LoTR Lawsuit Threatens Hobbit Production 427
eyrieowl writes "J.R.R.'s heirs are suing for royalties on the LoTR films. Apparently they haven't gotten any money due to some creative accounting. Peter Jackson ought to understand...he had to sue the studio for much the same reason.
As for The Hobbit? FTFA: 'Tolkien's family and a British charity they head, the Tolkien Trust, seek more than $220 million in compensation...[and]...the option to terminate further rights to the author's work.'"
Threatening Hobbit Production... (Score:5, Funny)
You know, if I were a Hobbit, I wouldn't let any lawsuit threaten my Hobbit-producing activities...
Re:Threatening Hobbit Production... (Score:5, Informative)
Unfortunately, you aren't a Hobbit, and this kind of stuff is so common it has it's own name and Wikipedia entry. Look up Hollywood Accounting [wikipedia.org]. It's pretty simple and extremely sleazy. Remember that profits are simply income minus expenses. If you make $100,000 but it costs you $40,000 in expenses, you have $60,000 in profits.
Most movie earnings are reported in gross sales. Profits are slim, on purpose.
Let's say you are a Hollywood producer.
1) Make a deal with somebody to "share the profits" by using their idea.
2) Produce the movie by hiring sub-contractor "companies" that happen to have you has the CEO. These "companies" are very expensive, and payed based on gross sales.
3) Movie gets produced, makes record sales.
4) The "companies" previously hired are payed based on the sales numbers, leaving no money left to call a "profit".
5) ???
6) Screwed partner makes nothing because there are no profits to share.
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Has Stan-Lee even been paid for any of the spiderman movies?
Last I knew they were pulling that age-old BS on him as well.
never EVER take net points with a movie. gross points are the only ones of value as no movie EVER makes money due to hollywood accounting.
Re:Threatening Hobbit Production... (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Threatening Hobbit Production... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Threatening Hobbit Production... (Score:5, Insightful)
Brought to you by the same people who are so deeply concerned that someone might copy a movie without paying for it. Of course, the whole industry in Hollywood started out dodging Edison's patent royalties.
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I was looking at the other side of the coin where the very laws Hollywood bought are what made them have to deal with the estate. So when Hollywood whines, they're whining because they got their way. Soon enough they'll whine for another extension followed by whining about having to pay someone else for an idea that would otherwise be public domain.
At least the Tolkien estate keeps it's story consistent.
I can't say I have a lot of sympathy for either side, but I can't help a little snicker at Hollywood's ex
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And this is apparently one of them:
"The heirs also question expenses, according to Eskenazi, including an advance payment to an unnamed principal in the âoeLord of the Ringsâ films for an unrelated project, and a $1 million completion bond charged against gross receipts for each of the three films, even though a bond was issued only on âoeThe Fellowship of the Ring.â The studio also deducted a distribution fee for the home-video market, she said. "
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Saturday morning cartoons really were educational television.
The agreement was made 40 years ago. (Score:5, Insightful)
If anything, it looks like he did pretty well for an agreement made in 1969 by trying to require a percentage of the gross, but he did permit certain expenses to be deducted which were then gamed by Hollywood accounting.
Ob. Futurama (Score:5, Funny)
Leegola: What else can we slay? Is that a hobbit over there?
Titanius Anglesmith: No, that's a hobo and a rabbit. But they're making a hobbit.
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I'm a rabbo, you insensitive clod!
Damn leeches (Score:4, Insightful)
These books should be public domain by now.
God damn extended copyright might kill another production.
Ob. quote:
"Is that a Hobbit over there?"
"No, it's a hobo and a rabbit, but they're making a hobbit."
Re:Damn leeches (Score:5, Interesting)
No, its the greedy, self serving, money grabbing, Narcissistic, control freaks who so often seek powerful jobs in big companies like Time Warner who are to blame (as usual). Their Narcissistic self interest at the expense of others forces people to finally take action against this kind of unfair treatment. They have tried for years to get some kind of fairness out of Time Warner.
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While I despise Christopher Tolkien for shamelessly milking his dads work, I can't see how you'd blame him for suing when they didn't pay him a dime for the first three movies.
They made a deal, and, as with Jackson, they tried to claim that they didn't make any cash so they didn't owe him anything. Give me a fricking break.
Re:Damn leeches (Score:5, Funny)
Agreed, it should have been in the public domain when I bought my copy of the trilogy in 1970.
