New York Times claims that the legal battles going on between Fox and Warner Bros. over the release of Watchmen are getting extremely sticky.
Fox has said it will seek an injunction blocking Warner's planned release of the film next March. Warner has argued that Fox should not be allowed to stop the movie, after standing by while Warner and its partners on the film, Paramount Pictures and Legendary Pictures, spent more than $100 million on the production, directed by Zack Snyder (300).
In a summary of its position in Friday's report, Warner said Fox "sat silently" as one of the producers of Watchmen, Lawrence Gordon, took the project "to studio after studio with Fox's express knowledge."
Fox, which filed a lawsuit in February, has claimed in its own filings that Mr. Gordon did not keep the studio apprised of his plans, as required by a 1994 agreement. That deal granted Mr. Gordon rights to Watchmen in "turnaround" - an industry term for arrangements under which producers can move a project from one studio to another under certain conditions.
In Warner's version of events, Mr. Gordon, who is not named as a defendant in the Fox suit, actually offered the project to Fox in 2005, shortly before bringing it to Warner after years of trying to make the movie with Paramount. "Fox simply rejected it," Warner said in the Friday filing.
As of now, Watchmen is still scheduled to be released on March 6th, 2009.
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