'Delgo' Creators Mull 'Avatar' Lawsuit
Filed under: Animation
In the day's "frivolous lawsuit" news, according to a story on PR Newswire, Fathom Studios, the producers of the little-seen animated film Delgo are contemplating legal action against the makers of Avatar, James Cameron's 12-years-in-the-making return to mainstream filmmaking. "From what we have seen, we are amazed by the visual similarities between the two films," a Fathom spokesperson said. "We are reviewing what legal options may be available to us."
The bad news for Fathom is that lawyers for Fox, the studio distributing Cameron's film, are tenacious and shrewd; earlier this year, a dispute between Fox and Warner Brothers over the adaptation rights of Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons' source material almost derailed the release of Watchmen, and the subsequent settlement virtually ensured that Warner turn over a big chunk of the film's profits to Fox. And of course, there's also the fact that a trailer for a film may or may not actually contain all of a film's surprises, story developments, or ideas, so Fathom may be gobsmacked over several images in the teaser which ultimately have little or nothing to do with Avatar's overall content.
But then again, the good thing is that in Hollywood – indeed, in the entire known universe – only one person is allowed to have an idea, and that idea is unique and completely separate from any other ideas that people come up with; see Volcano and Dante's Peak, Deep Impact and Armageddon, Freaky Friday, Vice Versa, 18 Again, Big, and the other Freaky Friday for examples of how this worked out wonderfully for everyone, especially including (but not limited to) Charlie Schlatter and Judge Reinhold.
The reason that this has become a source of contention for filmgoers and now potential plaintiffs is twofold: first, James Cameron hasn't been around for a while, but his mouth has, and it's been indicating that Avatar is nothing short of a cinematic revolution in two-hour form; second, media pundits and critics have analyzed and emphasized the similarities between this so-called completely new movie experience and other films that suggest its ideas are in fact, not new. Delgo is one of these films. Ferngully is another. I'm pretty sure Joe Dirt is a third. But as far as I'm aware, only a handful of industry insiders have actually seen the film, which means that most of this commentary is pure speculation – which doesn't make it wrong, but while both Delgo and Avatar took almost a decade apiece to come to fruition, one suspects that Cameron wasn't spending that time looking through Fathom's windows with a pair of binoculars and smuggling a tape recorder in a briefcase into their boardroom meetings.
But all snark aside, do the similarities suggested in the Joblo comparison story and the Movieline piece – even if they're legitimate – mean that Fathom truly has a leg to stand on legally? Or that even if they could prove somehow that their ideas were stolen, Fathom could successfully bring a suit against Cameron, much less win? My suggestion, since no one's asking, is that Fathom wait until the film is released, and then they hit up Cameron and co. for some money; at that point, Avatar is out there and they can't tinker or change or adjust anything that might be one of these overlaps in imagery or design. But until then, what do you think? Would a lawsuit by the Delgo filmmakers be legitimate venture for them? Do you think that the similarities are significant enough to warrant legal attention? Let us know!
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
8-27-2009 @ 2:54PM
jeff said...
This lawsuit is silly and won't go anywhere. Avatar's bigger problem is the oversaturation of the Smurfs or whatever their called and some of the environments, too. Things like skin and eyes should be more muted and subtle so they actually appear life-like instead of cartoon-like.
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8-27-2009 @ 4:00PM
Broncoskip said...
There is no problem. No one saw Delgo, Avatar is gonna tank unless new trailers show us something better. There will be no profits to sue for.
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8-29-2009 @ 6:49PM
Gordon said...
Maybe you didn't like the trailer, but an awful lot of people did. Trailer Addict's users graded it an A-; Coming Soon's users voted it very positively.…
And, seriously? You're not going to see the new sci-fi action movie by the guy who made Aliens and Terminator 1 & 2, not matter how "bad" you think the trailer is?
Please.
8-27-2009 @ 4:00PM
Brian said...