They're building one of those "Habitat Houses" down the street from me, and I wondered to my daughter if all the workers had tattoos of hobbits on them.
"Why?" she asked.
"Hobbit tat for humanity".
Ok, I'll get my coat...
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The author was still alive in 1970. Why do you think the copyright should have expired by then?
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He wrote those books in the forties. If he would have written them in 1840 the copyright would have expired by 1860. Why should Tolkien have a longer copyright period than Mark Twain?
Re:Damn leeches (Score:4, Funny)
David "Dangermouse" Morgan-Mar, is that you? [irregularwebcomic.net]
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There's a bit of dispute over whether or not the Lord of the Rings was ever covered by copyright in the US at all.
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Re:Damn leeches (Score:4, Insightful)
Of course the criminal movie business would just wait for stories to expire copyright, and make a mint off of them afterwards.
Like Disney and the Brothers Grimm?
Re:Damn leeches (Score:5, Insightful)
These books should be public domain by now.
God damn extended copyright might kill another production.
I agree the books should be in the public domain. But let's be honest here -- it's the usual movie production studio douchebaggery that is going to kill this production, not copyright. You know damn well they aren't thinking "Gee if only there were reasonable terms for copyright we wouldn't have to deal with the estate!" No, they are fully on board with life + infinite arithmetic progression copyright terms, they just want to twist the rules so they're the only ones who benefit. They've made their bed, and now they are trying to weasel their way out of sleeping in it.
Well, fuck them I say. I'd rather everyone who was contractually owed money for those movies gets it even if in my ideal universe they wouldn't be owed anything, rather than let the fuckers responsible for the current situation get away with this shit.
Re:Damn leeches (Score:5, Insightful)
The one where the rights of private property and public good are balanced. The one where the rights of personal works and public culture coexist. Also, the one established in the FUCKING CONSTITUTION, where Congress is given the duty (emphasis mine) "[t]o promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries" .
Notice also that it explicitly says authors and inventors, and not the estates thereof, but that is a side issue. What is important is that the time be Limited. Unless you want to get a shovel and go excavate Ugg the fucking Caveman and pay him back royalties for your use of fire and the wheel. Pelts only.
Re:Damn leeches (Score:5, Insightful)
It still amazes me how respondents in this forum think that there is some level on which it's acceptable to STEAL.
I don't, which is why I'm arguing that the studio needs to pay the estate the money that they are owed.
Under what bizarro universe does the public have more right to an author's work than the author (or their estate)?
In the bizarro universe where the purpose of copyrights was to promote the arts and thus enrich our culture, and its protections were for a limited time only with the express purpose of enriching the public domain. So, basically, the bizarre universe of the United States prior the year 1976.
For two hundred years, copyright served the purpose I describe and not the one you describe. This notion that an author's work is supposed to provide a life-long revenue stream for their children and their children's children is a recent invention, and contrary to the purpose of copyright, which is to encourage more works to be written. What has Christopher Tolkien done other than package up his dad's work? Maybe if he was operating under the same laws that his dad did when he wrote his books, then he'd have had to produce something of his own.
Sorry, I just don't buy that argument under any circumstance.
Okay, but the only reason author's have any right to an unnatural monopoly is because we, the people, agreed to compromise with them. The argument was the one that ruled the day from the authoring of our Constitution through to the Sonny Bono Copyright Act.
The discussion here seems centered on whether the studio should get the spoils or the public.
What a silly thing to say in a reply to my post where I argued that the "spoils" should go to the estate as contractually required. I think copyright law should be changed to match its original purpose, but that doesn't mean I think the movie studios, the very ones who lobbied for these ridiculous copyright laws, should be exempt from them! So basically it sounds like you missed my whole point. And I'm not the only one making this point. So pay more attention to the discussion, maybe?
Simple economics (Score:4, Insightful)
Under what bizarro universe does the public have more right to an author's work than the author (or their estate)?
Please understand that when the government enforces a private monopoly, the taxpayers incur direct costs. The "private monopoly" in this case is the author's sole distribution right over his work. The enforcement of that right means that real tax dollars get spent on investigations into copyright infringement violations, as well as the imposition of legal consequences.
So, that means that if you are an author, the rest of us (even those who do not buy copies of your work) are paying out-of-pocket to enforce your monopoly on your behalf.
What do we get in return for this? The privilege of being able to pay even more money if we want to experience your work? Do you really think this is balanced?
