Posted on 07/08/2006 9:24:52 PM PDT by BenLurkin
SALT LAKE CITY (AP) -- Sanitizing movies on DVD or VHS tape violates federal copyright laws, and several companies that scrub films must turn over their inventory to Hollywood studios, an appeals judge ruled.
Editing movies to delete objectionable language, sex and violence is an "illegitimate business" that hurts Hollywood studios and directors who own the movie rights, said U.S. District Judge Richard P. Matsch in a decision released Thursday in Denver.
"Their (studios and directors) objective ... is to stop the infringement because of its irreparable injury to the creative artistic expression in the copyrighted movies," the judge wrote. "There is a public interest in providing such protection."
Matsch ordered the companies named in the suit, including CleanFlicks, Play It Clean Video and CleanFilms, to stop "producing, manufacturing, creating" and renting edited movies. The businesses also must turn over their inventory to the movie studios within five days of the ruling.
"We're disappointed," CleanFlicks chief executive Ray Lines said. "This is a typical case of David vs. Goliath, but in this case, Hollywood rewrote the ending. We're going to continue to fight."
CleanFlicks produces and distributes sanitized copies of Hollywood films on DVD by burning edited versions of movies onto blank discs. The scrubbed films are sold over the Internet and to video stores.
As many as 90 video stores nationwide -- about half of them in Utah -- purchase movies from CleanFlicks, Lines said. It's unclear how the ruling may effect those stores.
The controversy began in 1998 when the owners of Sunrise Family Video began deleting scenes from "Titanic" that showed a naked Kate Winselt.
The scrubbing caused an uproar in Hollywood, resulting in several lawsuits and countersuits.
Directors can feel vindicated by the ruling, said Michael Apted, president of the Director's Guild of America.
"Audiences can now be assured that the films they buy or rent are the vision of the filmmakers who made them and not the arbitrary choices of a third-party editor," he said.
So I can't sell a college textbook after I have underlined certain passages??? Every college bookstore that allows resales would go out of business if that were true.
Why should they mind? It doesn't matter. They do. It's their right, it's their choice, and you don't have the right to steal someone else's property because you disapprove of how they choose to use it.
The fact is that artistic expression and freedom of speech are handy fig leaves for those who consider themselves more intelligent or creative than the rest of us.
If there's a market for "clean" movies, get a camera, hire some actors and go make clean movies. You have that right. You don't have the right to create derivative works based on someone else's property without their permission.
As long as whoever created the modified copies legally purchased the 1000 originals, I don't see a problem. It might actually make the Passion of the Christ watchable...
Yes, but that same person is not allowed to sell those 1,000 copies or distribute them or broadcast them or duplicate them.
OK,, lets change words here then and work on the legality of 'censorship'.
Thank you. I think we finally get around to the nub of the case. Most of those arguing on the side of the studios seem to concede that you can mark up your own copy of whatever, or even make your own copy for your own use. What we have here are companies that do the editing for you because as it has been pointed out, the companies own one copy of the unedited version for each edited copy rented or sold. So, if they do the editing for me (for a fee)...bad. If I can make my own editied copy from the unedited copy...OK
Then most college bookstores are in violation of the law because they sell used books that have been so altered by the previous owners. And could you point me to a law that says I can't resell a mangled book? I know you think that is true, but where's the cite?
It's been explained in numerous posts on this thread already.
If I buy 1,000 copies of a movie, I am certainly able to resell each and every single one of those copies.
That's a very disingenuous thing to say. The choices of the third-party editor are not "arbitrary," they are specific; The audiences of the santized films know good and well what vision they are assured of receiving.
Uh, no, it hasn't. I was asking a specific question about YOUR hypothetical. Your ability to dodge answering questions is amazing.
The issue isn't censorship -- you can't take someone else's work and screw around with the intent of distributing it.
However, copyrights do eventually expire. One of the major modern screw-ups in regards to copyright law was the movie It's a Wonderful Life. The copyright wasn't re-newed and anyone who owned a copy -- basically television stations --could play it as often as they wanted without paying royalties. Hence, it became a Christmas classic.
That's not illegal. Getting a MLB baseball player to autograph a copyrighted Topps baseball card makes the card worth a lot more. Are you saying I can't sell that altered card with the new autograph unless I get Topps' permission first? After all I am "profiting off of the alteration of a copyrighted work" am I not?
If I buy 1,000 copies of a movie, I am certainly able to resell each and every single one of those copies.
Not if you screw around with the content.
Have we jumped from censored artistic creation to used reference material not misrepresenting the authors true intent?
Are we losing this discussions point of reference which was creative works being censored for content?
1. That's not what your comment said.
2. Please explain to me the logic behind the rule.
It's not being "republished," it's just being edited.
It's not being "republished," it's just being edited. In fact, I'm just sending in a new unedited version purchased at retail to a company that makes edits for me that I requested. That's not "publishing."
This web site http://www.archive.org/search.php?query=mediatype:movies%20AND%20collection:feature_films&sort=-%2Fmetadata%2Fpublicdate
posts films that have expired copyrights, open copyrights or no copyrights. Some are horribly distorted or incomplete. No harm done because there is no longer a copyright infringement.
Actually nice site, I love the old stuff. :-)
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