Customer Reviews

Movie Money: Understanding Hollywood's (Creative) Accounting Practices

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This book will help anyone who desires to learn how their box office ticket dollars are spent. The authors take you step by step through a standard profit participation agreement. I feel the authors are not as aggressive as they should be hollywood's unethical "creative accounting". The distributors and the audit firms would like artists to believe that the lack of knowledge is why many artist are "cheated" out of their net profits or as Eddie Murphy stated "monkey profits". All net profit participants should read this before they listen to their lawyers and auditors. Many auditors and attorneys are willing participants in the "net profit scam"!

This is serious stuff! Written by three of the top "Profit Participation Auditor-Accountants" in Hollywood, this is a very informative, very scary inside look at how the legendary "Hollywood Accounting" really works. They also go into why it is the way it is...and that does give you some sympathy for the devil. It's not an easy read since we're talking about legalese and accounting strategies here, so it's not for the casual hobbist. I found it absolutely fascinating and extremely useful since I consider myself a serious filmmaker who wants to know what a good deal and a bad deal may look like...and want to make some money with my movies, not just hit a few festivals and it end up a trophy on the shelf. If you're serious, this is a must read...but bottom line: Don't try to do this yourself. Even the everyday lawyer or CPA will get bamboozeled if they don't have a movie biz experience.

I'm not an accountant, so there's always going to be a limit to how much of accountancy I understand. However this book does as good a job as possible explaining the principles (or lack of them) and terminology associated with "Hollywood Accounting".

The book also contains a series of dramatized examples, following a simple story, complete with a "Hollywood Ending"!

Personally, I can't wait to see the movie, and I would welcome a good sequel. :D