The Watchmen Movie Is Totally Screwed
Posted at 10:04 AM Aug 19, 2008
If you've ever thought to yourself, "Man, this Watchmen movie looks too good to be true," go pat yourself on the back. And then get a box of tissues, because the tears are going to flow—the Watchmen movie is in serious, serious trouble.
As big sis Nikki Finke reports, Fox—who for years sat on their old Watchmen movie rights while everyone in hollywood took a stab at making the film—has suddenly decided that Warner Bros.' upcoming film directed by Zack Snyder is infringing on their Watchmen movie rights, and are suing to get the new version from being released, and a Judge just allowed the suit to go to trial. While it might be some kind of power play from Fox to share in the profits, since everyone in Hollywood knows the film got great buzz at Comic Con, Fox has publicly stated their only goal is prevent the Watchmen movie from being released. Finke has this statement from Warner Bros.:
"The judge did not opine at all on the merits, other than to conclude that Fox satisfied the pleading requirements. We respectfully disagree with Fox's position and do not believe they have any rights in and to this project." But, privately, Warner Bros execs are decrying to me what they say is Fox's "opportunistic claim," noting that "Fox sat on its so-called rights for years while other studios in town developed this property. In fact, Paramount greenlit the movie for production and Fox never said a word! Fox even had an opportunity to re-acquire the project at some point and it passed on it!"
Hopefully, Warner Bros. will win the case, but god only knows how this will affect the film's 2009 spring release. Still, you can bet there's one guy whose happy—Alan Moore, who's likely tossing back a celebratory pint even know. Hell, he might be having one with a Fox exec.
Comments
Fox doesn't want to stop the movie, they want a slice. That's it. A deal will be struck. Paramount new about the license when they got into this, I'd wager their lawyers already had a strategy from the get go. Basically what it's going to come down to is who's got the better case and the better lawyers and that will decide how big Fox's payout will be.
Posted 08/19/2008 at 07:20:19 AMLets hope you're right, superoceanlad, and as for the trials itself... blech.
Posted 08/19/2008 at 07:24:25 AMNo! Fox is the bad guy in this. We want Warner Bros. to win. Fix the error, I demand it!
Posted 08/19/2008 at 07:44:53 AM"Hopefully Fox will win the case"?
Posted 08/19/2008 at 08:06:56 AMHuh?
Seriously, if Warner Bros. gets screwed over in this, it's their own stupid fault. How do you not know you have the 100% rights to make a film? Where are the mulit-million-dollar lawyers whose job it is to make sure this kind of crap doesn't happen?
I mean, how hard is this?
WB Execs: "Hey... do we have the rights to make Watchmen?"
WB Lawyers: "Umm... we don't know."
WB Execs: "Great! Let's start production!"
-Two years later-
Fox Execs (to Fox lawyers): "Excuse us, but don't we still own the rights to Watchmen?"
Fox Lawyers: "Yup"
Fox Execs to WB Execs: "Nice try. No movie for you."
WB Execs: "Whaaattt????"
Posted 08/19/2008 at 08:21:05 AMThis is apparently going to put a crimp into WB's plans for their "Pirates of the Caribbean" sequels, "Shrek" sequels, and remake of "E.T."
and building off what superoceanlad said, this is hyping the movie even more. wake up sheeple.
Posted 08/19/2008 at 08:26:25 AMSpot on, nice job.
Posted 08/19/2008 at 08:32:16 AMDark Pirahna, if you read the article, you'd realize that it isn't a case of not knowing, it's a case of Fox interpreting their contract differently than WB. WB bought the rights from Larry Gordon. Fox says he wasn't legally able to sell the rights. As far as WB was concerned, they did everything properly.
The question here is does Fox retain the rights 20 years after cancelling the project.
Posted 08/19/2008 at 08:34:06 AMI was being half-facetious, but my point still remains. How do you commit hundreds of millions of dollars towards the production and promotion of a film and not be 100% sure that you have all the rights to do so? How do your lawyers not realize that a contract could be read a different way, especially since they went through the exact same thing with Dukes of Hazard?
That's either arrogance, or extreme stupidity.
Posted 08/19/2008 at 09:39:59 AMNuke'm til they glow, then shoot'em in the dark.. JUST RELEASE THE DAMN MOVIE!
Posted 08/19/2008 at 01:56:19 PMI'm pretty sure they do think this stuff up as soon as possible. I don't know the exact quote, but didn't Brian Micheal Bendis write about one of his first meetings to get one of his indie books made into a movie and some movie company guy said "Who owns the rights to Eliot Ness!?"
Posted 08/19/2008 at 02:01:50 PMI was fairly certain as of yesterday they didn't want to prevent release of the film, they wanted a cut of the profits as they still own some rights to it. Hm...
Posted 08/19/2008 at 03:34:24 PMI hope Fox doesn't win this because otherwise a precedent for easy money and truly bullshit politics will slowly erode our current Golden Age of Media into wholly unoriginal IPs that are rebranded and flash fried under a spot light.
If Fox wins this case it could mean a thousand years of darkness befalling the great kingdom of Cinema. All you would need to do to make money is speculate on IP like it is real estate; just buy everything under the sun and when someone wants to make a movie, you sell a piece of it but not the whole thing and then wait until the movie is finished to then lean on it with legality until they either cut you into their profits or take a multi-million dollar loss that would rival some third world countries. Since no studio can afford that, they will either stop making movies with pre-existing IPs or they will just fork over the money and pay it.
Either way it still sounds like extortion.
Posted 08/19/2008 at 05:49:47 PMFuck everybody on this one.
This is the best news I've heard all day.
In my opinion, the ideal scenario would be to never release this movie, and then have it show up at conventions or LimeWire. That would satisfy both my spite and morbid curiosity.
And as for Zach Snyder? It couldn't have happened to a nicer guy. Have you ever read an interview with him? He never explains WHY he's making this movie, and quickly changes the subject when Alan Moore's name is mentioned. He does nothing but bitch about how "Regular" superhero comics are just an excuse to churn out merchandise. Toys. Cartoons. Video Games. Good thing that never happened to WATCHMEN, douchebag!
Posted 08/19/2008 at 07:19:36 PM