I've only seen the trailers for both, but I must admit that I immediatlwy thought of the Delgo trailer while watching the Avatar trailer for the first time. Bizzare...
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8-27-2009 @ 4:03PM
Rufus said...
Wow, some of those images over at Joblo are pretty similar. The floating rock formations are the most apparent...
...I would be questioning my legal legs if I were Fox.
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8-28-2009 @ 1:28AM
Marc said...
That’s just as crazy at the Batman/Batman lawsuit news that came about last November:
“Batman vs. Batman
The small-town mayor of Batman, Turkey, is threatening to sue filmmaker Warner Bros. for using his locale’s name without permission.”
Sure out of context these images can be found similar but the real distancing evidence will be what happens this December…should they wait that long…frivolous lawsuits
And as far as any anticipation for this movie, I for one wasn't really impressed with the trailer, probably because of all the years of the hype saying it's going to be the greatest movie of...well ever. Looks a little foolish if you ask me - something like if you took Aliens but took all the cool stuff out an inserted a mix up of Delgo, Battleship Earth, 10,000 B.C., Attack of the Clones and Ferngully:( Hope Cameron is throwing us off with what we've seen so far...
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8-28-2009 @ 1:27AM
madgamer said...
Hurray for a Joe Dirt reference!
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8-28-2009 @ 1:25AM
vegimorph said...
sheesh, you guys are all cynical. I saw Delgo and the Avatar trailer and they didn't really look similair at all. Delgo was a so so movie, a interesting effort but Fathom needs more practice. Hopefully this thing's just a stupid internet rumor.
I'm definetely going to see Avatar because it looks really awesome and even if its not that good, at least its going to be a visually pleasing movie but I still think you guys are counting your chickens before they hatch and are too picky. I know Cameron is a good storyteller and this scenario echoes the one of Titanic because i heard the prebuzz for that was negative. As for the designs of the aliens, how could anyone not be pleased by that? What kind of alien were you expecting and what knd do you think would blow your mind? If its just over the details, relax, Cameron's still got several months to go and he's still in post production so you can't fairly judge him yet.
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9-02-2009 @ 6:44PM
Annonymous said...
I was one of those that got to see the preview for Avatar on Avatar Day. To be honest , I really didn't care for it after I saw it. It wasn't what it was boasted about being. Everything was too blue or too green in color and the backgrounds were washed together in alot of scenes. The Avatars were just plain confusing. Alot of us were confused on which were guys and which were girls? I mean, they just all looked like the same sex pretty much-unless they got to talk. It just made everything very confusing for alot of us. The movie has good and bad elements-they are pretty much even in number. However, it's really not as "spectacular" as everyone's been talking about. As for Delgo? There isn't that much similarities. The main thing is - I guess Camerons' characters have more detail and are more one color (non colorful). They're not the same.
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9-02-2009 @ 1:27PM
Jake said...
Seriously, how have all of you people seen Ferngully?
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9-02-2009 @ 7:09PM
madmaxmedia said...
Superficially they look similar, but it's not like the images being compared have never been seen before. Floating islands/rock formations, pteradon-like flying creatures, etc.
I'm not impressed by the comparison pics. Whether there is any substance to the story, I don't know (I didn't see Delgo and no one has seen Avatar.) But I don't think those images are much to go on at all.
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9-13-2009 @ 9:23PM
Ron said...
Delgo vs. Avatar lawsuit?? Sounds like throwing good money after bad to me, but who knows what the brain trust at Fathom thinks about? If I ran that place, speaking or writing the word "Delgo" would result in instant termination without benefits.
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9-15-2009 @ 1:19PM
Goat Dude said...
The Avatar animation team would not have needed binoculars. Fathom posted all dailies throughout production. Many members of the animation community were aware of Fathom Studios "Digital Dailies", and I'm sure that at least some members of the Avatar team had seen some of Delgo. That might work in Fathom's favor if it goes to court...
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