As if eating New Line alive wasn’t enough to feed the beast, Warner Brothers has announced today that they will also be shuttering up Picturehouse and Warner Independent Pictures.

What’s worse is the official statement seems to blame the folding on New Line’s addition, subtly hinting that the New Line banner will be taking over the production budgets and schedules of both Picturehouse and WIP.

Get the statement and more inside.

From the official statement of Alan Horn, President and COO of Warners:

“With New Line now a key part of Warner Bros., we’re able to handle films across the entire spectrum of genres and budgets without overlapping production, marketing and distribution infrastructures. After much painstaking analysis, this was a difficult decision to make, but it reflects the reality of a changing marketplace and our need to prudently run our businesses with increased efficiencies. We’re confident that the spirit of independent filmmaking and the opportunity to find and give a voice to new talent will continue to have a presence at Warner Bros.”

After cutting 450 jobs at New Line, we’re pretty sure that Warners isn’t just going to shuffle talent and budgets from Picturehouse and WIP to the New Line banner. Any way this is cut, it only means one thing: less cheap art movies from Warners.

That’s not a huge hit to the overall market, especially to people who believe (as we do) that the “Independent” label should be left to films that are actually independent.

On the other hand, this does mean less movies, which we are always against.

Who is next?

Warners can’t sever HBO Films without pissing off HBO, and Cartoon Network films has a built in slate.

That leaves only poor Castle Rock Entertainment, who has been a Warners subsidiary since the 90s.