Warner shakes finger at India over ‘Benjamin Button’

Given the recent legal experience Warner Brothers had in court with Fox over rights to ‘Watchmen’ you may think Warner would have little interest in pursuing even more legal battles. However, when it comes to market growth and profitability, these concerns apparently fall by the way side.

With the motion picture market on a consistent boom in India, Warner has issued a warning to anyone who may want to remake ‘The Curious Case of Benjamin Button’ to seek legal rights and permission, otherwise face the wrath of the giant in court.

The preemptive stern slap on the hand from Warner came in the form of media advertisements appearing Monday in India after word that Bollywood producer Vipul Amrutlal Shah had considered developing a Hindi-language movie titled ‘Action Replay’. The movie would star Akshay Kumar and the story would be curiously similar to that of ‘Benjamin Button’ about a man who experiences his life aging in reverse.

“We took the step of publishing a notice regarding the possible unauthorized remake of ‘The Curious Case of Benjamin Button’ as part of that rigorous defense of our rights, and to ensure that the filmgoing public in India experience our movies in the way that they were intended,” Mumbai-based Warner Bros. India told The Hollywood Reporter on Tuesday. — HR

While I’m a supporter of copyright laws (with all of their flaws) I do sort of find this a little humorous. I’ve never been to India myself, but do have some friends who have been and combined with a casual interest in the culture, it seems that Warner hopes to develop a larger interest in their movies playing in India than is likely. India loves movies, but they have their own market and their own filmmakers and for Warner to be so adamant about this just sort of comes off like they have no sense of humor.

“We hope that this will serve as a deterrent to any filmmaker planning an unauthorized remake,” attorney Chandler Lall said, adding that the Hollywood studio had issued similar notices in the past around such films as “The Departed,” which reportedly is slated for a Bollywood remake by producer Sajid Nadiadwala. — HR

This is yet another example in a long-running series of disputes between Hollywood and Bollywood over rights issues, involving films such as ‘Jerry Maguire’ and the ‘Harry Potter’ series. In regards to past notices, as mentioned above with ‘The Departed’, I wonder whether anything has ever or will ever come of them? Perhaps it’s all just a massive bluff that Warner doesn’t expect the Indian filmmakers to call. On a side note, regarding an Indian remake of ‘The Departed’… which is actually a remake itself of the 2002 Hong Kong film ‘Internal Affairs’ (Mou gaan dou)… how does this fit into their argument? It’s all about legal rights on paper, I suppose.

[source: Hollywood Report]