Wednesday, August 27, 2008

Hari Puttar and the Copyright Lawyers of Covent Garden



In the department of you can't make this stuff up, envision if you will the upcoming Bollywood satire of Harry Potter, as implied by this squib from yesterday's times:

ARTS, BRIEFLY
Warner Brothers Sues Over Indian Film
NY Times, August 25, 2008

Warner Brothers has filed a lawsuit over an Indian film whose title it says is too similar to that of the Harry Potter series, The Guardian of London reported. The studio is suing Mirchi Movies over “Hari Puttar: A Comedy of Terrors,” which is scheduled to be released Sept. 12. The film, which does not appear to be based on the J. K. Rowling books that form the basis of the Warner series, is about a 10-year-old boy who moves to Britain and becomes involved in a series of adventures. Munish Purii, the chief operating officer of Mirchi Movies, said: “We registered the Hari Puttar title in 2005, and it’s unfortunate that Warner has chosen to file a case so close to our film’s release. In my opinion, I don’t think our title has any similarity or links with Harry Potter.” A spokeswoman for Warner Brothers said it would not comment on litigation. An Indian court was to hear the case on Monday.

Based on the official website, a more accurate pitch would be "Hindu Harry Potter does Home Alone at a Defense Ministry War-on-Terror Hogwarts." The dance numbers on that one are going to freaking rock.

Not that anything will ever match the wonder of Koi Mil Gaya, pitched as "Forrest Gump meets Close Encounters of the Third Kind and E.T. (with a healthy does of Flowers for Algernon) in Bollywood." Complete with a dance number involving little aliens who are, yes, Krishna blue.

Check it out and see if this isn't enough to make Dick Cheney want to play with pink unicorns:

1 comment:

Dave Hardy said...

Forrest Gump meets ET? Dancing Bolywood aliens?

Why doesn't Holywood make movies like that?