J. Arthur Rank but continued to handle all distribution for the Rank organisation until 1955, when it was renamed J. Arthur Rank Film Distributors. In 1939 Rank consolidated his film production interests in both the Pinewood Film Studios and the Denham Film Studios. In 1938 Rank bought the Odeon Cinemas chain. and the Amalgamated Studios in Elstree, although the latter were never used as film studios by Rank. In 1941, it absorbed the Gaumont British, which owned 251 cinemas, and the Lime Grove Studios, (later owned by the BBC) and bought the Paramount Cinemas chain, so that by 1942 the Rank Organisation owned
Fountain Studios opened in September 1929. Perhaps because of a major fire, the studio was never as successful as had been hoped. They were taken over by the American Fox Film Company, who leased the site and then bought it outright in 1936. Fox used the studio for the production of their 'quota quickies'. A change in the law in 1938 led 20th Century Fox to use other studios, but it retained ownership. During the war the studios were leased to the military (the Army Kinematograph Service and RAF Film Unit), with intermittent rental to independents. Ealing Studios filmed "Ships with Wings"