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It's also part of crazy Hollywood acounting. The more you can charge against the film the better, that's why flops like Titanic and Empire strikes back still haven't made a profit

You don't want the film company to actually own anything because then the people owed money might have something to go after

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That only makes sense if you have a stake in Panavision. There are tons of film makers who don't have an interest in spending more money.

I might not have understood properly, but the idea is for these companies to basically always be "losing" money on paper. Many popular movies are "flops" on paper because of accounting reasons. If these companies have 100 RED cameras lying around, creditors will have something to come after.

The studio could be standing between the filmmakers and the camera providers, pointing the filmmaker to the public rate sheets while actually paying much less.

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