TV/Movies Megathread

[celedhring]

Yeah lengthy copyright is a big part of it, so that's what I mean, but also the general mindspace where creative activity is about generating "IP" and owning "IP" is about efficiently exploiting it. I mean, there's always been a business built on art - and it's often been cynical in a number of ways.ook at it another way.

Look at it another way.

The Terminator franchise.  At some points, and maybe it still is the case, the rights were set to expire a set number of years after the last movie was produced.  If the company holding the IP did not produce a movie, the IP rights were expiring and reverting back to someone else.

So what happened?  Lots of successive Terminator movies of average/dubious quality.  Not less.  For fear of losing these rights.

It's a bit different, but similar than your proposal: if the rights are going to expire after a shorter time, the IP holders are going to produce more material over a shorter period of time to make sure that IP is as profitable as possible before they lose it.

Imagine knowing your car will drive itself back to the garage in 2 weeks.  Will you let it stay in your parking lot for two weeks undisturbed, or will you drive around as much as you feel to for the next week?  Same thing for IP.

I think we have an early proof of concept with Winnie the Pooh, and so far it goes against what you say. The last animated Pooh movie was in 2011 (and a live action one in 2018), the last straight to video movie in 2010, the last animated show in 2010.

The original Pooh books started to revert to public domain in 2022, but Disney hasn't certainly rushed to milk the porperty before that happened.

[Admiral Yi]

Was the original a dud?  Only worth keeping the IP alive if it's making you money.

[HVC]

Can't release in China, doesn't help the bottom line for a film.

[Josquius]

Can't release in China, doesn't help the bottom line for a film.

And boy do those Chinese love their generic special fx fests.

This is something I'm hopeful about as far as films are concerned. China isolating itself and becoming more arbitrary with banning films makes it no longer the prime market it once was.

[Sheilbh]

One for the Brits but I started watching Edge of Darkness on iPlayer - really strongly recommend if you've not seen it:
https://twitter.com/BBCArchive/status/1631323480871546880

[viper37]

Original Gone with the Wind Script Reveals Behind-the-Scenes 'War' Over Depiction of Slavery

Well, Valmy was talking about that book in another thread, so here's something interesting about the movie.

[Barrister]

Yeah lengthy copyright is a big part of it, so that's what I mean, but also the general mindspace where creative activity is about generating "IP" and owning "IP" is about efficiently exploiting it. I mean, there's always been a business built on art - and it's often been cynical in a number of ways.ook at it another way.

Look at it another way.

The Terminator franchise.  At some points, and maybe it still is the case, the rights were set to expire a set number of years after the last movie was produced.  If the company holding the IP did not produce a movie, the IP rights were expiring and reverting back to someone else.

So what happened?  Lots of successive Terminator movies of average/dubious quality.  Not less.  For fear of losing these rights.

It's a bit different, but similar than your proposal: if the rights are going to expire after a shorter time, the IP holders are going to produce more material over a shorter period of time to make sure that IP is as profitable as possible before they lose it.

Imagine knowing your car will drive itself back to the garage in 2 weeks.  Will you let it stay in your parking lot for two weeks undisturbed, or will you drive around as much as you feel to for the next week?  Same thing for IP.

Thats kind of a different thing.  That's not IP law itself - it's the movie rights.

The easier example is Marvel.  Marvel comics signed movie deals for Spider Man, Fantastic 4, and X-men over to Sony and Fox.  But under the terms of those licensing deals the rights revert back to Marvel if they're not used after a certain amount of time.  So Sony and Fox have to keep cranking out content in order to not lose those rights.  (Fox of course has now been bought out by Disney, which owns Marvel anyways).

But that's not really IP law - that's just the contract that was agreed to.

No one is forcing the estate of JRR Tolkien to produce LOTR material if they don't want to.

[Darth Wagtaros]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pCN_q3hX_RE

Stumbled across this last night.  Robert Shaw singing Ladies of Spain in some early pirate movie.  Which makes his reprise in Jaws a nice little self referential shout out.

That link takes me to a vid of Nancy Whiskey by the Irish Rovers.

To be fair the Rovers kick ass.

[grumbler]

To be fair the Rovers kick ass.

True.  I listened with pleasure even though it was the wrong link.

[Valmy]

No one is forcing the estate of JRR Tolkien to produce LOTR material if they don't want to.

Seems like they aren't interested in producing anything except printed materials.

[viper37]

Thats kind of a different thing.  That's not IP law itself - it's the movie rights.

The easier example is Marvel.  Marvel comics signed movie deals for Spider Man, Fantastic 4, and X-men over to Sony and Fox.  But under the terms of those licensing deals the rights revert back to Marvel if they're not used after a certain amount of time.  So Sony and Fox have to keep cranking out content in order to not lose those rights.  (Fox of course has now been bought out by Disney, which owns Marvel anyways).

But that's not really IP law - that's just the contract that was agreed to.

No one is forcing the estate of JRR Tolkien to produce LOTR material if they don't want to.

I know it's different.  But I just do not foresee any changes for diversity movies in IP laws on changes for this type of work.

For medications, though, I think it would be beneficial, but that's for another thread, and for entirely different reasons, within the Canadian context.

[Admiral Yi]

This is the Part Where I Leave You now on US Netflix.  I recommend.  Quasi Jewish family comes together for dad's funeral and Shiva.  Great cast.  Comedic family drama.

[Darth Wagtaros]

This is the Part Where I Leave You now on US Netflix.  I recommend.  Quasi Jewish family comes together for dad's funeral and Shiva.  Great cast.  Comedic family drama.

My first thought on reading this was:

[Admiral Yi]

Mank on Netflix.  Black and whiter about the writing of the Citizen Kane screenplay.  Hearst, Louis Mayer, Marion Davis have prominent roles.  I liked it a lot.

[The Brain]

Who Killed The KLF? Documentary about the rise and end of the KLF (fall would be wrong). Interesting stuff if you, like me, was around back in the day but just remember the great tracks and their reputation for being weird. I also knew about their exit from the industry and burning of a million pounds. Kind of odd how the later part of the documentary focuses on the burning of the million. To me that's the least interesting part of the KLF story.

After the documentary was made but still in time to be mentioned in aftertexts, they re-released their music. Which I did notice back when it happened when they appeared on Spotify. I assume they simply needed the money, but the documentary is silent on the reasons.