The reason why copyright law has a term limit is to try and strike this (otherwise missing) balance. In return for spending our money to protect your private monopoly for a period of years, we eventually get your work for free, in the public domain. Thus, you have your incentive to create secured (in the form of a protected period of sole distribution rights), and we get a ROI on all the tax money we spent to give you that (specifically, the work for free, eventually).
The problem that frustrates many posters on Slashdot is that the term of copyright is now so long that it is no longer balanced. In response to this perceived injustice, many people feel justified in dishonoring the private monopoly, and obtaining the work for free.
Whether or not they actually are justified is a debate in which I am presently remaining silent (though I won't deny an obvious bias). However, I will state that the current copyright law is not at all balanced, and the public good is getting the losing end of the deal. There is clearly an injustice being perpetuated by copyright holders and lobbies at the present time.
As an aside, copyright infringement is illegal and (arguably) immoral. However, it is not theft. Theft is generally defined in terms of the harm done to the victim, rather than the benefit to the perpetrator. Finding an un-owned object and claiming it for one's self is not theft, even though one got something without paying for it. However, depriving the rightful owner of access to his property is theft, and that wording is often used in legal proceedings involving theft.
In the case of copyright infringement, the rightful owner still has full access and full control over his own work. You have a duplicate of the work, but since you haven't deprived the owner of the work, you have not "stolen" it. You have merely copied it.
To use the ever-popular car analogy...if I see your car on your driveway, and I build myself a separate car just like it....you still have your car. I have not stolen it. Though my copy of it might still be illegal.
But don't take my word for it. The supreme court already ruled that copyright infringement is not theft. Read all about it. [wikipedia.org]
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No, but if the copyright wasn't so onerous the studios could make the movie, and so could I,oor you, or anyone.
Sure, but in the meantime, I'm not going to let the studios off the hook for the stupid law they themselves are responsible for.
And they got what the contract said.
Are you sure? That's what the studio says, but they said the same thing about Peter Jackson and Stan Lee and it wasn't true.
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These books should be public domain by now.
God damn extended copyright might kill another production.
In this case, I'd say it's not just copyright laws. Hollywood accounting [wikipedia.org] is in my eyes more clearly douchebaggery than using the broken copyright system. It might be absurd that the estate maintains a copyright what should be public domain, but it's even more absurd for New Line Cinema to claim the Lord of the Rings movies didn't make a boatload of money.
Re:Damn leeches (Score:4, Insightful)
These books should be public domain by now.
God damn extended copyright might kill another production.
(before film is made) "Darned copyrights are keeping us from making a film!"
(after the film is made) "People are violating our film's copyright and should be punished!"
Re:Damn leeches (Score:5, Insightful)
These books should be public domain by now. God damn extended copyright might kill another production.
The irony being that the movie companies are the big $$$ behind the ridiculous copyright extensions that are preventing them from not having to go through the JRR descendants to make movies.
I guess the next copyright legislature will make book copyright shorter than music or movie copyright.
Re:Damn leeches (Score:5, Insightful)
If they didn't have extended copyright, they wouldn't have needed a contract to begin with. That's what he's saying.
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Exactly. They'd be even more free to screw people on the movie profits as they've already done! It's hilarious to see so many people on here actually defending a studio has screwed people who have worked on these films out of money and is a prominent RIAA member. The hypocrisy of this thread is astounding.
Re:Damn leeches (Score:5, Insightful)
Yet, I'm sure you saw all 3 LOTR movies in the theater at least once as you'll probably see the Hobbit (not to mention other movies made by that studio) which will allow them to continue their screwing over of people who may or may not deserve a cut in the money.
Re:Damn leeches (Score:4, Insightful)
What work did the Christopher and Priscilla Tolkien do on this film exactly?
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Exactly. They'd be even more free to screw people on the movie profits as they've already done! It's hilarious to see so many people on here actually defending a studio has screwed people who have worked on these films out of money and is a prominent RIAA member. The hypocrisy of this thread is astounding.
My sympathy fails for the heirs of rights to content produced so long ago.
The heirs seeking money didn't actually DO anything to earn it. Peter Jackson made a movie. The studios made it available, etc. These parties took action, so compensation seems reasonable. Did the heirs take any action at all that contributed to the product or the potential for it to exist?
Re:Damn leeches (Score:5, Informative)
Actually, Chris did a goodly amount of work recompiling the whole Middle Earth saga from notes, he tried to fill in unfinished stories of his father. He did try to clarify inconsistencies, add stories, and overall maintain the work that was left behind.
