Friday, April 07, 2006

"Code" Words For And Against

The World Entertainment News Network reports that the OSCAR winning drama Crash (I ordered my Director's Cut DVD, have you?) is being adapted for the small screen and will appear on televisions across the U.S. next year. The movie version starring Sandra Bullock, Terrence Howard, Matt Dillon and Don Cheadle, won Best Picture at the Academy Awards in March. The film's producer Cathy Schulman says, "I hope it will air in the next year. "The actors from the film will show up. Don Cheadle is a producer and will also be on at least a few episodes. "We'll see about everyone else."

As regular visitors to this blog already know, I am one of the film's biggest supporters, but I just don't know about turning it into a weekly series... I have no problem with the tube tackling race relations...Can't they call it something else? If the show flops--I fear it will somehow diminish the film in some way.

Jill Lawless of the Associated Press has news on the final outcome of Britain's Da Vinci Code case:

A judge ruled Friday that mega-selling author Dan Brown did not steal ideas for "The Da Vinci Code" from a nonfiction work, ending the suspense about the case with an ultimately unsurprising decision.

High Court judge Peter Smith rejected a copyright-infringement claim by Michael Baigent and Richard Leigh, authors of "The Holy Blood and the Holy Grail," who claimed that Brown's blockbuster "appropriated the architecture" of their 1982 book. In the United States, the book is titled, "Holy Blood, Holy Grail."


The ruling will allow a film based on the book starring Tom Hanks to open as scheduled on May 19.

Click here to read the entire article as it appears in The Boston Globe

Kudos to judge Smith for making the correct ruling in this case. I'm no lawyer folks. From everything I have read about the case and the plaintiffs though, it just seemed like they wanted to get as much cash/publicity as possible, as the debut of the film adaptation fast approaches.

Even though Baigent and Liegh lost the case--They still feel like winners--for the chance to have their day in court. Sure the duo are happy as clams. Sales of their book have skyrocketed since the lawsuit began.

No comments: