HBO Films is a division of the cable television network HBO that produces feature films and miniseries. While much of HBO Films' output is created directly for the television market, such as the film Witness Protection and the mini-series Band of Brothers, Pacific, Generation Kill and Angels in America, it has also branched into theatrical distribution with such critically acclaimed films as Elephant and American Splendor. These theatrical releases are usually handled by Picturehouse, a joint venture between HBO Films and New Line Cinema; both are owned by Time Warner.

HBO began producing films in 1983 with their HBO Pictures banner; their first film, The Terry Fox Story, was also the first feature film produced expressly for pay television. Another film production company, HBO Showcase (later HBO NYC) was folded into HBO Pictures to produce the current company HBO Films.

HBO Films productions are generally regarded to be high-quality and groundbreaking productions; the films produced by the company have garnered hundreds of Emmy and Golden Globe awards; HBO Films productions have won the award for the Primetime Emmy Award for "Outstanding Made for Television Movie" every year from 1993 to 2002, except 2000. Elephant is the first film produced by HBO Films to win the Palme d'Or at the Cannes Film Festival.

Armand Anthony Assante, Jr. (born October 4, 1949) is an American actor.

Assante was born in New York City and raised in Cornwall, New York, the son of Katherine (née Healy), a music teacher and poet, and Armand Anthony Assante, Sr., a painter and artist. His father was Italian and his mother was Irish, and was raised in a devoutly Roman Catholic family. Assante was married to Karen McArn from 1982 to 1994, and has two daughters, Anya and Alessandra.

During the 1970s, Assante was a regular on two NBC soap operas, How to Survive a Marriage as Johnny McGee and The Doctors as Dr. Mike Powers. His first film was The Lords of Flatbush (1974), although the title credits misspelled his last name as Assanti. A role that brought him greater attention came in 1980's Private Benjamin as a handsome Frenchman who becomes the love interest of a U.S. soldier played by Goldie Hawn.

Assante's somewhat sinister look has made him a popular choice for tough-guy heroes, as in his starring role as private eye Mike Hammer in the film I, the Jury (1982) or as Mafia gangsters like that of Michael Moretti in Sidney Sheldon's Rage of Angels. He portrayed the notorious Bugsy Siegel in a comedy, Neil Simon's The Marrying Man (1991), another mobster in Hoffa (1992) starring Jack Nicholson, and crime kingpin John Gotti in the 1996 made-for-television biopic Gotti, for which he won his Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Miniseries or a Movie.