How are we looking at the "Country of Origin" field these days? The contribution rules state:

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Enter the country or countries in which the main feature's production company/companies are based, in the order they appear in the credits.

It's important to note that this rule explicitly points to the feature's production company/companies - not the theatrical release studio. And for good reason: after all, the theatrical release studio for a given film may not even be the same for various markets. I've read some old discussions about this, and the example that's given a lot is the 'Lord of the Rings' trilogy. While theatrical release studio New Line Cinema is American, the production company on them is WingNut Films - which is a New Zealand company. The rules tell us to look at the production company/companies, not at the theatrical release studio, and as such, most (but not all) of the 'Lord of the Rings' profiles have New Zealand listed as it's sole CoO.

It is, however, not always easy for everyone to determine which are the theatrical release studio(s) and which are the production companies. If the credits state: "Company A and Company B present, in association with Company C, a Company D production", then what? Are the CoO's of Company A and Company B ignored, as their "Presents" credit makes them theatrical release studios? Is the CoO of Company C ignored, as it's technically still part of the "presenting" studios? Or are they all included, resulting in the fact the the CoO of the true primary production Company D is left out because there's no room left for it? Are we all on the same page as to where we take the CoO from, in such cases?

As someone with lots of discs from various regions and localities, I find this to be more and more problematic. Films that are released in various markets may be released by different theatrical release studios, and that isn't always done by merely pasting another animated vignette at the start of the movie - I've seen quite a number of examples where the actual film credits are amended, suddenly including a different theatrical release studio than the same film has in the same place on the DVD/Blu-ray-release of that same film in that country of origin. And that's just between large markets as the US and the UK. Home video releases by independent distributors in smaller countries, such as in The Netherlands where I happen to live, seem to have no problem to occasionally butcher the film credits and remove all trace of the original theatrical release studio, and either replace it with their own name, or leave it off altogether.

The bottom line is: when an American film distributor buys the US distribution rights to a fully completed, purely UK-produced film, then it doesn't suddenly become an American film. The CoO was, is and should stay "United Kingdom". Right? And if it's released in German theaters by yet another company, a German one, then it doesn't suddenly become a German film - then, too, it stays a UK film. Right? That, to me, is why the rules point to the feature's production company/companies for determining the CoO's, and not to theatrical release studios. Right? By all means, correct me if I'm wrong...

On the other hand, there are plenty of users that say: "Hey, I see an American company name on-screen, so I'll enter US as a CoO" - even if it's not remotely a US film. It's difficult to get everyone on the same page. I have huge amounts of specific examples where this leads to problems, but for now, let me sketch the one I ran into today. The film is 'Johnny English Strikes Again' - IMHO, primarily a British film, produced by British company Working Title. The credits read:

UNIVERSAL PICTURES and STUDIOCANAL present, in association with PERFECT WORLD PICTURES, a WORKING TITLE production

Universal Pictures is American, StudioCanal is French, Perfect World Pictures is Chinese, and Working Title is British. So how would you enter this film's CoO(s)? Someone actually submitted United States, France and China as CoO's, leaving out the UK, as there's no room for it. But again, to me, this is a primarily a British production. The fact that it even *got* a (minimal) theatrical release in the States was really merely an afterthought - it was always clear to the makers that this film would make it's money in other territories (read this article for further background). It seems very wrong to list this as US/France/China while it's really a British film. Looking at the contribution rules, which explicitly point to the feature's production company/companies, not the theatrical release studio(s) - which CoO's should we leave out? Are the CoO's of Universal Pictures and StudioCanal B ignored, as their "Presents" credit makes them out to be theatrical release studios? And is the CoO of Perfect World Pictures ignored, as it's technically still part of the "presenting" studios? Or not? Or are they all included, resulting in the fact the the CoO of the true primary production Working Title is left out because there's no room for it?

Examples are nice, and I can supply lots more, but I'm really looking for a more generic answer. I don't just want to be sure how to fill the field for this specific title, but I'd like a generic approach that we can apply to the next similar set of studio credits as well...

Quoting iPatsa:

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I don't see where the rule is unclear.

I don't either. It's just that I see lots of contributors handling this field *very* differently, which is why I thought I'd ask.

Production companies only, so in your example UK is the sole CoO.

So now we've got several users stating that the United Kingdom is the sole CoO for 'Johnny English Strikes Again', and one user, ObiKen, who feels that the CoO field should be filled with China and the United Kingdom, in that order.

The key difference in viewpoint is whether Company C, in "Company A and Company B present, in association with Company C, a Company D production", is seen as a production company or not. That can be argued both ways, and that's a big part of why I posted this. In the specific "Company A and Company B present, in association with Company C, a Company D production" format, I'm personally still not viewing Company C as a production company for our purposes - it's in the "Presents" camp to me, and therefore I'd ignore it. AlunH and dee1959jay seem to agree. So what now? How do we get everyone on the same page?

The only part we need to concern ourselves with for the purpose of CoO is "a Company D production".

Quoting ObiKen:

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The credit "in association with" is applicable to Production companies only in the opening credits, that is the industry standard.

Any prove or documentation for this claim?

Might one use the copyright notice to help clarify?

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Isn't it true that these "in association with ...." credits are usually referring to a company or organization which is providing funding but is not involved in the actual production work?