US: AMC hit with antitrust suit over Spanish-language cinema

A short-lived Spanish-language cinema in Houston is accusing AMC Theaters of using its market power to block it from getting studio licenses to show first-run movies.

In a lawsuit filed on Monday in a US District Court in Houston, Viva Cinema Theaters said it went out of business just six months after opening when AMC threatened distributors that it would not show any of their first-run movies, English or Spanish, at one of its 30-screen theaters in Houston if they licensed to Viva.

Viva opened in spring 2013, but closed in November of that year.

“During the period of Viva Cinema’s operations, AMC infrequently showed some films in Spanish or with Spanish subtitles (during matinee and not evening showings), and then, once Viva Cinema went out of business, AMC went back to its prior practices of exhibiting no, or virtually no, Spanish-language films, and — if exhibiting them at all — only on an extremely limited basis,” Viva contends in the lawsuit.

Full Content: Variety

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