A German court has filed a $2.3 million insolvency action against a film company owned by the Russian producer of Oscar-nominees 'Leviathan' and 'Loveless'.
A German insolvency court has filed bankruptcy proceedings against a film company based in Cyprus and owned by Alexander Rodnyansky, the famed Russian producer of Oscar-nominated features Leviathan and Loveless, claiming the company owes more than $2 million to the shareholders of now-defunct German production and licensing group A Company.
In the Wednesday filing, seen by The Hollywood Reporter, the court states that Alexander Rodnyansky Films Limited, a holding company based in Cyprus, has failed to pay $2.299 million it owes A Company and that it should be ruled insolvent.
The money is part of a series of loans, totaling close to $10 million, that Rodnyansky's A.R. Films gave A Company in 2011. After A Company filed for bankruptcy protection in 2015, a Berlin state court found that those loans were part of A Company's assets and should be paid out to the group's creditors.
"It can't be that Mr. Rodnyansky can be allowed to just take this money and run," Torsten Martini, the court-appointed liquidator, told The Hollywood Reporter. Martini had initially tried to get the money from one of Rodnyansky's German companies but to no avail.
At its peak, A Company was one of the leading film licensing and distribution companies for the Eastern European market, handling such independent titles as The King's Speech and the Sin City and Saw franchises. A sharp downturn in the Russian theatrical market and the shutdown of operations in Ukraine in the wake of the 2014 armed conflict with Russia hit A Company hard and forced the company into bankruptcy.
Rodnyansky has cut all ties with A Company and not responded to demands for payment. He declined a request from The Hollywood Reporter to comment on the legal action against AR Films Limited in Cyprus.
Former A Company CEO Alexander van Dülmen accused Rodnyansky of "double standards." "His films, like Leviathan and Loveless, are a condemnation of the moral corruption in Russia today," he told The Hollywood Reporter, "but when it comes to his own business, he seems to apply other standards of morality."
