Tarantino abandons film, sues for a million after movie script is posted on Gawker
Top film maker Quentin Tarantino is suing online publisher Gawker Media and the website AnonFiles.com for more than $1 million for posting an unproduced screenplay and links to it, the Wall Street Journal reports.
Tarantino: Film is abandoned
The complaint, filed today in Los Angeles, accuses AnonFiles.com of copyright infringement and Gawker of contributory copyright infringement for, respectively, posting an online copy of of Tarantino’s script titled “The Hateful Eight” and directing readers to it.
The lawsuit follows a controversy last week when “The Hateful Eight” leaked online. In an interview with the entertainment website Deadline, Tarantino, known for movies such as “Django Unchained” and “Pulp Fiction,” said he was “very, very depressed” as a result of the development and would abandon plans to direct the Western as his next production.
The complaint says Tarantino’s representatives made repeated demands that AnonFiles.com take down the script and that Gawker take down links in an item titled “Here is the Leaked Quentin Tarantino Hateful Eight Script.” The script was removed from AnonFiles but then reappeared, according to the lawsuit, while Gawker did not remove links on its website.
“Gawker Media knowingly and actively acted as a promoter of copyright pirates, and, itself, did directly cause, contribute to, enable and facilitate copyright infringement,” the complaint alleges.
Gawker founder and publisher Nick Denton did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
A link to the script on AnonFiles.com no longer works, said the WSJ . An email to the website was not immediately returned.
AnonFiles.com is a website that allows people to upload and share files anonymously. A notice on the site says it “does not allow illegal content to be uploaded.”
The suit also names nine anonymous defendants allegedly involved in posting the script online, said the Journal.
In addition to at least $1 million of damages from defendants’ alleged profits, the lawsuit seeks "statutory, punitive and exemplary damages to be determined in court," as well as an injunction preventing them from posting or pointing readers to the “Hateful Eight” script.