EuropaCorp SA, the French movie studio founded by director Luc Besson, filed for bankruptcy protection in the U.S. after releasing a string of recent flops and botching a change in how it distributes films, Bloomberg News reported. Losses stemming from the decision to handle its own U.S. distribution and the poor performance of movies like “The Circle,” “Their Finest” and “Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets” led to the studio’s downfall, according to papers filed May 17 in Manhattan federal court. EuropaCorp signed a creditor protection procedure last week in France that gives it six months to restructure its debt while continuing operations. The studio had outstanding debt of 86.9 million euros (about $97 million) under its first-lien credit agreement and 94.6 million euros under its second-lien credit agreement, according to a declaration filed by company consultant Kevin Tatum McDonald. The company has posted losses for two and a half years, with results hurt by an ill-fated 2014 decision to distribute its films in the U.S. internally through EC Films rather than through major U.S. studios and independent distributors, according to court papers.
