Beatty Wins First Round in 'Dick Tracy' Battle
08-12-05, 02:35 PM
#1
DVD Talk Legend
Thread Starter
Join Date: Sep 1999
Location: Building attractions one theme park at a time.
Posts: 10,800
Received 82 Likes
on
49 Posts
Beatty Wins First Round in 'Dick Tracy' Battle
From imdb:
Andrew
Actor Warren Beatty has been given the go-ahead to proceed with a lawsuit he filed in May in a battle over the film rights to Dick Tracy. Beatty, who starred in and directed the 1990 movie, plans to make a sequel to the comic book detective film, and has launched a legal battle against Tribune Media Services in order to do so. And the actor won the first stage of the wrangle on Wednesday, when US District Judge Dean Pregerson denied the company's motion to dismiss the lawsuit, explaining the case involves issues of contract interpretation and "mixed questions of fact and law" which need to be sorted through in court. Beatty is seeking $30 million in damages and a court ruling that he controls film and other rights. According to the complaint, Beatty obtained film, television and other rights in Dick Tracy from Tribune in a 1985 agreement. Beatty claims that bosses at Tribune then moved to reclaim the rights in 2002, in violation of various notification procedures, and have now "clouded the title" to the rights and made it "commercially impossible" for him to produce a sequel. The first Dick Tracy film was the ninth highest grossing for 1990, raking in $100 million that year.
Andrew
08-12-05, 03:48 PM
#3
DVD Talk Gold Edition
Join Date: Oct 2002
Posts: 2,134
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
What would be even better is a full SE of the DVD. I watched bit and pieces of the original on TV the other night, and I wish I could watch it all the way through. Thanks for this info, BTW. HOpefully someone will actually get to own something they created. Imagine that.
08-12-05, 03:57 PM
#4
DVD Talk Legend
Originally Posted by reubs82
HOpefully someone will actually get to own something they created. Imagine that.
I don't believe that ownership of the 1990 movie is the big question here - Beatty is arguing that he should have control of all "film, television, and other rights" to Dick Tracy.
08-12-05, 04:39 PM
#5
Banned
Join Date: Feb 2002
Posts: 7,982
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
Just cause comic-book movies are a hit today doesn't mean a Dick Tracy movie will be too.
I remember 1990 when that movie came out. Beatty was on every show around doing promos for the movie , about as much that was done for BATMAN the year before.
So yes the movie made $100 million, but not alot of people enjoyed it.
I remember 1990 when that movie came out. Beatty was on every show around doing promos for the movie , about as much that was done for BATMAN the year before.
So yes the movie made $100 million, but not alot of people enjoyed it.
08-12-05, 08:23 PM
#6
DVD Talk Hero
No kiddin'. I wasn't into BO receipts back in 90 (as I was seven years old). I remember that my family all thought it was stupid. All this time, I always thought that it tanked, and made, like, $20mil. I'm suprised to learn that it made $100mil.
That being said, SCREW what the general movie-going public thinks about Dick Tracy. Beatty represents some pretty classic filmmaking. Just like Clint Eastwood. They're not all about making a buck. They're about working on respectable projects.
Oh, and we'll forget that TOWN AND COUNTRY ever happened. What movie? EXACTLY.
That being said, SCREW what the general movie-going public thinks about Dick Tracy. Beatty represents some pretty classic filmmaking. Just like Clint Eastwood. They're not all about making a buck. They're about working on respectable projects.
Oh, and we'll forget that TOWN AND COUNTRY ever happened. What movie? EXACTLY.
08-12-05, 08:54 PM
#7
DVD Talk Limited Edition
Originally Posted by wm lopez
Beatty was on every show around doing promos
He was also doing Madonna. I think it's a ploy by him to get her back.
08-13-05, 12:18 PM
#15
DVD Talk Gold Edition
Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Pittsburgh, PA, USA
Posts: 2,456
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
We use Dick Tracy as a demo disc at work, as the DTS track is phenomenal. After watching it alot lately, I'd very much like to see a sequel. Beatty might be able to do it somewhat cheaply if he were to use a similar technology as was used with Sky Captain and Sin City, since that seemed to be what he was attempting 15 years ago, but CGI just wasn't there yet.
08-13-05, 02:12 PM
#16
DVD Talk Legend
I would also like to see a SE of Dick Tracy, as I heard Beatty had a whole different feeling cut intended for a PG-13 rating that got edited for the family friendly PG that they wanted to release under the Disney banner (though it still got the Touchstone one).
If they did a sequel, it would either have to involve another actor playing Tracy or portraying him in his elder years.
If they did a sequel, it would either have to involve another actor playing Tracy or portraying him in his elder years.
08-13-05, 11:33 PM
#17
DVD Talk Legend
I had (and still have) a ton of problems with Dick Tracy, but there's a good movie buried underneath them all. For starters, Tracy started out gruff and hard-fisted in the beginning but after the first 20 minutes or so devolved into a personality-less softy. That's just about when the movie lost me. Plus it really felt unfocused and haphazard throughout. No me likey.
