Momentum Pictures (also known as Momentum) was one of the leading independent motion picture distributors in the UK and Ireland and released approximately 20 theatrical films a year, with several dtv releases.
Momentum's most successful theatrical releases include the Oscar, BAFTA and BIFA-winning The King's Speech, Amélie, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, Lost in Translation, Control, Downfall, The Young Victoria, Defiance, Milk, Let the Right One In, The Illusionist, Just Friends, District B13 Ultimatum, The Men Who Stare at Goats, Law Abiding Citizen, Glorious 39, O Brother, Where Art Thou?, Red Tails and P.S. I Love You.
The studio has also released several family films, such as Hoodwinked, The Adventures of Rocky and Bullwinkle (co-distributed with United International Pictures as part of a two-year agreement), Arthur and the Invisibles and Igor, as well as the home video rights for popular TV series Creature Comforts.
Dead Man Down, Snitch, 21 & Over, In the House, The Bay, Antiviral, Safe Haven, Uwantme2killhim? and Dark Skies were among the last films before released under the Entertainment One banner.
On 9 January 2013, Entertainment One acquired the parent company of Momentum, Alliance Films.
Sam Walczak (Mischa Barton), is a recent engineering graduate. At her graduation party, her father, an owner of a demolition company, gives her a gift: a job supervising the demolition of a building in the middle of nowhere. If she's successful, she will become his partner. Sam arrives at the Malestrazza Building, and is greeted by Mary (Deborah Kara Unger), the caretaker. Sam tells Mary she will be staying in one of the apartments in the building. Jimmy (Cameron Bright), the caretaker's teenage son, takes her bags to her apartment and explains the rules of the building. She is to stay off the eighth floor because it is Malestrazza's and the roof because it is too dangerous.
Three girls, a down-and-out stripper named Trixie, a drug-running killer and ex-convict named Camero, and a corporate powerbroker nicknamed Hel, arrive at a remote desert hideaway to extort massive riches from a ruthless sword-wielding killer named Pinky, who is also a notorious underworld figure. None of the three women is who they appear to be: each has an ulterior motive.
Jesco White (Edward Hogg) is the last of the West Virginia mountain dancers. He is the son of D Ray White (Muse Watson), the greatest mountain dancer of all time. Ever since Jesco was a child, D Ray tried to keep him on a straight path—one that would put him on the right hand of the Lord. Dancing was just one way to keep Jesco from losing his soul. But from a young age, there was temptation drawing him away from D Ray, away from the dancing. There were the voices in his head, tormenting him. Maybe that’s why Jesco loved to get high.
Three years after the events of the original film, the authorities are attempting to return law and order to ravaged District 13. However, their efforts so far have failed to do so. The death of gang overlord Taha Ben Mahmoud has left a power vacuum, and total control of the area is now being fought over by five rival territorial gang lords who want to step into Taha's position. Leïto tries demolishing the walls surrounding the district on a daily basis, but is told to stop by African gang lord Molko, who sees the walls as protection from outside the district.
Fred Simmons (Danny McBride) is a fourth-degree black belt in Taekwondo who runs his own dojo in a small North Carolina town. He styles himself a big shot, driving a Ferrari and extolling the virtues of Taekwondo to potential new students, but loses his confidence after he discovers that his wife, Suzie (Mary Jane Bostic) gave her boss a handjob after a drunken office party. In order to restore his confidence, he attends a martial arts expo. He meets his idol, B movie action star Chuck "the Truck" Wallace (Ben Best), who in reality turns out to be a dirty and drunken mess. After nearly brawling with Chuck's seedy friends, Fred persuades Chuck to make an appearance at his upcoming Taekwondo belt test and then parties with his friends and students in Chuck's hotel room. Fred returns home and sells his Ferrari to pay Chuck's $10,000 appearance fee. Shortly thereafter, Suzie returns to Fred after losing her job. On the night before the belt test, Fred catches Suzie having sex with Chuck on his own couch. Fred challenges Chuck to a fight, but is eventually beaten and driven off. The next morning, Suzie once again asks to be taken back, but Fred rejects her and urinates on his wedding ring. Fred arrives at the test late, battered and bruised, but with his confidence restored. When Chuck arrives for his appearance, Fred challenges him to a martial arts demonstration of board breaking, which he wins. At the following belt ceremony, Fred reads a new student pledge that he has written, which outlines the goals and responsibilities of Taekwondo.
