Carnival, the world’s most popular cruise line, along with AMC, basic cable’s premiere destination dedicated to movies and movie culture, announced they have teamed up to offer “You Cast Your Crew,” a one-of-a-kind contest where contestants compete to win a Carnival Caribbean “Fun Ship” cruise for the winner and up to 19 family members and friends. From now through September 30, contestants may log onto Carnival’s new social networking website, CarnivalConnections.com to enter. The contest will be promoted via 30-second television spots on AMC, as well as through advertisements in People magazine and various e-marketing channels.

Contestants are asked to supply basic personal information and to fill out a fun and easy multiple choice survey, which includes questions related to their movie preferences. Participants will then submit a short essay on why they feel their group should be chosen to win the grand prize Carnival cruise. Entries will be judged on appropriateness of theme, originality, creativity and story flow. The winner may choose from among Carnival’s wide variety of three to seven-day Caribbean itineraries. The prize has an estimated value of up to $15,000. 10 second-prizes will receive a rolling duffel bag filled with Carnival and AMC branded merchandise, as well as a portable DVD player.

“A Carnival cruise is the perfect environment for reconnecting with friends and family and the ‘You Cast Your Crew’ contest offers a terrific means for encouraging consumers to visit CarnivalConnections.com and learn just how easy it is to put a cruise group together,” said Bob Dickinson, Carnival president and CEO. “Partnering with AMC to promote this contest is an excellent synergy given the high quality, cinematic programming offered by this outstanding TV network,” he added.

“We are pleased Carnival chose AMC as their media partner for this very important initiative. It’s so much fun to take a cruise with family and friends, so we are happy to team up with Carnival to offer this unique opportunity to our viewers,” said Arlene Manos, president of Rainbow Nat Network Advertising Sales. “At AMC we are always looking for new ways to brand our advertisers’ messages with our core audience of movie lovers. On the heels of the network’s best performing July ever we look forward to continuing to deliver customized packages to our advertisers.”

CarnivalConnections.com is an interactive website that makes it fun and easy for families and friends to plan a group vacation and share information with other cruisers. Consumers can utilize CarnivalConnections.com to create and send customized “e-vites” to others to join their “Fun Ship” vacation group. Members can also review the in-depth information resources on the web site’s real-time message boards to help organize and plan their trip.

Today’s announcement comes on the heels of a number of developments at AMC. Its investment in its film library, programming specials and original content had a tremendous impact in 2004 and 2005, rewarding AMC with its best years ever. In 2006, AMC premiered its first original movie, Broken Trail, a 2 day event executive produced by and starring Academy Award® winner Robert Duvall, co-starring Academy Award® nominee Thomas Haden Church and directed by Emmy award winning director Walter Hill. The heroic western story became the second most watched cable movie since 1995 and delivered the network all time record ratings with a stellar 7.7 HH rating, HH delivery (6.8 million) and total viewership (9.7 million). Using a programming formula that couples valuable iconic movies with cinematic original content, AMC has seen its ratings grow dramatically, providing record ratings growth in every day part since 2002.