20th Dimension Films
A catalogue of films that should not have been, and thankfully weren't.
20th Dimension Films was a short-lived production company founded in 1987 by entertainment lawyer Murray Pfennig and an unnamed investor widely believed to be a mid-level executive at Cannon Films who had recently come into an inheritance. The studio's business model was based on Pfennig's legal theory—never tested in court, because no one wanted to test it—that combining two existing intellectual properties created a third, wholly original property that infringed on neither.
About the Archive
Murray Pfennig (1944–2011) practised entertainment law in Los Angeles from 1972 until his disbarment in 1996 for reasons unrelated to 20th Dimension Films but which he maintained were "thematically consistent." Following his bankruptcy, he relocated to Tucson, Arizona, where he operated a notary public service and, according to his obituary in the Arizona Daily Star, "never stopped pitching."
The 20th Dimension Films archive is held by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences Margaret Herrick Library under restricted access. Researchers may request viewing by submitting Form 7-B and providing "a compelling reason, or at minimum an entertaining one" (per the finding aid).
No 20th Dimension film was ever produced, financed, or greenlit. The studio produced no finished films. It did, however, produce a remarkable number of pitch documents, several of which survived Pfennig's 1994 bankruptcy proceedings and were donated to the Academy by the court-appointed trustee, who described them as "evidence of something, though I'm not sure what."
Promotional Materials
