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The Lawsuit of the Rings
securitas writes "The New York Times' Ross Johnson reports that Lord of the Rings trilogy director, Peter Jackson, is suing New Line Cinemas for underpaying him by as much as $100 millon. The lawsuit filed Feb. 28 alleges that New Line committed fraud. Jackson 'reportedly receives about 20 percent of the gross revenue realized by New Line for the trilogy, minus expenses such as taxes.' Jackson's lawyer confirmed that of the more than $4 billion that New Line collected from revenues, merchandise and licensing, Jackson has received 'almost $200 million to date from New Line for the trilogy.' If the opening line doesn't make you want to read the article, I don't know what will: 'What if Frodo Baggins, instead of confronting the evil empire in "The Lord of the Rings," just got himself a lawyer and sued?'"
I guess this doesn't look good for PJ to make The Hobbit with New Line.
...He would have lost the case because Sauron would be able to afford better lawyers.
Truely cripped...
"Justice IS Tenacious" - a new inscription from our collection of lawyer rings. The tradition of giving lawyers rings upon admittance to the Bar began in England in the early 1400's. These simple bands were inscribed in Latin around the outside with a verse that referred to a legal ideal. Our's reads "Justice Tenax" (Justice is Tenacious). The original of this ring can be found in the collection of the Honourable Society of the Inner Temple, London. Ring is cast in sterling silver or in 14 kt. gold and completely hand finished and hand polished. Gold rings available with an antique finish if requested. Gift box included. Lawyer Of The Rings
The bikini - security through obscurity since 1943
What if Frodo Baggins, instead of confronting the evil empire in "The Lord of the Rings," just got himself a lawyer and sued?
Possession is 9/10 of the law. Even had Frodo been able to get a restraining order in time, even a +5 vorpal restraining order ain't gunna stop a pack of Nazgul from performing an early morning BATF raid at Bag End.
Real life example: Someone I know(tm), had a large (~$30,000) amount taken by the IRS over a disputed tax account. Just taken, as in dissappeared from bank accounts. Someone at the IRS actually said verbatim, "Yeah we're probably wrong, but we have your money. Now try and get it back."
Somewhere, something incredible is waiting to be known. -- Carl Sagan
yea, it really sucks when people get the compensation they deserve for producing great works! the nerve of that man! movie producers deserve all the money in the world. all that work they have to do surely justifies the stranglehold they have on the creative medium known as movies.
if you read the article (which it appears you neglected to, surprise surprise) Mr. Jackson claims that new line basically sold away the merchandise rights without taking bids, which would have resulted in millions of more dollars being made. a poor business decision no doubt, since it resulted in significantly lower profits.
the writeup itself is also flawed, as the NYT is using an anonymous quote from one of the parties involved, ostensibly the defense, which is against its own policies regarding anonymous quotes.
turn up the jukebox and tell me a lie
Its called marketing, I mean seriously, none of you actually beleive they lose money doing it? I mean they are BUYING services from a subsidiary of their own freaking company. Thats why half the "Box Office Bombs" actually end up making money for these assholes, they never spent the money to begin with, they just transfered it around.
The day companies like New Line legitimatly dont cook the books and underpay directors and writers etc, is the day the earth will be consumed by 500,000 mile tall aliens as a snack.
"Slashdot, where telling the truth is overrated but lying is insightful."
Apparently part of the secret is that private contracts and generally accepted accounting principles don't have to have anything to do with each other (according to the link). Leading to some pretty creative techniques -- I like the Interest section in particular.
This kind of reminds me of Albini's paper on the recording industry, although I'm under the (perhaps mistaken) impression that the movie industry treats its people better.
If it's in his contract he's entitled to it, period.
I RTFA and it is a little weak on detail, but it appears that PJ got what he was entitled to.
The article seems to be saying that New Line sold off merchandising rights to companies within the Time Warner family rather than sell to the highest bidder.
The suit contends that NL would have made more money, and therefore PJ would have recieved a higher cut, if the merchandising rights were sold on the open market.
For everyone who posted that a contract is a contract, it would seem that if NL never promised to sell to the highest bidder, then NL met all the terms of the contract and PJ got what he deserved.
How many folks out there would appreciate their employers under-paying them because "they had already been paid enough", or some such non-sense?
I wonder if I could sue our sales department for not generating enough revenue?
On a side note, I also support a near 100% estate tax. Or the "death tax" to people who think wealth should be determined at birth, much like in the medieval days.
They probably justify ripping off the artists just like the recording industry does - to make up for all of the lost sales due to filesharing.
It's unfortunate that Hollywood is so far away from New York. Otherwise, Eliot Spitzer would be all over the movie studios like white on rice.
The suit charges that the company used pre-emptive bidding (meaning a process closed to external parties) rather than open bidding for subsidiary rights to such things as "Lord of the Rings" books, DVD's and merchandise. Therefore, New Line received far less than market value for these rights, the suit says.
