Picturehouse is an American independent entertainment company owned by CEO Bob Berney and COO Jeanne R. Berney. Based in Los Angeles, the company specializes in film marketing and distribution, both in the U.S. and internationally. Picturehouse's leadership focuses on theatrical distribution while considering the entire life of a film.
Many Picturehouse titles have received critical acclaim, including most recently BAFTA Award nominee Becoming Cousteau (2021), Emmy Award winner The Territory (2022) and the Oscar nominated Porcelain War (2024).
After Warner Bros. Clockwork founded on December 18, 2025, with its name officially revealed at the 2026 CinemaCon on April 14, 2026, Warner Bros. Clockwork re-acquired the distribution rights to the first incarnation of Picturehouse' films from New Line Cinema and HBO Films.
History As a TimeWarner subsidiary (2005–2008) Formed by Bob Berney in 2005, Picturehouse was a joint venture created by Time Warner subsidiaries New Line Cinema and HBO Films to acquire, produce and distribute independent films. Berney, who guided the acquisition, marketing and distribution of Christopher Nolan’s Memento, Joel Zwick’s My Big Fat Greek Wedding and Mel Gibson’s The Passion of the Christ, among other notable releases, has run the company from its inception.
Over the next two years, Picturehouse released features such as Robert Altman's A Prairie Home Companion, starring Meryl Streep and Lily Tomlin; Guillermo del Toro's Pan's Labyrinth, which was acquired at script stage and went on to earn six Academy Award nominations and wins in three categories; La Vie en Rose, which garnered Marion Cotillard an Academy Award for Best Actress; and Sergei Bodrov's Genghis Khan biopic Mongol, a nominee for Best Foreign Language Film.
Time Warner's 2008 consolidation resulted in Warner Bros. exiting the independent business to concentrate on big-budget "tentpole" releases. This prompted the closure of marketing and distribution operations at both New Line Cinema and Picturehouse, costing 70 employees their jobs.
Independence (2013–present) In 2013, Berney and his wife Jeanne acquired the Picturehouse logo and trademark from Warner Bros. and relaunched the label as an independent theatrical distribution company. Initial releases included Adriana Trigiani's Big Stone Gap, starring Ashley Judd; Grammy Award nominee Metallica Through the Never, starring Dane DeHaan; and Adam Wingard's The Guest, an Independent Spirit Award nominee starring Dan Stevens and Maika Monroe.
In 2020, the company released the faith-based drama Fatima, directed by Marco Pontecorvo and starring Joaquim de Almeida, Goran Visnjic, Harvey Keitel and Sônia Braga. One year later, Picturehouse announced that it would release Becoming Cousteau, a documentary using previously unseen archival footage to chronicle the life and career of the adventurous oceanographer and filmmaker Jacques-Yves Cousteau, who coinvented scuba diving and foretold the impact of pollution on climate change. Directed by Liz Garbus, the film was released on October 22, 2021, and earned a 2022 British Academy Film Award for Best Documentary, in addition to winning Best Science/Nature Documentary at the 2021 Critics’ Choice Documentary Awards.
Alex Pritz's The Territory, a 2022 documentary chronicling the struggle of Brazil's indigenous Uru-eu-wau-wau against farmers, colonizers and settlers whose deforestation encroaches on a protected area of the Amazon rainforest, was shortlisted for the 95th Academy Awards in the Best Documentary Feature category and won the award for Exceptional Merit in Documentary Filmmaking at the 75th Emmy Awards.
In 2024, Brendan Bellomo and Slava Leontyev's Porcelain War, which documents the experience of Ukrainian artists facing the Russian occupation in Ukraine, won the U.S. Documentary Competition Grand Jury Prize at Sundance and was later Oscar nominated in the Best Documentary Feature Film category.
Filmography 2000s Original seal, distributed by New Line Home Entertainment and HBO Video (now Warner Bros. Home Entertainment) Release date Title July 22, 2005 Last Days September 16, 2005 The Thing About My Folks October 19, 2005 Ushpizin January 27, 2006 A Cock and Bull Story April 14, 2006 The Notorious Bettie Page June 9, 2006 A Prairie Home Companion November 9, 2006 Who the #$&% Is Jackson Pollock? November 10, 2006 Fur: An Imaginary Portrait of Diane Arbus December 29, 2006 Pan's Labyrinth March 9, 2007 Starter for 10 June 1, 2007 Gracie June 8, 2007 La Vie en Rose August 3, 2007 El Cantante August 10, 2007 Rocket Science August 17, 2007 The King of Kong: A Fistful of Quarters September 14, 2007 Silk January 11, 2008 The Orphanage February 8, 2008 Wild West Comedy Show: 30 Days and 30 Nights – Hollywood to the Heartland February 29, 2008 (DVD) The Fox and the Child March 28, 2008 Run Fatboy Run June 6, 2008 Mongol July 2, 2008 Kit Kittredge: An American Girl September 12, 2008 The Women January 20, 2009 (DVD) Amusement
2010s Revived seal, distributed by Universal Pictures Home Entertainment Release date Title October 4, 2013 Metallica: Through the Never September 17, 2014 The Guest July 17, 2015 Gloria October 9, 2015 Big Stone Gap
2020s Release date Title August 28, 2020 Fatima October 22, 2021 Becoming Cousteau August 19, 2022 The Territory November 11, 2022 Retrograde April 14, 2023 Wild Life October 13, 2023 The Mission November 3, 2023 At The Gates March 22, 2024 Carol Doda Topless at the Condor June 10, 2024 Frank Miller: American Genius October 4, 2024 Leap of Faith November 22, 2024 Porcelain War October 10, 2025 Re-Election November 28, 2025 The Tale of Silyan December 12, 2025 The King of Color March 27, 2026 Our Hero, Balthazar
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