Geffen Pictures

Background

Geffen Pictures (also known as "The Geffen Film Company" and "The Geffen Company") was the movie production arm of Geffen Records established in 1980 by DreamWorks co-founder and media entrepreneur David Geffen. Its output was distributed by Warner Bros. Pictures.

Geffen later sold Geffen Records to MCA, but retained ownership of Geffen Pictures. Geffen Pictures closed its doors in late 1998; the Geffen movies, with the exception of Beavis and Butt-Head Do America (owned by Paramount Pictures), are currently held by Warner Bros. Entertainment.

Meanwhile, Geffen Records remains an active music imprint under the aegis of Interscope Records and its Interscope Geffen A&M faction of the Universal Music Group.

(February 5, 1982-July 13, 1997)

Logo: On a black background, a light blue (or silver) sphere appears and slowly moves forward. At the same time, the sphere slowly turns clockwise, revealing a thin, inscribed "G". When the "G" is fully revealed, the sphere stops, and text that reads "A GEFFEN COMPANY RELEASE", "GEFFEN PICTURES" or "A GEFFEN PICTURES RELEASE" in ITC Eras Bold font, appears under it. A few seconds later, smaller text appears near the bottom of the screen, which says "DISTRIBUTED BY WARNER BROS." on the left side of the WB bug (either the \\' or WB shield) and next to the bug is the Warner byline.

Bylines (next to the WB bug):

February 5, 1982-February 2, 1990: "A WARNER COMMUNICATIONS COMPANY"
March 22-December 13, 1991: "A TIME WARNER COMPANY"
October 1, 1993-July 13, 1997: "A TIME WARNER ENTERTAINMENT COMPANY"
Sometimes, the logo appears bylineless.

Variants:

On Personal Best and Risky Business, "A GEFFEN COMPANY RELEASE" is in L&C Hairline font.
A still version of this logo where the sphere "G" is completely enlarged, exists on the trailer for Personal Best, the first Geffen movie release, and it's also seen at the end of most Geffen movie releases.
On Little Shop of Horrors, the logo is on a starry background.
On Beetlejuice, the logo is accompanied by a ghoulish rendition of "Banana Boat", sung by Danny Elfman.
A version has been spotted in which the finished logo remains intact, but then the company's name and the WB bug fades out, then the sphere zooms backwards and disappears into the black background. This was seen at the end of Geffen-produced films, mainly Little Shop of Horrors.
A later variant of this logo has the finishing animation of the sphere revealing the "G" halt rather than slowing down, leaving a small gap on the right side of the sphere (if someone looks carefully at it). This was seen at the beginning of later Geffen-produced films.
Some films have the "G" sphere white or blue.
On Beavis and Butt-Head Do America, the Warner Bros. byline is absent.

Technique: What appears to be model work. This was designed and animated by Saul Bass.

Music/Sounds: A series of lullaby-like synth notes accompanied by a deep synth fargo note is heard, which then leads to a 5-note synthesizer tune. Sometimes, the opening and closing themes of the movie, or none.

Availability: Appears at the beginning of Geffen-produced films, such as Risky Business, After Hours, Little Shop of Horrors, Beetlejuice, The Last Boy Scout and Joe's Apartment. The last movie produced by Geffen was the 1997 movie The Butcher Boy, released in the U.S. on April 3, 1998.