Most of those rights went to other companies in the New Line family or under the Time Warner corporate umbrella, like Warner Brothers International, Warner Records and Warner Books. So while the deals would not hurt Time Warner's bottom line, they would lower the overall gross revenues related to the film, which is the figure Mr. Jackson's percentage is based on.
I think he's within his rights, because it sure sounds to me like he's being treated unfairly according to the contract he has with New Line. Whether he makes $200M or $300M is immaterial, it's the company thinking they can get away with ripping him off.
And what if $100M (or whatever) is the difference between PJ financing his own films completely independently, away from all this corporate BS?
"Look, Smithers! I'm Davy Crockett!"
The lawyer makes it sound as if New Line was some kind of magnanimous benefactor, "giving" Jackson money because he was a great filmmaker and an all-around good guy.
I wonder if we can not freely start copying and sharing our LoTR DVDs, since we have already "given" New Line enough money to rebuild Baghdah, New York, London, Paris, Moscow and Tokyo (by this lawyer's math - if 300 or 400 million are enough to rebuilt Baghdad, imagine what 4 billion can't do).
Using your logic the studio could have simply sold the entire movie to a company with in the Time Warner family of companies for a dollar and he would have received .20 cents.
Did Time Warner delibrately sell off the merchandising rights to a family company in an attempt to hide revenue?
If open market bids would have been higher than the sale they made, then yes they likely did try and hide the money.
This is of course in bad faith of the contact, however depending on what's in the contact may be perfectly legal.
200 million isn't enough to rebuild baghdad regardless of who you use for labor.
If you started with the parts that would generate income, 200 million would be plenty to get the ball rolling. For instance, start with the cell network. Almost immediately after the bombs stopped falling, an Arab company rigged a make-shift GSM network that covered Baghdad. It worked well. Had the American authority in Baghdad not ordered it shut down so that MCI could win a huge contract to build out a CDMA network (thanks to lobbying by Qualcomm's...err...San Diego's house rep), that make-shift GSM network would be generating revenue which could be applied to other re-building efforts.
I know it's a strange concept, but a lot of people rightly believe that nobody is 'entitled' to obscene wealth -- it's a privilege society tolerates as long there's enough leftovers to go around.
1.) If a contract states you are entitled to a sum of money, there is nothing "right" about people disregarding that contract. If you deem wealth "obscene," that's your own personal judgment call. Personally, I'd love to be obscenely wealth--not only would I have earned it through a lifetime of hard work, but I would put a lot of it towards philanthropy. This is what Slashdot's hated, "obscenely wealthy" nemesis Bill Gates does.
2.) If you worked for that wealth, yes, you ARE entitled to it. End of story.
3.) Uh, wealth isn't a "privilege society tolerates." It's money you earn that is yours. You know, that whole ownership thing. The issue is how you earn it, but in this case it's irrelevant and is a whole different discussion. You're suggesting that you don't really own your money; society does.
There's a growing backlash against the increasing concentration of wealth at the top.
Yeah, it's the same tired college dorm-room "down with the rich" antics that have been around for generations and generations. Nothing new. What's most amusing is that these pseudo-socialists who want to distribute everybody's income are often funded by giant, rich organizations like George Soros--multi-millionaires who live wealthy lives away from the rest of us.
I imagine you're one of those types who uses the word "greed" in every other sentence. Working in exchange for money is probably greedy in your eyes. Have fun with that in the real world.
Still, seemingly stupid of Hollywood to try to hide accounting details-- if, as they say, $200 million is "enough", then why not have the original agreement say so up front? Because then it'd be harder to dodge taxes? Because PJ wouldn't have agreed, as if there aren't thousands of other taleneted persons who would've leaped at that kind of money and done LotR as well or better? So the greedy entertainment conglomerate tries to divert attention from its shady accounting by accusing the "victim" of greed. Who knows, maybe this lawsuit is in part a publicity stunt or could be made into one, possibly by the principles but more likely by others in the entertainment biz, and the movie rights will one day be worth millions. The issue is already a few day's worth of good copy. The media, I believe, naturally thinks that way.
We could drain the swamp in an instant if we would all quit buying. The issue between PJ and New Line would be mere roadkill on the route to copyright reform. There may be benefits to having the will of the people manifest in such clarity, but it of course won't happen, any more than sports fans would boycott their favorite sport for going on strike. No need for such an effort anyway, not when "piracy" is and always will be easy. But I think generally it would be better (except for sensationalist media) to have more honest dealings and openness than for everyone to be screwing everyone, and blustering and winking about it all.
Intellectual Property is a monopolistic, selfish, and defective concept. It is "tyranny over the mind of man"
A better version of this analogy would be:
Imagine this - you have a contract with your boss that any new inventions you make, you get 2.5% of the gross profit (remember no gross profit = no paycheck). You make your boss an invention that earns 12 billion dollars.
Your boss contracts out the marketing and sale of this invention. A competative contract would give your boss 10 billion dollars, of which he would own you 250 million. But instead of getting the most competative contract, he awarded the contract to his wife and is only paid 5 billion, so he only pays you 125 million.
You are short 125 million, but he got the other 5 billion through his wife.