Paramount Did Not Promise 30 Films a Year. It Promised 156 Over Five

California's Attorney General announced the settlement in the Warner Bros./Paramount litigation on Monday 21 September. The headline everywhere is thirty films a year.

The release says something more specific, in two consecutive sentences: "30 films a year — including 20 wide releases — in the first two years. 32 films a year — with 21 wide releases — in years three, four, and five."

Which is 156 films over five years, not 150. And 103 wide releases, not 100. The press release never does either sum itself, which is presumably how everyone came to do it wrong.

The $30 million is the smaller half of the penalty

"$30 million per missed film" is in the release and is accurate. Two things attached to it are not being reported.

First, where it goes. The release says healthcare and retirement trust funds associated with the WGA, IATSE, DGA, IBT and other unions, plus the National Association of Attorneys General. The consent decree splits it precisely: 50 percent to union health and retirement trusts, 40 percent to the Motion Picture & Television Fund, 10 percent to a NAAG fund. The 40 percent recipient does not appear in the press release at all. So "it goes to union trusts" describes half the money.

Second, the cash is the secondary remedy. Missing the target triggers a six-month cure period; failing to cure forces divestiture of Miramax within twelve months, with no reacquisition during the commitment period. The decree states the per-film payment is "in addition to and independent of" that. A story built on the fine alone understates the deal by a studio.

"Wide release" is the load-bearing term, and only one document defines it

Search the press release for a screen count and there is nothing — no threshold, no numbers, not even the word "screens." The consent decree is explicit: "'Wide Release Film' means a Film that is released on at least two thousand (2,000) screens."

Two more requirements live only in the decree and in none of the coverage:

• A minimum 45-day theatrical window for every qualifying film.
• At least 50 percent of qualifying films must be produced or co-produced by the combined entity, not merely distributed by it.

The rest of the numbers, with the labels straightened out

• $1.5 billion in additional US production spend over five years above 2025 levels — the decree sets it as at least $300 million more per year.
• $47.5 million over five years — $9.5 million a year. The Attorney General calls it a "Workforce Fund" for workers displaced by the merger; the decree calls it "Community Investment" and points it at qualified educational institutions and at film programmes and community arts organisations. Displaced workers get a separate, softer protection in the decree: a right to reapply for open positions.
• $5 million a year, $25 million total, for independent film — and the decree specifies it is a fund for acquiring independent films, not financing them.
• At least four independent films a year. The decree's definition is broad enough that an in-house original screenplay qualifies.
• Twelve attorneys general: California plus Arizona, Colorado, Connecticut, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Nevada, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, Oregon and Washington.

What is not settled

• Court approval. As of today the settlement is pending; no approval order has appeared.
• Whether the state-incentive ratchet trips. The decree ties it to a 43 percent uncapped credit in California or New York; the press release says only "a more expansive state film tax credit."
• Whether day-and-date streaming titles can count toward the 2,000-screen definition. Nothing addresses it.

A number a court can enforce, and a number everyone printed

Thirty is a good round figure for a headline. The enforceable one steps up in year three, and the enforcement mechanism is not the cheque — it is a studio changing hands.

Nobody has to correct anything. The press release is accurate, the decree is public, and the arithmetic is two sentences apart. It is just that the sum was left for the reader, and the reader got 150.