Piracy Tagged Articles at Cinematical

Just when we thought we had seen the last of gossip columnist and part-time movie pirate Roger Friedman, it looks like the guy has found a new home at The Hollywood Reporter. The trade paper announced that they've hired the infamous writer to head up their new celebrity news feature. According to THR editor Elizabeth Guider, Friedman was joining the team because, "For some time, THR has wanted to beef up its coverage of the celebrity world and how it intersects with and influences the business of show business. Bringing Roger on board gives us a great leg up in that effort and will help extend our audience reach."

In case the name isn't ringing any bells, Friedman infamously covered the OJ Simpson trial back in 1995, and was also considered one of the 'leading authorities' on Michael Jackson after covering the pop star's 2005 child-molestation trial. Friedman always had a taste for the tawdry, and over the years, broke some equally seedy stories about Anna Nicole Smith and the collapse of Rudolph Giuliani's marriage. But after Friedman published a review of Wolverine using an unfinished print that had surfaced online, he was quickly (and publicly) fired. Granted, it didn't come as a big shock, but you almost felt sorry for the guy ... almost. Even if you didn't want to argue about the morality of Friedman's actions, you have to wonder: just what did he think was going to happen when he admitted to downloading an illegal copy of one of the summer's big releases?

Friedman already has a reputation for fighting dirty, but as periodicals jostle for position among a growing pool of online competition, I guess even THR isn't above playing fast and loose for a scoop -- and it looks like nobody is willing to bend the rules like Friedman.

No, it's not one of those large-living, seaman-snatching Somali pirates to blame for those shoddy stolen copies of Hannah Montana: The Movie hitting the streets already. In fact, if you believe Gerardo Arellano, who was arrested along with his wife Maribel Fernandez last weekend for illegally filming the movie in the theater, his mom is to blame.

According to the Chicago Tribune, Arellano said of the 44,000 pirated movies found in his home, "my mother saved all of the DVDs, CDs and videos...She saves those." His mom is also selling the stolen movies on a French website, I guess, since his computer turned up a link to such a site during the investigation.

His kids are big fans of Hannah Montana, too. Maybe they were in on it.

On the other hand, at least he didn't wish on Miley/Hannah various venereal diseases and drug habits as per class act Jamie Foxx.

We've seen the ads countless times. Piracy is theft. If you steal a movie, you're no better than a thief. So on, and so forth. But what actually happens if you do?

As The Hollywood Reporter posts, heading to the theater and recording two films can land you nearly two years in prison. Michael Logan had recorded two films in a theater in Washington, D.C. -- 28 Weeks Later and Enchanted. Granted, the "MPAA says forensic analysis indicates Logan could be responsible for illegally recording more than 100 films from January 2006 to January 2008 in four states and the District of Columbia," but he was only found guilty for two.

Man, I would hope that he did record more -- not to suck it to the studios, but for the simple fact that it would suck if those were the films you got sent to prison for. I'm not saying that they're bad, but if I was getting sent to the slammer for a film, I would want it to be something really great.

Perhaps we'll see a revamp of those commercials in the future. I know tons of non-pirates who think the ads are a big joke, but maybe the message could be relayed a little better if stories like these were used. Weigh in below!

The nomadic DVD peddlers in Chinatown and other urban areas seem virtually unstoppable, but that hasn't kept Hollywood studios from launching various attempts to prevent movie piracy. Boing Boing reports on the rumor that at least one theater has been silencing the soundtrack in Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull throughout the film in order to mess with potential bootleggers trying to record the thing. If true, it's got to be one of the most brain dead attempts at security since the rise of quart-sized bags. When you really get down to it, most two-bit criminals with camcorders in their laps don''t really care if the quality of the movie they're recording suffers, since the resulting product will already feature lo-fi video, the overlapping sounds of laughter and other audience reactions, and silhouetted cameos from patrons venturing to the concession stands or taking bathroom breaks. With all that, the intermittent exclusion of music doesn't sound like a major concern for the bad guys.

Studio anti-piracy measures are notoriously ill-conceived. Premieres and all-media screenings often force critics and even the filmmakers themselves to undergo intense evaluations before they're allowed to enter the theaters, while films open to the public, where pirates are more likely to show up, don't take any precautions. Granted, multiplexes wouldn't help their business if attending them felt like entering an airport terminal, but that doesn't mean there isn't a better way to prevent the crimes from taking place. Anyone care to offer some ideas?

