Vancouver: Lions Gate Entertainment of Vancouver has restructured its home entertainment operations into three distinct video labels – in part stimulated by the acquisition of Trimark last year.

The three labels will be Trimark, Studio and Avalanche. Peter Block, newly named as president of home entertainment, will oversee their operation, including tv licencing, pay-per-view and Internet-based video-on-demand.

‘The merger of Lions Gate and Trimark has substantially expanded our home entertainment portfolio, giving us access to some of Lions Gate’s exciting pipeline of theatrical releases as well as one of the largest and most valuable libraries in the independent film business,’ says Block. ‘We now have deeper pockets to build a powerful catalogue of rental and sell-through titles and, with Lions Gate as our parent company, we are positioned to acquire and distribute quality product at all levels.’

Ron Schwartz, who like Block is a Trimark veteran, has been named executive vp, North American home entertainment sales and operations.

lge has also hired former mgm sales vp Michael Katchman as its new vp of sell-through. Scott Hayman has been promoted to manager of publicity and marketing for Lions Gate home entertainment.

Lions Gate theatrical releases set to go to video include: Steal This Movie (Vincent D’Onofrio, Janeane Garofalo) by Trimark; Urbania (Dan Futterman, Alan Cumming) by Trimark; Million Dollar Hotel (Mel Gibson, Jeremy Davies, Mila Jovovich) by Studio; and Nowhere to Hide (Dong-Kun Jang, Ji-Woo Choi) by Avalanche *.

Ian Edwards

-www.lionsgatefilms.com