SUPPLY AND DEMANDS

Dave O’Meara’s Malibu Cinema, which serves the nearby film colony, continues its war with Warner Bros. and Columbia.

The studios stopped supplying their films to O’Meara 18 months ago because of an auditing dispute--a $50,000 disagreement about O’Meara’s ticket take for 1982--and now O’Meara’s posted a sign that reads: “For your viewing guidance: no Warner Bros. or Columbia film will be exhibited in this theater.”

Warner distribution president Barry Reardon called the sign “confusing and misleading” because it implies a boycott: “In fact, we took him off service because he was under-reporting box-office receipts.”

No lawsuits have been filed by either side and O’Meara, who maintains that his box-office tallies were accurate, claims he’s unruffled by the rupture in the studio supply line: “I suspect we’ve lost maybe two to three good pictures,” he quipped. “It just so happens they didn’t come out with anything too good.”