[Via Movie City News]

If someone were to get caught illegally recording a movie in New York City today, he would get charged with a violation (like a speeding ticket) and hit with, at most, a $250 fine. Not much of a deterrent, I daresay, for folks who make a criminal enterprise out of making and selling bootlegs. Furthermore, only the folks actually in the theater with the camcorder would get in trouble -- everyone else, like the people doing the selling, get off scot-free, assuming they're not breaking any other laws.

New York State Attorney General Andrew Cuomo was joined Monday by Tina Fey and a couple of other movie types for the unveiling of the "Piracy Protection Act," which would make piracy either a misdemeanor or a felony, depending on whether you're a first-time or repeat offender, and punish it with actual, y'know, jail time (up to a year for first-timers). They're hoping to have the law in place within the month. So, uh, if you're in New York City and you're planning to bootleg something, I'd recommend doing it now.

This law is obviously a result of movie industry lobbying, as evidenced by MPAA president Dan Glickman standing by Cuomo's side at the press conference. Does the new punishment fit the crime? Will harsher punishments make a difference? (I'm not so sure -- especially not if New York law enforcement doesn't dedicate more effort to actually ferreting out the bootleggers.) And are you surprised to hear that up until now people could record movies with virtual impunity, even if they got caught?

ed note: Corrected Attorney General's name

Once again, it seems search titan Google is being asked to look into itself a little more closely. When Google bought YouTube in October, 2006, several big Hollywood players -- most notably Viacom -- asked Google to take a little more care in the presentation of copyrighted material. Now, says the Hollywood Reporter, an open letter to lawmakers released Wednesday sees the independent watchdog group, the National Legal and Policy Center alleging that Google's servers and services are still a too-convenient haven for pirates.

The math is pretty compelling -- an NLPC review of Google conducted between Sept. 10th and 18th found over 300 apparently pirated films that had been viewed some 22 million times. Multiply 22 million by an average ticket price of $10, and you're talking some serious money. Extrapolate those 10 days into a full year, and you're looking at a sum of 8 billion dollars -- that exceeds Google's annual revenue of 7.5 billion and is four times their 2 billion dollar profit.

It'd be easy to see this as yet another veiled swipe at the internet's cavalier attitude towards intellectual property by big studios -- except for the fact that the NLPC is a wholly independent group with no apparent ties to the film industry. For it's part, Google claims that any and all copyrighted material found on their sites and services illegally is removed as soon as a copyright holder makes their displeasure known. However, the NLPC's Ken Boehm says that's not good enough: "We are hoping to shame Google into doing something. What they are doing is inexcusable corporate behavior. When big companies do something unethical, it sends a message to everyone else that it's OK." Google also claims to be working on better content filtering that they hope to unveil as soon as possible.

For the second time in as many years, the Director's Guild of America, which represents not only directors but unit production managers and assistant directors, has said no to the Hollywood studio's policy of for-consideration screeners being mailed to its members for the 60th annual Director's Guild Awards. This decision finally puts to rest the question left form last year when the Guild said it would not allow screeners for the 59th annual awards but might consider them for the 60th -- which take place on January 26th.

According to The Hollywood Reporter, for the 59th Awards, the Guild initially indicated that it would allow screeners to be made available to its members. But then, almost immediately afterward, reversed the decision. At the time, it did allow for the possibility of screeners being sent out to members for this year's awards but now that's obviously not going to happen. "The DGA recognizes that this decision is different from what was stated last year," the Guild said in the article, "However, closer examination of the issue revealed concern among members that films sent out on DVD might have an unfair advantage over films that were not able to be sent out due to limited marketing budgets or other financial considerations."

Ok, I guess those reasons make sense. Still, as a member of the Director's Guild, I always felt it was an unusual policy to not allow screening copies as virtually every other union or guild does allow it. In addition to the reasons stated above, maybe the ban is meant to help stem the tide of pirated DVDs being sold all over the world? Or, perhaps the Guild actually expects its members to go see films under consideration in a movie theater instead of on DVD? Or maybe it's because the DGA just likes to be different? I don't know, but whatever the reason, even if we don't get screeners mailed to us, at least we still get to see screenings of films at DGA HQ, which is nice. So I guess I shouldn't complain too much.

The news from Hollywood Reporter isn't merely that The Simpsons Movie has been pirated -- it's no surprise that a big summer movie has been illegally copied and distributed, and that you can find bootleg DVDs easily in China. The newsworthy aspect of this piracy, however, is the country where it originated: Australia this time. Twentieth Century Fox traced the source of an illegal online version of the film to a man in Sydney, and had him charged with copyright infringement. The video pirate worked fast: the version was discovered within 72 hours of the animated film's release Down Under. Although the original illegal copy was removed from the Internet even before The Simpsons Movie was released in U.S. theaters, the file had already been viewed or downloaded more than 3,000 times, so you know it's probably still out there somewhere.