No, he wasn't responsible for the work that these movies is based on directly... But he did become the de facto caretaker of the fictional setting.
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Re:Damn leeches (Score:4, Insightful)
I'd say the hypocrisy of RIAA is astounding.
The reason for reducing the copyright times are just because it would enable derivative works. Kind of how Disney took "Cinderella" or other stories in the public domain and made money and new stories out of them.
The hypocrisy comes in when they refuse to ever give stuff back to the public domain.
The people being screwed in this case isn't the heirs to Tolkien it's us. They shouldn't get any money after so many years. They are the true "leeches". That doesn't help or develops our civilization or culture.
Re:Damn leeches (Score:5, Insightful)
That's because there would be NO ONE to screw if not for artificially long copyright periods.
The man is dead. He's been dead since 1973. You know... 36 years. The last book was published in 1955. 54 years.
Copyrights are not going to incent him to write any more books.
Copyrights as currently implemented primarily benefit corporations. Not human beings who are dead long before the copyrights run out.
Re:Damn leeches (Score:5, Insightful)
Well, is that strictly true? Children of Huron was published a good deal more recently than that. In fact, IIRC, four times as many books have been published by JRRT since he died than when he was alive. Not to mention the audio tapes (which include JRRT reading from his work and singing Elvish poetry that doesn't otherwise survive).
This is all new material. Yes, technically it was all written before JRRT died, but not one scrap of it would have been released if there was no incentive by either Christopher Tolkien OR (more importantly) the publishing house to publish it.
This new material included such gems as The Silmarilian, one of the all-time greatest works of JRRT, and the one he put the most effort into. That was never published in his lifetime. Not because it was no good, but because the publisher didn't realize the market for High Fantasy was as extensive as it proved to be. The other material, likewise, was often not held back by the author, it was held back by the publishers.
I'm not saying extended copyrights are always good, but there ARE special circumstances where they are valuable.
Another example would be the repair and restoration of crates upon crates of Hemmingway material that was left, abandoned, in his house after his death. Most of it is damaged by fungus and rot, but it is salvageable. The costs for the repairs are all being covered by the value of the material being salvaged.
These are exceptional circumstances, you won't find anything remotely similar in the majority of cases, but the exceptions SHOULD be covered by law no less than the general rule.
Re:Damn leeches (Score:4, Informative)
Fourteen years, renewable once, from date of first publication would cover everything you complain about.
BTW, the Silmarillion was not delayed until Tolkien's death due to lack of demand. Ballantine (who sold LOTR in the US) would have loved to publish it while Tolkien was still alive. Tolkien didn't authorize it. Lin Carter (in charge of Ballantine's fantasy fiction line at the time) told me (a long time ago, at a science fiction con), that he thought Tolkien simply didn't want to stop fiddling with it and changing the form, that he thought Tolkien really didn't have anything else he wanted to do.
Re:Damn leeches (Score:5, Interesting)
I wouldn't say defending. I would be perfectly happy to have EITHER the extended forever copyright abolished OR the studio execs tossed in the clink. The simple fact is that they are demanding to have their cake and then cheating (by doing everything they claim others wrongly do to them) in order to try to eat it too.
In fact, I don't think the studio should have had to contract with the estate at all. However, I also believe that many of their works should now be public domain. Given the way they've bought twisted IP laws, I have no sympathy for them however. I hope they end up having to cough up treble damages and more. Perhaps they should be penalized at the same ratio as a p2p file sharer is.
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Because copyright isn't a right. It is a license society gives IP creators as a "consideration" to induce them to create because society finds it a valuable trade.
If copyright ends, you didn't lose it, the society took it back. Culture belongs to society, you just get use of it.
And the carpenter's home is his only as long as he pays property taxes. Stop paying those taxes and he'll either have to add on wheels and leave or lose it, in much less time than copyright lasts, to cover missed payments for use
Bad news all around (Score:5, Insightful)
...on the one hand, the studios are greedy schmucks out to screw everyone all around.
OTOH, the next of kin should not be in the picture here. These are works
that should be in the public domain now for a variety of reasons. The
worthless relatives should not have the ability to interfere with any of
the greedy schmucks. The fact that a charity is involved is just a nice
red herring to confuse things.
Imagine if the Bard's estate could screw around with people like this.
That's the direction we are headed.
Re:Bad news all around (Score:5, Funny)
Imagine if the Bard's estate could screw around with people like this.
Oh, man... the implications... I bet none of the Bard's Tale games would have ever been released!
