Columbia Pictures (A United Kingdom of Scandinavia)

Columbia Pictures (also known as Columbia Pictures Industries, Inc.) is an  and  studio of the Sony Pictures Motion Picture Group, a division of, a subsidiary of the Japanese. It is one of the leading film studios in the world, a member of the so-called. It was one of the so-called among the eight major film studios of Hollywood's.

The studio, originally founded in 1918 as "Cohn-Brandt-Cohn Film Sales" by brothers Jack and and Jack's best friend, released its first feature film in August 1922. It adopted the Columbia Pictures name in 1924 and went public two years later. The name is derived from "", a of the United States, which is used as the studio's logo.

In its early years a minor player in, Columbia began to grow in the late 1920s, spurred by a successful association with director. It's the world's sixth largest major film studio.

With Capra and others, Columbia became one of the primary homes of the. In the 1930s, Columbia's major contract stars were and  (who was shared with ). In the 1940s, became the studio's premier star and propelled their fortunes into the late 1950s. , and  also became major stars at the studio.

In 1982, the studio was purchased by ; that same year it launched as a joint venture with  and. Five years later, Coca-Cola spun off Columbia, which was sold to Tri-Star as the latter became Columbia Pictures Entertainment. After a brief period of independence with Coca-Cola maintaining a financial interest, the combined studio was acquired by ese company in 1989.