The New York Times has just revealed that Gary A. Feess, a federal judge in Los Angeles, said he intended to grant 20th Century Fox’s claim that it owns a copyright interest in the Watchmen, a movie shot by Warner Brothers and Legendary Pictures and set for release in March. At an earlier hearing, the judge said he believed that issues in the case could be settled only at a trial, which was scheduled for late January. On Wednesday, however, Judge Feess said he had reconsidered and concluded that Fox should prevail on crucial issues.
“Fox owns a copyright interest consisting of, at the very least, the right to distribute the Watchmen motion picture,” the ruling said.
This battle became public back in February 2008 when Fox said it planned on suing Warner Bros. claiming to have exclusive rights to develop, produce and distribute a film based on the graphic novel “Watchmen.” The suit has been discussed in a variety of issues since then all pointing to producer Lawrence Gordon who sold the rights to the film to Fox but when Fox dropped plans for a movie he began shopping it around to Universal and Paramount until it ultimately fell in the hands of Warner.
However, don’t get too concerned just yet fanboys, in Wednesday’s ruling Judge Feess advised both Fox and Warner to look toward a settlement or an appeal.
“The parties may wish to turn their efforts from preparing for trial to negotiating a resolution of this dispute or positioning the case for review,” he said.
Will there be a settlement? I can only assume so since that March 6 release date is looming, but this is definitely interesting news heading into the holidays as we probably won’t hear any new details until the new year.
