Triumph Films (also known as Triumph Releasing Corporation) was an American independent film studio division of Sony Pictures Entertainment, that geared towards theatre and direct-to-video film production and distribution.
It was founded in 1982 as a joint venture between Columbia Pictures and the French company Gaumont to distribute foreign films in the US. In 1984, Marcie Bloom, who was formerly of the New York Film Festival, joined Triumph Films to serve as New York publicity director (Bloom would later co-found Sony Pictures Classics).
In 1985, Triumph Films announced that they would cut back down on their production slate, focusing on foreign-language films with English subtitles. Shortly afterwards, Gaumont decided to cut ties, and Columbia Pictures, now the sole owner, decided to shutter Triumph Films, and fold it into the Columbia Pictures label. The arthouse functions were later taken by Sony Pictures Classics in 1992.
On January 5, 1988, the then-newly founded Columbia Pictures Entertainment announced that they would revive the Triumph brand as a new worldwide subsidiary, Triumph Releasing Corporation; this incarnation of Triumph provided administrative services related to the distribution of Columbia Pictures and Tri-Star Pictures in the U.S. and Canada, while internationally, Triumph would be responsible for the sales, marketing and distribution of Columbia and Tri-Star films under the direction of each individual studio. It was officially incorporated on March 24, 1988.
In 1989, Triumph began to distribute films from Crédit Lyonnais's Epic Productions Inc. under a theatrical distribution agreement. The company also started distributing films from 21st Century Film Corporation and SVS Films (owned by Sony) around the time, the latter after Sony acquired Columbia Pictures Entertainment.
In 1991, when SVS was reorganized, SVS Films was absorbed as the production branch of Triumph Releasing Corporation, while the home video unit of SVS was reorganized as SVS/Triumph before the home video unit shuttered.
In March 1992, David Saunders, who was business partner with Zalman King, and former president of The Guber-Peters Entertainment Company, became president of Triumph Releasing Corporation, which transferred from distributing films by Epic Productions and Vision International to focus itself on low-budget productions. In 1994, the company entered into a pact with Crystal Sky Pictures for production of two low-budget family feature films.
On November 23, 1994, Triumph Releasing Corporation was renamed as Sony Pictures Releasing Corporation, and the Triumph name was spun off at film production as Triumph Films, now primarily a label for low-budget and direct-to-video releases.
The company shuttered in 1997, as many of these films made under the Triumph name were flopped at the box office, and also as part of a cost-cutting measure by Sony Pictures Entertainment's new president, John Calley, and many of Triumph's finished films like In God's Hands and Baby Geniuses was transferred to TriStar Pictures. The role as a genre label would later been taken by Screen Gems.
After being shut down in 1997, the Triumph Films label was re-activated in 2003. The label went dormant again in 2008, becoming an in-name-only division of Sony Pictures Releasing Corporation. The company came after the formation of a new entity, Sony Pictures Worldwide Acquisitions. In 2014, the label was revived yet again for the release of The Remaining. Their direct-to-video role has been taken by Destination Films within Sony.
Notable films include To Gillian on Her 37th Birthday, The Ambulance, Brainscan, Magic in the Water (co-released by TriStar Pictures), The Golden Laws, Steamboy (co-distributed by Destination Films) and the critically panned '.