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Something Good Could Come of It (Score:5, Insightful)
...on the one hand, the studios are greedy schmucks out to screw everyone all around.
Remember that these "greedy schmucks" are the ones lobbying and influencing the law. You, I, the Slashdot community, we do not. But we are tax paying constituents. The only time we influence this is when we vote--and let's face it, it's not a voting issue.
When Sonny Bono and Walt Disney effectively controlled the government into changing these laws, they were done selfishly. Nowhere were we represented. To say that Senator Bono acted with only his constituents in mind is a joke.
So suddenly the double edged sword is coming back to cut one of the prime promoters today of these laws. Historically these term limits of enforceable copyright have only gotten longer. And their implications for the internet and digital media has been more than encumbering. I'm not saying these laws don't help the big companies and artists make more money. I'm only saying that it's getting to a ridiculous point. Time Warner/New Line Cinema might take it so hard from the Tolkien family that they realize their lost future profits 50 years from now is a small price to pay compared to all the material they could have in public domain to make movies and derivative works from.
Lastly, was anyone ever wondering why there was no Lord of the Rings movies officially for so long? It's because the Tolkein family was just looking for someone to get screwed by. They probably saw through all the other scams.
Hopefully this is a wake up call to those who have extended copyright for far too long. It will only start hurting themselves and actually inhibiting/endangering their profession.
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Yup, just like every slave owner was perfectly within his rights to beat his slaves to death.
Would you have cheerfully joined the (mandatory) posse to track down a runaway slave?
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Wow, that could be the worst argument I've ever heard.
If I made myself a chair, would that then be a slave chair, just because I owned it?
I agree that copyright has gone overboard, but I disagree that it is therefore a bad thing in general. In this particular example, Tolkien spent the better part of a decade putting together LOTR. It's fair that he should be compensated for that, for a reasonable period.
I don't agree that his kids should be able to hoard the IP for the rest of their lives, but I do think t
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Yup, just like every slave owner was perfectly within his rights to beat his slaves to death.
Wow, you are comparing efforts to enforce copyright to efforts to track down a sentient human being and force him back into servitude at gunpoint? I think you need some perspective.
(At least you didn't Godwin yourself though ;)
Re:Bad news all around (Score:4, Insightful)
There's no way to avoid this sort of comparison. If I cited any example of a bad law that should not be enforced, and it was just as serious as our bad copyright laws, most people would have no opinion on that law. and of the few who did, roughly half of the people would argue that it was a good law (especially here). Just try it. Is tougher sentencing for crack cocaine than regular cocaine about proportional to copyright law? How about occasional abuse of eminent domain clauses? Raising the drinking age to 21 and including members of the armed forces on post? You have to compare the abysmal but quite limited injustice that is current copyright law to something more serious, something that affected hundreds of millions and literally cost lives, broke governments, or caused wars, or you can't make a critical comparison at all.
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but here we are in 2009 and currently looking at something like 2017 or 2020 before they are extended again
Fixed that for you :)
(Yeah, I know, you said "theoretically", but let's be real....)
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It certainly was not.
Copyright was enacted in order to motivate content creators to create content If it takes a long copyright period to motivate creators, then that is what we need.
It should be quite obvious thought that the long copyright we have now are far in excess of what is needed to motivate creative people to create.
Re:Bad news all around (Score:4, Insightful)
Also, my utter lack of faith in humanity says that particularly unscrupulous individuals would "arrange" things so that an author who didn't want to sell the rights to their work would have the creator killed and poof! Public domain now for me to create my crappy movie and destroy the work. While I wish I could believe that people would never sink so low, this IS an article about movie studios trying to claim a major film trilogy made NO money at all. If they thought they could get away with it and make money, I don't doubt that some of them would do it.
I can see a 20 year period after death being reasonable as any children they had should be grown capable of self-support by then and the incentive of making a derivative work of something 20 years old will often lose its allure unless it's a seminal work of culture in which case that's EXACTLY the compact society has made with the creator...we get the stuff back to inspire the next generation of creators. The current system we have is simply abusive of society as a whole though.
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Maybe a lot of slashdotters aren't old enough to have kids, but it seems to me that providing for one's widow and/or children is one of the things that an author would likely be concerned about, and probably even consider to be a "need".
Nobody is talking about locking up works "forever". This is about books that were written and published long after Mickey Mouse made his first appearance, and Mickey is still copyrighted (which seems to be stretching it a bit TOO far in my opinion).