The film opens with on-screen text stating: "A true story". It is August 1941, and Nazi Einsatzgruppen are sweeping through Eastern Europe, systematically killing Jews. Among the survivors not killed or restricted to ghettoes are the Polish Jewish Bielski brothers: Tuvia (Daniel Craig), Zus (Liev Schreiber), Asael (Jamie Bell), and Aron (George MacKay). Their parents are dead, slain by the local police under orders from the occupying Germans. The brothers flee to the Naliboki forest, vowing to avenge their parents.
Thirty years old and single, Pauline "Poppy" Cross shares a London flat with her best friend Zoe, a fellow teacher. Poppy is free-minded, high-spirited and kind-hearted. The film opens with Poppy trying to engage a shop employee in conversation. He ignores her, yet his icy demeanour does not bother her. She maintains her good mood even when she discovers her bicycle has been stolen. Her main concern is not getting a new one or finding the bicycle, but that she did not get a chance to say goodbye to it. This prompts her to decide to learn how to drive.
The Menno Meyjes directed drama stars Adrien Brody as Spanish bullfighter Manolete, in a film that covers his late life love affair with actress Lupe Sino (Penélope Cruz) before he was gored to death in the bull ring. Sino's communist politics turned their affair into a scandal in the early 1940s, especially after discovering her previous marriage to a PCE member. The film begins with Manolete's last day in Linares.
Ian Curtis (Sam Riley) and Debbie Woodruff (Samantha Morton) marry in 1975 in their home town of Macclesfield at ages 19 and 18, respectively. Ian retreats from domestic life, preferring to write poetry in solitude. On June 4, 1976 they attend a Sex Pistols concert with Bernard Sumner (James Anthony Pearson), Peter Hook (Joe Anderson), and Terry Mason (Andrew Sheridan), who are starting a band. Mesmerized by the concert, Ian volunteers to be their singer. They name themselves Warsaw, and Terry moves into a managerial role with the addition of drummer Stephen Morris (Harry Treadaway). The band debuts 19 May 1977 and soon rename themselves Joy Division. Ian and Debbie finance their first EP, An Ideal for Living (1978).
In 1941, an eight-year-old Hannibal Lecter lives in Lecter Castle in Lithuania. Hitler's invasion of the Soviet Union turns the Baltic region into part of the bloodiest front line of World War II. Lecter, his younger sister Mischa, and their parents travel to the family's hunting lodge in the woods to elude the advancing German troops. After three years, the Nazis are finally driven out of the countries soon to be occupied by the Soviet Union. During their retreat, however, they destroy a Soviet tank that had stopped at the Lecter family's lodge looking for water. The explosion kills everyone but Lecter and Mischa. They survive in the cottage until six former Lithuanian militiamen, led by a Nazi collaborator named Vladis Grutas, storm and loot it. Finding no other food in the bitterly cold Baltic winter, the men look menacingly at Lecter and Mischa.
Holly and Gerry are a married couple who live on the Lower East Side of Manhattan. They are deeply in love, but they fight occasionally. By winter that year, Gerry suddenly dies of a brain tumor and Holly realizes how much he means to her as well as how insignificant their arguments were.
In 1796 William Wilberforce is severely ill and taking a recuperative holiday in Bath, Somerset, with his cousin, Henry Thornton. It is here that William is introduced to his future wife, Barbara Spooner. Although he initially resists any romantic overtures, she convinces him to relate the story of his career.
The film focuses on Michael (Michael Djerzinski) and Bruno and their disturbed sexuality. They are half-brothers who are very different from each other. They both had an unusual childhood because their mother was a hippie, instead growing up with their grandmothers and in boarding schools.
Penelope Wilhern (Christina Ricci) is a young woman from a wealthy family with all the qualities to make an excellent match for any other well-bred man of her status. What sets her apart is that she has pig-face disorder.
After the suicide of one of the inmates at a British young offender institution, a group of teenage offenders, along with a prison officer, are sent to a remote island, formerly used as a British Army training area, but now serving as a prison training area. They soon find out they are not alone on the island as some members of the group come across a camp site with two female young offenders and their prison officer. The story develops into a tale of betrayal and vengeance. Strange murders start occurring, and the boys eventually work out that they are being persecuted by the father of the boy who killed himself, a special forces soldier. One by one, the teenagers and their supervisors are picked off, either by the father, his dogs, or by each other.