present".

'''Availability:''' Quite rare. It was seen on some Cannon films from the time frame, as most (including ''Northville Cemetery Massacre'') had no logo or contained only a "The Cannon Group Presents" text notice. Appears on films such as ''The Happy Hooker'', ''The Happy Hooker Goes to Washington'', ''The Alaska Wilderness Adventure'', and ''Hot T-Shirts'' (the latter after the second 1984 logo). It may be seen on American theatrical prints (and possibly the Paragon Video Productions VHS) of the 1980 film ''Contamination'', released in the United States as ''Alien Contamination''. The shorter variant can be seen on ''New Year's Evil''. The early variant can be seen on ''Fury on Wheels''.

===2nd Logo (September 12, 1980-March 20, 1987) ===

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'''Logo:''' Against a black background, the C and arrow from before, in {{Font color|blue|blue}}, come together in the center of the screen from both sides. As this happens, "THE CANNON GROUP, INC.", in white, appears below. The hexagon shines brightly, and after a while, a bright flash occurs, turning the hexagon a glowing white and quickly zooms out. A large ping appears in the middle, and it fades out.

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File:Cannon18.png|The segments of the hexagon

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'''Logo:''' Just like the 1st and 3rd logos, the "C" and arrow, which now look more metallic, appear and meet in the center of the screen. "CANNON", in a bronzish color, fades in below, and the hexagon shines. Then, the text fades out and the segments of the hexagon fly toward the screen one by one.

*One version had the "flying segment" animation playing in reverse, and when the logo's almost formed, it fades to black to make room for the text "THE CANNON GROUP presents" (or "presenteert" in original Dutch), in {{Font color|deepskyblue|light blue}}. This appeared at the beginning of the Dutch film ''The Assault''.

*There is a version with a {{Font color|silver|silver}} hexagon that was seen on ''Invaders from Mars'' (1986 version).

*On films released in France, after the usual animation, the words "CANNON France présente", with "France" in script, zoom in upside down, then flip over. "{{Font color|blue|Cannon}}" is in {{Font color|blue|blue}}, "{{Font color|red|France}}" is in {{Font color|red|red}}, and "présente" is in white. The music cuts in a couple of seconds later in this variant.

* The 1st jingle is adjusted for the short version, fading out before the last flourish.

* On a Paramount Channel France broadcast of ''King Solomon's Mines'' and the French Blu-Ray release of ''Runaway Train'', there is a low tone version.  

* On a Bulgarian release of ''Rescue Me'' (1992), the [[Cannon Video]] music is used.

'''Availability:''' Very common. Can be seen on several Cannon films from the time. It debuted on ''The Naked Face'', though Cannon continued to use the previous logo for another year. A sped-up version was used as Cannon Video's logo in the UK between 1986 and 1988. Some TV prints of Cannon films may have the logo removed, such as TBS broadcasts of ''Invasion U.S.A.'' in the 1990s, ending with the Viacom "wigga-wigga" logo. It also appears on the HBO/Cannon release of ''The Manhattan Project'' and the Media VHS of ''Mannequin'', both of them [[Gladden Entertainment Corporation|Gladden Entertainment]] productions distributed by 20th Century Fox domestically (the U.S. video rights presumably were retained by Cannon, [https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1986-08-13-fi-17904-story.html the result of a lawsuit filed by Gladden] after Cannon's takeover of Thorn EMI's assets; Thorn EMI had been a financial partner of Gladden's). This is also retained on the 2012 [[The Criterion Collection|Criterion]] Blu-ray of ''Powaqqatsi''.

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