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Maybe a lot of slashdotters aren't old enough to have kids, but it seems to me that providing for one's widow and/or children is one of the things that an author would likely be concerned about, and probably even consider to be a "need".
Author's can buy life insurance like the rest of us.
Do plumbers demand royalties for toilets they fixed for their children after they die? Nope.
Same difference.
Just because you write books or make music, doesn't give you anymore rights than all the cubicle slaves and factory
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That's not a very good analogy.
Plumbers get paid for fixing the toilets at the time they fix them. And if the plumber dies before you pay your bill, you don't automatically get to forget the charges. Should the plumber have to buy insurance to cover that case? You might have life insurance to cover the fact that you won't be earning any more after you're dead, but do you buy insurance to cover your last paycheck because your employer won't have to pay it after you're dead?
So, yes, it is the "same differe
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Scene: Hollywood, California, 1972. Francis Ford Coppola sits in front of a fireplace, stroking a cat. Two underlings are in attendance.
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Any author can already put the money they make during a fixed term into a trust for their heirs, or otherwise leave it to them in their will or make many other arrangements to get it to them, just like a person running a business or working for wages can leave money. So it's not just like any other property, it's a special, additional way to provide for a family after death, added on to all the rest everyone including authors can use.
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I am a descendant of Adam, and since the bible was written about him, I should get royalties on every Bible sale!
Yeah, but apparently the Bible was divinely inspired, so you have to give a cut of profits to God.
The Vatican has offered to handle the transfer.
Re:Bad news all around (Score:4, Informative)
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You already do, but since everyone is a descendant of Adam, and there are far more people than Bible purchases, you're getting paid a fraction of a cent (rounded down to the nearest cent, of course).
(Nitpick: If I write a book about George Bush, Bush's children do not get royalties for that work. My children, however, would. Thus, Adam's children wouldn't get royalties for Genesis, but Moses' children would...)
Thought experiment (Score:5, Insightful)
This is going to sound wacky, but I really just want to think it through.
What if we made the kind of fraud that's apparently exercised by music and movie studio accountants, punishable by death?
How would that play out in society and culture?
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It wouldn't work.
A jury is not going to want to punish you unless you are "one of the little people".
PR flacks will make sure that the white collar criminals maintain a well manicured reputation.
Ultimately, the little guy will end up the one on the hook for the new draconian punishment. ...something sounds familiar here.
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You don't have to make it "punishable by death," just flipping make it ILLEGAL! I'm so tired of hearing about a-hole musician managers like Klein ripping off artists and swindling them out of song rights, talent agents taking their pounds of flesh from artists and athletes, and trusted personal financial advisors diverting funds from their clients to their own coffers. Just make it clearly ILLEGAL. Draw strong outlines around what compensation these people are allowed to make while in the service of their clients. Create template contracts that uninitiated people can use to protect themselves. As it stands, you need a lawyer and an accountant to make sure your lawyer and accountant aren't fucking you!
I think we're talking about two different things. You're arguing about unfair contracts. What the article is talking about (I believe) is out-and-out fraud regarding how much money is earned for a given movie.
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I think we're talking about two different things. You're arguing about unfair contracts. What the article is talking about (I believe) is out-and-out fraud regarding how much money is earned for a given movie.
Not quite. This is essentially fraud on a moral level, but legally it's nothing more than an unfair contract. Look up Hollywood Accounting [wikipedia.org].
They crossed up their net and gross reciepts... (Score:5, Informative)
Looks like the deal was done maybe 40 years ago:
Under the contract, New Line was to pay a percentage of all gross receipts, after deducting 2.6 times the production costs, plus advertising expenses in excess of a certain amount, according to Eskenazi. (from TFA)
Nowadays it seems as though even the average slashdotter knows you take a portion of gross, because nothing involving MPAA or RIAA related-companies ever clears a 'net profit' (wink wink).
It looks like Tolkien & co where less saavy 40 years ago, and essentially signed up to get screwed. I hope the movies were profitable enough that they can still clear some money for the family, but 2.6 times production costs of those movies is a hell of a lot, and 'advertising expenses in excess of a certain amount'- especially if that amount was a 1969 dollar amount, and not a percent-well, they could really end up with a contractually dictated 'nothing.'
Re:They crossed up their net and gross reciepts... (Score:5, Insightful)
It looks like Tolkien & co where less saavy 40 years ago, and essentially signed up to get screwed.
Less savvy or just not very forward thinking in terms of technology.
