Streamline Pictures
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Carl Macek started Streamline Pictures, an American film company best known for their dubbing and distribution of the Studio Ghibli films: The Castle of Cagliostro, My Neighbor Totoro, and Kiki's Delivery Service. This was at a time when dubbing was not very common. As a fan of Studio Ghibli's films, Carl did not think Laputa - The Castle in the Sky (of which Streamline was the distributor) had received the quality of dubbing that a Ghibli film deserved. He thought that it could have been done better, so Studio Ghibli gave him the opportunity to prove his words. For his first project, he asked to dub My Neighbor Totoro, one of his favorite Studio Ghibli works.
Studio Ghibli was pleased with the quality of the initial work and they immediately hired Streamline Pictures to produce the English language version of Kiki's Delivery Service. Soon after its release, the film was bought by Japan Airlines who showed it during their flights between Japan from the U.S. It also had a strong showing nationally in art house theaters. It also licensed other popular anime series and movies such as Little Nemo, Akira, Vampire Hunter D and Speed Racer.
Streamline Pictures became synonymous with Carl Macek in the eyes of fans, which seriously hurt the company when Macek earned the ire of fans and Studio Ghibli for some of his other projects, including a "Warriors of the Wind", a re-edit of Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind that horrified Studio Ghibli (and fans) so badly that the insisted on absolutely no cuts and final dialogue approval over all future licensing deals. The controversy over Robotech also involved Mr. Macek, which in the eyes of many fans meant it involved Streamline Pictures. Even though Streamline Picturs was not directly a part of these incidents, the image of the company suffered strongly. It became largely synonymous with bad dubs and poor importation, and many fans only remember it for movies misattributed to it. Streamline Pictures went out of business early in 1999.