What I find amusing is that the guy used his mobile phone to record the movie. How much of a threat to box-office is something that poor in quality? Do people really think, "Oh look, a crummy and barely watchable version of The Simpsons Movie taped off a cell phone ... now I don't have to pay to see it in a theater!" The people I know who boast they can find illegal copies of movies online seem to find these downloads a kind of amusing novelty, and the bootleg files don't appear to have any effect on their desire to see these movies in theaters or on DVD. I can't even stand old commercial videotapes of movies these days -- I can't imagine trying to sit through a cell-phone recording made in a theater.

The Australian who illegally recorded the movie faces up to five years in jail, if convicted. As a longtime fan of The Simpsons TV show, all I can think about is the episode "Bart Vs. Australia" where Bart is sentenced to "the boot" by the Commonwealth Parliament as punishment for international telephone fraud. I know they don't really have "the boot" in Australia, but it would be a delightful irony to watch an online video (perhaps recorded with something higher quality than a mobile phone) of the offending video pirate getting "the boot" from the Prime Minister, or from Rupert Murdoch.

I think it's safe to say that the fear of movie piracy has officially gone too far. On July 17th, Marymount University sophomore Jhannet Sejas (pictured) was celebrating her 19th birthday with her boyfriend at a screening of Transformers. Sejas, a Bolivian immigrant working two part-time jobs to support her education, was loving the flick. She wanted to show her little brother a clip from the film to get him excited to see it, so she took out her digital camera and recorded 20 seconds of the climax. The assistant manager of the theater saw her use the camera and reported it to the general manager. The general manager decided to bypass such reasonable steps as a) asking her never to record in the theater again, b) asking her to erase the footage or c) asking her to leave the theater, and simply telephoned the police. Within minutes, two police officers entered the theater, confiscated the camera, and charged Sejas with the crime of "illegally recording a motion picture."

Sejas says "I was terrified. I was crying. I've never been in trouble before." Sejas has been banned from the theater (where she frequently paid for and viewed films) for life, and she has to go to trial for the incident this month. She faces up to a year in jail and a fine of up to $2,500. The Regal Cinemas Ballston Common 12 Theater decided to prosecute the case, which is a first for Arlington police. Kendrick Macdowell, general counsel for the Washington-based National Association of Theatre Owners, says that there has to be a "zero-tolerance policy at the theater level," adding "We cannot educate theater managers to be judges and juries in what is acceptable. Theater managers cannot distinguish between good and bad stealing."

You know what? They can, actually. It's part of being a manager. This story really infuriates me. Do they really think this girl intended to sell a 20-second clip of a movie that had been out for two weeks? Where's the market for that? If anything, she was trying to give these people more money by getting her little brother psyched to see the film. If they really need to make an example of somebody, why don't they go after the people who actually do pirate entire movies, and leave this poor girl alone. Or better yet, how about we hold off on calling the police until, I don't know, there's a friggin' emergency! See, because that's what the police are for. Disgraceful.

"A friend hooked me up with it." This is what a fifth-grade teacher told his class right before he showed them a bootlegged copy of Shrek the Third. And he may have even gotten away with it if one of his female students didn't run home and write Dan Glickman a scathing email. Okay, I'm kidding -- but she did tell her father what had happened, and he subsequently told MSNBC that he is pissed -- not because his daughter was shown an illegal bootleg of a film still in theaters -- but because the teacher in question was actually screening this film in replace of whatever the lesson plan should've been for that day. And I whole-heartily agree.

The school, located in Peekskill, New York, is currently investigating the issue, and Superintendent Judith Johnson issued a statement saying that, essentially, it is against school policy to show a pirated video. No word yet on what will happen to the teacher, Lovell Quiroz, but personally I feel he should be sent to some sort of moron jail. I mean, c'mon dude -- was it that important for you to look "cool" in front of a bunch of fifth graders? Next week, during show and tell, will you pass around that bag of pot your friend hooked you up with as well? And it's actually quite comical, because this is exactly where I think the MPAA should be focusing a lot of their efforts. In a couple of years these kids will be wizards of the online world (if they aren't already), and they'll most certainly learn how and where to download illegal movies. If you want my opinion, the MPAA should set up some sort of program where actors (or what have you) travel around to different elementary schools to talk about the disadvantages of movie pirating. Get to these kids while they're still young and naive.

And as far as this teacher goes, I'm not sure what should happen to him. Should the guy lose his job over this? Should he be given a warning? If you were the parent of a child who was in that classroom, what type of penalty would you suggest?