[nerd-speak]
Tolkien pretty much gave away the movie rights because he (and whom else ever in his camp) never thought you could even make a movie out the LOTR. Would you have wanted to see a film adaptation using early 1970's film technology? Not as fun to watch if the Balrog looks Godzilla and the Nazgûl like some kind of Medieval Mothras, not to mention Treebeard looking worse than he even did in the films, or primitive miniatures making the cities of Middle Earth look like something made of Lego(s).
Technology may have been Saruman's downfall, but it allowed for a pretty cool set of movies.
[/nerd-speak]
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
> Tolkien clearly, obviously, lifted a lot of his LOTR trilogy from Wagner's opera Ring of the Nibelungs.
No, he stole from the same sources that Wagner's sources used to compose the Nibelungenlied and the Volsung Sagas, even going back to old Finnish epics.
Admittedly, LoTR could have been made using animation much earlier, as it WAS (look the two movies up on IMDB). The animated versions don't come close to the film adaptation, though.
but but the MPAA is for the artists? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:but but the MPAA is for the artists? (Score:5, Insightful)
The MPAA is fighting to make sure the artists and copyright holders get what they are owed? Did they forget or is it just a bunch of BS and you should not feel bad about piracy and ignore them?
When they say "artists" they mean their accountants.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Re: (Score:2)
The MPAA is fighting to make sure the artists and copyright holders get what they are owed?
He's dead, Jim.
I don't see anywhere in there where the US constitution allows anyone but an author or inventor to be granted patent or copyright. How exactly does that twisted logic work, anyway? Is New Line Cinema British or something?
Even Tolkien
Dragon magazine... (Score:3, Funny)
Dragon Magazine had a cartoon bit about this ... apparently they weren't even allowed to use the word "ring" anymore...
"Hey, someone get the phone - its been circular metal band-ing off the hook!"
Then explain this (Score:2)
How in the fuck did these guys in any way contribute to the LOTR films, or even the whole mythos itself?
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Christopher Tolkien published the Silmarillion, after JRRT's death, among several other books, including the History of Middle Earth. Sure, strictly speaking it was all JRRT source material, but there has been a wealth of information out there, produced by these guys.
Re:Then explain this (Score:5, Informative)
Uh, The Silmarillion and The Children of Hurin. There are tons of notes and papers the Tolkien kept while writing his stories. Many of these offer insight into the world of Middle Earth, and would not have been easily accessible if it wasn't for the work of his son. Christopher Tolkien has spent a great deal of time going through his father's work, assembling notes from various sources to try to provide a more detailed history of Middle Earth. While the heirs aren't responsible for the original tale, they have done there share of work to get the story behind the story out and available to the public. Without the background, creating a movie like LotR would be much more difficult. The entire mythos was not well documented within the confines of the books. There were a lot of details that don't fit nicely within story form that were important to the movie. One of the biggest examples is the Elvish language. Much of the language has been put together from his original notes, which have been assembled by Christopher over the years.
This is definitely not a case were the children are sitting around trying to bum money off of their parent's work. I am very thankful for their contributions. Without their work, my knowledge of Tolkien would probably be limited to The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Christopher also did a fair bit of editing, cleaning-up and polishing, so he did actually have some creative input. I'd also include the audio tapes, which include an otherwise unknown piece of Elvish poetry being sung by JRRT, as contributing to our knowledge.
Re:Then explain this (Score:5, Informative)
The contract was signed by J.R.R. Tolkien in 1969. Copyright doesn't even enter into the argument. New Line, Time Warner, and MGM are all bound by the original contract, signed by J.R.R. Tolkien. As the Inheritor of his estate, Chris Tokien has the right, along with the Tolkien Trust, to enforce the terms of the contract through civil action.
I hate to make this sound angry, but it has nothing to do with Chris Tolkien, other than he's the one who inherited the money. J.R.R. Tolkien sold a product for a specific fee, partly up front, and partly to be paid later. The studio is now using fraudulent accounting techniques to avoid paying the "later" part. If J.R.R. Tolkien were still alive, he would be the one suing. Hes not, but the contract is still binding, so his estate is suing.
Copyright doesn't even show up in this equation. Nor does whether his heirs added anything to the mythos (which he has through his clean up and publishing of all the remaining Tolkien works and notes.)
This is just simple, every day, contract law.
Disclaimer: IANAL, and this is my opinions, based on reading TFA.
