Miramax Films is an American entertainment company known for distributing independent and foreign films. For its first 14 years the company was privately owned by its founders, Bob and Harvey Weinstein. In 1993, the company was acquired by The Walt Disney Company.
Founded in 1979 by Bob and Harvey Weinstein and headquartered in New York City and Cambridge, Massachusetts, Miramax was a leading independent film motion picture distribution and production company before it was acquired by The Walt Disney Company in 1993. The Weinsteins operated Miramax with more creative and financial independence than any other division of Disney, until 2005 when they decided to leave the company and founded The Weinstein Company. Miramax was sold by Disney to Colony Capital in 2010, ending Disney's 17-year involvement with the studio.
Founded by the brothers Harvey and Bob Weinstein in Buffalo, New York in 1979, the company was named by combining the first names of their parents Max and Miriam,[dead link] and was originally created to distribute independent films deemed commercially unfeasible by the major studios.