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Judge refuses to block release of Spielberg's 'Amistad'
December 8, 1997
Spielberg
Web posted at: 4:16 p.m. EST (2116 GMT)LOS ANGELES (CNN) -- A federal judge refused Monday to block the release of "Amistad," Steven Spielberg's film about a slave ship uprising.
Author Barbara Chase-Riboud sued the studio for $10 million, asking the court to block the film's release claiming the studio had plagiarized her book "Echo of Lions."
The allegations challenge the reputation of Hollywood's best-known director over a movie Spielberg calls "perhaps the most important of my career." In turn, DreamWorks studio is attacking the integrity of the award-winning novelist who filed the lawsuit.
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The dispute has turned increasingly personal and vitriolic.
"What an irony that the renowned filmmaker who produced and directed 'The Color Purple' would be a party to denying a prominent black American of letters and the arts her rightful recognition for raising public consciousness about slavery," Chase-Riboud's attorneys said in court papers.
The film will premier Monday night in Los Angeles, open in Los Angeles and New York on Wednesday and go into national release Friday.
Scene from the movie "Amistad" Chase-Riboud claims DreamWorks based much of "Amistad" on her 1989 book "Echo of Lions" without her permission. Both book and movie chronicle a real-life 1839 slave ship rebellion led by a Sierra Leone slave named Joseph Cinque and the resulting landmark legal case, argued by John Quincy Adams before the Supreme Court.
While no one can copyright history, Chase-Riboud maintains DreamWorks illegally copied "themes, dialogue, characters, relationships, plots, scenes and fictional inventions" she created for "Echo of Lions."
DreamWorks insists its movie is an original blend of history and the book "Black Mutiny," first published 36 years before "Echo of Lions" and whose rights are now owned by DreamWorks.
Actress-choreographer Debbie Allen, producer of "Amistad," said she began working on the film before "Echo of Lions'" publication.
The film's credited screenwriter, David Franzoni, swears he never read Chase-Riboud's book. John Shaeffer, a lawyer for Chase-Riboud, said Franzoni may be lying and wants to interrogate him in court. Shaeffer says newly discovered documents suggest Franzoni read "Echo of Lions" but not "Black Mutiny."
DreamWorks' lawyers say Chase-Riboud herself is a plagiarist, arguing there are at least 88 similarities between "Echo of Lions" and "Black Mutiny." DreamWorks attorneys also have circulated a passage from Chase-Riboud's 1994 book "The President's Daughter" that appears almost verbatim in Nella Larsen's 1929 book "Passing."
The attorneys also say Chase-Riboud is using the movie's imminent opening to pressure DreamWorks into a $5 million settlement. The fledgling studio, which released its first movie, "The Peacemaker," in September, says it has invested $70 million producing and marketing "Amistad."
Chase-Riboud said she did not plagiarize "Black Mutiny" and that any similarities are merely historical facts. Shaeffer said the allegedly plagiarized "President's Daughter" passage "looks like it came from a historical source."
"No one likes to be called a thief," said Bert Fields, a lawyer for DreamWorks. "This is a very important film for Steven. He has African American kids he has adopted."
In court papers, Spielberg said, "For (the movie's) exhibition to be stopped would, of course, be a tragedy for our company, but I believe it would also be a serious loss to the American public."
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
Related sites:
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- The Internet Movie Database (IMDb) - A database of more than 120,000 movies
- Amistad - The Film (official)
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