This is common in Hollywood (Score:5, Insightful)
These people are simply criminals, and deserve to be locked up as such. However Hollywood is famous for making large political contributions, and their boys are in power at the moment. (not that the "other" party did anything about it either)
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
I agree that its criminal, but anyone who deals with this knows that you MAKE SURE you negotiate for "above the line" or "pre-expense" percentages of gross, guaranteed $x of the initial gross BEFORE expenses and marketing, as well as pre-production "commitment" fees of about half of what you want to make on the entire project. The latter is most important as it says nothing can even begin production until you get paid.
However it would be really funny to see a few people get charged with felonies for fraud
re:this is common in hollywood (Score:3, Interesting)
what i don't understand about all of this: how do the studios make any money whatsoever with accounting of that sort? how does this survive any kind of auditing process?
Re:this is common in hollywood (Score:4, Informative)
I'd normally side with the family, but... (Score:4, Interesting)
If it weren't for the deal that J.R.R. made with Saul Zaentz way back when, we wouldn't have any of the Lord of the Rings movies in the first place. Nor the Lord of the Rings Online game (which I happen to play). Nor any number of other things that may have first turned people on to Tolkien, including the old pen and paper Middle Earth RPG system.
Christopher Tolkien has had control over the rights to things like The Silmarillion, and is notoriously limited in what he'll allow people to do in relation to it. I'd hate to think of what would happen (or more to the point, not happen) if he were able to somehow get back control over The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings also.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
The Silmarillion? And what do you propose to do with that?
As for turning people on to Tolkien, everyone I know who reads sci-fi/fantasy read those books back when we were kids, before any of the derivative stuff was out. The books are sufficient and wonderful in themselves. And they had no trouble finding deeply-appreciative readers on their own strength.
On the other hand, I'm sure the movies are fine. They were done at the right time, when cgi was finally good enough. Still, should I show my son the movies
Smeg off! (Score:2, Informative)
The book is 72 years old. Smeg off you vultures!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hobbit [wikipedia.org]
LotR (Score:2, Offtopic)
"The" doesn't deserve capitalization any more than "of". You wouldn't capitalize the in the book title either. For abbreviations show all articles and prepositions as lower case. If you have an article or preposition at the beginning of the abbreviation, show it as lower case. Of Mice and Men would be oMaM.
By showing articles in lower case you give a clue to the reader that the letter represents something small and structural, rather than a 'real' word. LoTR would suggest Lord of Token Rings.
Side note:
Obligatory (Score:5, Funny)
Rumors of my death have been greatly exaggerated.
Does anyone own their own ideas anymore? (Score:3, Interesting)
LoTR was a great work by someone who really spent time and effort writing the book. Does he (or even his family) not deserve to reap the rewards of his efforts that we are all enjoying? Why does everyone think that just because you like it that somehow it's now no longer HIS but OURS. Communism?
On a separate but related note.... if Hollywood studios came up with their OWN IDEAS instead of just using comics / books / other movies as a basis for new scripts, they WOULD NOT HAVE THESE PROBLEMS. Screenwriters need to start coming up with original ideas, not just remakes of movies from the 50s or childrens cartoons from the 80s.
Prince, Michelle Shocked (Score:3, Interesting)
Courtney Love, Joni Mitchell the list goes on.
Prince changed his name to an unpronounceable symbol, a stroke of genius because the contract he was under said he could use his own name if he jumped ship. He became "the artist formerly known as Prince".
Courtney Love got hosed and wrote about how a band with a platinum album could end up scraping by on whatever a record company threw them.
http://archive.salon.com/tech/feature/2000/06/14/love/ [salon.com]
Joni Mitchell got hosed, and put an article about it up on the web.
(can't find the link)
Michelle Shocked couldn't record an album for 10 years due to a bad contract.
Beck accepted the lowest contract offer he got because it gave him the most control.
It's not just the movie companies.
Book publishers too. God help you if you accept an advance or or go on a book tour. The charge backs can be horrific. Don't ever let them buy you anything. They'll overcharge you for any and all services. the limo to the airport or the venue might seem nice, but they will charge you back for it.
The opening night gala for the movie opening, book openings. Etc.
The word "pimps" comes to mind.
Re:Read this elsewhere (Score:5, Funny)
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Apparently J.R.R. Tolkien warned us in advance of the actions his heirs would take WRT copyright.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Which is more that can be said for those vampire Otherkin communities created by those shitty teen vampire romance novels (especially Twilight). Those people are batshit insane. There's even been rumors going around that a prominent Boston prep school is inhabited by "vampires" [boston.com] to the point where the police had to