Miramax by any other name

Label is one of industry's catchiest tags

By IAN MOHR

As media speculation kicks up over the status of slogging talks between the Weinsteins and Disney, one question is whether the brothers would come away with the corporate moniker they famously created by mixing their parents' names, Miriam and Max.

By inventing Miramax, Bob and Harvey Weinstein not only created a label with sentimental -- and perhaps motivational -- freight, they also established one of the catchiest tags in a contemporary film world littered with so many Spyglasses, Revolutions and Phoenixes. (The Mouse House doesn't seem to be quite as attached to the less-inventive name of Miramax's genre arm Dimension Films.)

Harvey Weinstein has publicly shown the clout he could wield with Wall Streeters who may back him in any new venture. But sifting for clues as to what that endeavor could be named calls into question the Weinsteins' track record.

Back in 1995, when "Kids" was slapped with an NC-17 rating -- meaning Miramax couldn't release the film under its Disney contract -- the siblings formed their own banner, Shining Excalibur, to release the pic. That brand name had an appropriately defiant tone, but it sounded better suited to the "Dungeons and Dragons" set.

Flash-forward to last year, when the brothers bought the doc "Fahrenheit 9/11" from Disney under another hastily created nom du film, the Fellowship Adventure Group.

That name gave journalists everywhere headaches trying to figure out an acronym that would look fit to print.

If the Weinsteins move out of the Mouse House, and the Miramax label stays with Disney, the brothers may want to start mixing and matching their grandparents' names to come up with another American original.