Advanced Entertainment Law – Film/TV Liabilities

In the entertainment industry, especially, there are many issues that can arise as a result of copyright, trademark, patent and trade secret infringement. Since we now reside in the digital era and with everything being transmitted via cable, satellite, etc. the ability of intellectual property being misused has become that much greater. In an effort to obtain a better understanding of how large of an issue this has become, let’s take a look at a couple recent examples. These examples will give us some insight as to the issues many individuals and companies face on a day-to-day basis within the industry.

One of the most talked about new franchises within the film industry has been Lionsgate’s The Expendables. This movie franchise is well known all over the country as being action-packed films comprised of some of the most extraordinary and popular stars in the genre. Sylvester Stallone, Jason Statham, Harrison Ford, Arnold Schwarzenegger and Mel Gibson are just few examples of the highly regarded actors in these films. Unfortunately, the company, Lionsgate, is currently dealing with a fairly large intellectual property issue, a stolen high quality digital file of the third film circulating the torrent sites. Mr. Gardner, of Hollywood Report Esq., writes in an article that the company in an effort “to counter the Expendables 3 leak in advance of a Aug. 15 release for the film, Lionsgate's outside vendor MarkMonitor has sent about 2,770 take-down requests covering 10,846 unique host URLs. The film studio told the judge that it wasn't merely concerned about the amount of potential revenue lost at the box office, but also its relationship with theatrical exhibitors” (more info here). Per copyright law, once any film has been completed and exists in a tangible format (physical or digital), it instantly becomes copyrighted. However, this is something that is not new to the industry as this occurs almost too regularly. These torrent sites have become a major problem amongst all of the entertainment conglomerates. What people do not realize is the harm that downloading an illegal file has caused to the industry overall.

Another great example on the topic of intellectual property issues would be yet another recent case between the creator of an animated short film and The Walt Disney Company. After reviewing this article, Kelly Wilson, the producer of the short film The Snowman, felt that the teaser trailer of Disney’s movie Frozen infringed upon the copyright of her work. The overall story and sequence of events found in the trailer seemed to match almost exactly the story she told in her short film. From Mr. Gardner’s article, he writes that “in a ruling on Disney's motion to dismiss, California federal judge Vince Chhabria writes, "The sequence of events in both works, from start to finish, is too parallel to conclude that no reasonable juror could find the works substantially similar."” When a small producer goes against a fairly large company, such as The Walt Disney Company, it is going to make headlines and be a fairly large topic of discussion among those in the industry. In this case, Miss Wilson’s lawyers are going to need to prove, if this goes to trial, that The Walt Disney Company did in fact infringe upon her copyright. This will entail making sure that the Miss Wilson can prove the date that her work was created before the release of Frozen and whether or not it had been made public. If Miss Wilson had already registered her work with the United States Copyright office, she may be able to win this case.

Finally, there is one last case that is worth discussing and that is between the producers of the TV show ‘Southland’ and Hilda Abarca and Jessica Abarca, the relatives of man who was murdered. Within the opening credits of the TV show, there is an autopsy photo that is displayed which is the son/brother of the Hilda and Jessica Abarca. As one could imagine, the display of this photo has caused severe grief and hard ache to these women. Thus, both women have filed a lawsuit against “Warner Bros. Television, producer John Wells, NBC, Turner Network Television, the city of Los Angeles, the County of Los Angeles and Warner Home Video.” According to this article, “the suit says this has impacted their health, strength and activity and caused injury to their nervous system and person. It means they will have to incur expenses to treat psychological injuries using drugs and others “sundries” required in the treatment.” It is unfortunate that something like this happened to these women; however, this could have been avoided. When one produces film and television it is extremely important to verify the source of all materials used for production. It will be interesting to see the outcome of this lawsuit and whether or not both Hilda and Jessica Abarca will obtain justice.

Overall, intellectual property will always be an issue for all of those working within the entertainment industry (film and TV, especially). Since the products of the entertainment industry are, for the most part, not something tangible (in light the digital era) like other industries, it is extremely important to have a firm understanding of the concepts behind obtaining permission if you decide to use someone else’s work in your production. By being able to recognize all aspects of intellectual property law, one can safely avoid ever having to deal with these types of issues.