DreamWorks Secures Additional Funding from Reliance

After a long and suspenseful wait, India's Reliance Entertainment has agreed in principle to continue financing DreamWorks Studios in a deal that will allow Steven Spielberg's company to make at least eight to 10 movies during the next two to three years.

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Reliance has thrown DreamWorks a lifeline after long discussions, according to sources. Going forward, DreamWorks will make three or four films a year, focusing on tentpole or low-budget fare and avoiding the middle. On larger movies, DreamWorks will seek to partner, as it has with Fox on the upcoming Robopocalypse, set for release in July 2013, and with Participant on The Help and Spielberg's upcoming biopic Lincoln.

Reliance originally invested $325 million in DreamWorks in 2009. But after a number of films disappointed, including Cowboys & Aliens, it was unclear whether Reliance would continue to fund the company.

Under the new deal, first reported by The New York Times, DreamWorks' relationship with Disney, which distributes its films, will not change. The company will release only two small movies this year: People Like Us, set for June 29, and Lincoln in December.

Email: Kim.Masters@thr.com