Several Indian films could be sued for plagiarism

Seeking investment for Indian film industry is proving to be a double-edged weapon. With a growth rate of almost 17 per cent, Indian Entertainment and Media industry is flourishing. Iconic film-makers such as Warners, Sony, Universal and DreamWorks have now reached Mumbai, the film capital of India, offering tie-ups with local producers. More money, more films, more business- so far, so good. Here's the bad news; Hollywood giants will not take it kindly if Bollywood producers keep on stealing their themes, stories and screenplays right in front of their eyes. They will sue not only in Mumbai but in London and California as well, writes Kathy Robinson exclusively for iefilmi.

Warner Bros. have sued the producers of "Hari Puttar: A Comedy of Terrors'' made by Mumbai-based Mirchi Movies for plagiarism. They say the movie title as well as its theme resembles too closely to their mega-famous boy wizard franchise- The Harry Potter series.

"There is absolutely nothing to link 'Hari Puttar' with 'Harry Potter,'' says Munish Purii, chief executive officer of Mirchi Movies. Now it's up to the High Court of Mumbai to see who's telling the truth.

List of Indian remakes/copycats/inspirations that could have been sued

Indian film 'Partner' allegedly was a Bollywod version of 'Hitch'Remaking of successful Hollywood films in India has been going on for ages. Indian producers hate the term 'plagiarism'. Instead, they prefer to call their unofficial remakes 'inspirations'. As more and more Hollywood companies are establishing their presence in Mumbai, it's imperative that they will take legal action as and when they see the violation of their copyrights. It's a real serious threat to those Indian producers who earlier thrived on illegitimate copycats/remakes/inspirations- whatever they prefer to call them. It has to stop NOW, say the Hollywood giants.

The legal action against Hari Puttar is seen as a key test of India's intellectual property laws. Regardless of the result, Hari Puttar, due for release in India on September 12, is likely to be derailed for some time.

Two giants of media and films face each other in a court battle. Mirchi Movies is owned by Bennett & Coleman, the publishers of The Times of India. It's valued at up to $25 billion (£13.5 billion). Warner Bros, owned by Time Warner, grossed about $3.4 billion last year from its films.

Western publishers take the cases of copycats and plagiarism very seriously. The Harry Potter brand is estimated to be worth more than £7 billion and the books have sold more than 400 million copies. Because, they made sure that no body could violate their brand.

It's ironical that Bharati Dubey, writing for The Times of India Group, says in an article, dated August 22, 2008: Hindi film-makers can no longer flick ideas with the same impunity as in the days of yore. With Hollywood companies keeping a hawk's eye on every release, copyrights are slowly replacing the copycat culture-although it will take a while to stamp it out completely.

The right way of doing it is to work in partnership with the original title holders, suggests Ms Dubey. She writes: As a result, film-makers here have become more cautious. So Ravi Chopra's new film Banda Yeh Bindaas Hai may be a remake of the crime comedy My Cousin Vinny, but an insider at BR Films assures us that "Ravi bought the rights a long time ago'' . Producer-director Vipul Shah said he had wanted to buy the rights of Frank Oz's film Death at a Funeral but dropped the idea after he found that another producer had the same film in mind. The Indian Film Company (IFC) has bought the rights of the Charlize Theronstarrer Italian Job from Paramount Studios. Says Sandeep Bhargava of IFC, "Italian Job is a thriller and we thought it had great scope if adapted for the Indian market.''

India EU Film Initiative did a feature earlier: Remakes! Inspirations! Or, sheer coincidence!