Hollywood studios bid for Michael Jackson's rehearsal footage

LOS ANGELES, July 20 (Xinhua) -- Major Hollywood movie studios found themselves in a frenzied bidding war over the weekend to acquire film rights to late pop.

7TIME Magazine's special commemorative issue on pop  star Michael Jackson is shown here, released to  Reuters on June 27, 2009. The June 29 special edition, featuring a photo of Michael Jackson by Herb Ritts. (Xinhua/Reuters Photo)

AEG Live, the concert promoter behind Jackson's planned 50-concert tour at London's O2 Arena, offered the rights to some 1,200 hours of rehearsal footage to all the major movie studios last week, according to the Los Angeles Times.

Michael Jackson performs during a Victory Tour concert in Toronto, in this October 5, 1984 file photo. (Xinhua/Reuters Photo)

Sony, Fox, Paramount and Universal submitted bids, but Sony's aggressive 50-million-dollar offer, coupled with the fact that its music division controls distribution of Jackson's output as an adult solo performer and retains the right to block a competing studio from using his songs, put the studio in the strongest position.