The Hero of Fail
For those guessing that the question about the Zelda fan-film, The Hero of Time, taken down last December, has finished, a nasty surprise: at the beginning of January, Nintendo officially filled a lawsuit at the Federal Court of Canada against BMB Finishes, the group formed by the producers of the fanfilm, for copyright infringement. Nintendo claims that the group, although "peacefully warned earlier, continued providing the film on the Internet, and even after taking it out of the air, was "extremely permissive about the illegal copies subsequently distributed". The company is also suing the Dailymotion site for the same reason. The site would have made an agreement with the group to exclusively stream the film, for business purposes, and initially ignored the request of Nintendo to take the video down.
"Creative Monopoly"
The producer and film director Joel Musch rejected the accusation of the company and said they are being intolerant and selfish. "A simple tribute fan should never be treated with such arrogance and disrespect", said Musch. "It's not our fault if the Internet did not agree with censorship of the film and decided to share it. We do not control the network, and neither want to".
The director goes further, accusing the company to go against its own public. He says that people admire the Zelda series, they want to reimagine the events, create theories and want to expand this universe, but can not. "There is a creative monopoly, where only Nintendo can say what happens and what it is, doesn't matter if people just want to have fun. Rather it is forbidden to think of Zelda in any different way than the company", says the producer.
There are doubts, however, if the film made by fans was really just a tribute. A lawyer who is working on the case independently, David Allard, considered "suspicious" the intentions of the group. "Almost all team members were professionals of the cinema, and had some high profile after the announcement of the film," says Allard. He argues, however, that legally the biggest problem is the "clearly commercial" purpose of movie. "They were trying to get it to display in theaters, were planning a DVD release, planned interviews. Most of fan-made projects, no matter how well prepared they are, do not tend to get so much excited with this kind of thing."
The first meeting between the two parties, Nintendo and BMB, should take place in Vancouver in early February.
"On my business card, I am a corporate president.
In my mind, I am a game deveoper.
But in my heart - I am a gamer"
Satoru Iwata
