Cinema, television and theatre – Page 5

Last night, MGM movies showed the 1984 movie Teachers, about a lawyer who sued her high school for graduating an illiterate pupil. It starred JoBeth Williams as the lawyer; Nick Nolte as the idealistic but frustrated and jaded ageing hippie teacher; and Judd Hirsch as the pragmatic head teacher just trying to get through with the pupils he’s got (for a more recent, also iconic, role, see here (DaithÃ)). A fine supporting cast included Ralph Macchio (‘wax on, wax off‘) as the tough kid Nolte was trying to reach; Laura Dern as the kid Nolte helps to have an abortion after another teacher gets her pregnant; and Morgan Freeman (with an extraordinary hairstyle almost as much a member of the cast in its own right as Kevin Costner‘s in Robin Hood. Prince of Thieves) as the school’s lawyer. There is a perceptive review here. Among the many Hollywood-sardonicisms in the script, the large, underfunded high school is named for John F Kennedy; and the illiterate graduate (whom we never meet) is called John Calvin(!). The case settled (JoBeth Williams’ boss, William Hill (in the key scene, he is world-weary, wearing a waistcoat, and sitting behind a desk – for all the world as he would appear in TV’s Law & Order) did the deal, much against her wishes).…

Filibustering the Defamation Bill? Surely not?

23 March, 200724 September, 2008

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| Cinema, television and theatre, Defamation, Irish Law, Irish Society, Media and Communications, Politics

Filibuster: (noun) an action such as a prolonged speech that obstructs progress in a legislative assembly while not technically contravening the required procedures.

The word originates in words of piracy, such as the French ‘flibustier’, the Spanish ‘filibustero’ and the Dutch ‘vrijbuiter’, all etymologically equivalent to ‘freebooter’. The 1939 movie ‘Mr. Smith Goes to Washington‘, directed by Frank Capra (nominated for two oscars for this movie), stars Jimmy Stewart, in his patented role of a young naif, this time oscar-nominated as a newly elected Junior Senator Jefferson Smith. The climax of the movie is a filibuster staged by Mr Smith in the Senate so that there would be enough time to expose the corruption of his mentor, Senator Joseph Harrison Paine, played by the also oscar-nominated Claude Rains.

I have already commented on the slow progress of the Defamation Bill, 2006 (Department of Justice | Oireachtas (pdf)) and the number of red herrings in the debate, and concluded that it had become increasinlgy unlikely that the Bill would be enacted before the election. Now, from yesterday’s Order of Business in the Seanad (html | pdf to follow | Irish Times report (sub req’d)), a cynical explanation: a filibuster!…

Flying question for copyright lawyers

16 February, 200719 November, 2010

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| Cinema, television and theatre, Copyright, Fair use

This week’s newspapers bring us yet another Disney movie scenario of ‘plucky little community group’ being faced down by ‘horrible international conglomerate’. But this time, there is no happy ending for the little group; and the conglomerate are Disney themselves. As RuadhÃ¡n Mac Cormaic reports on the front page of Wednesday’s Irish Times (picked up by eircom.net, grand gesture, gcn.ie, queerty.com, mickeynews.com and thedisneyblog.com):

With only two days to go before its opening night, a play to be staged by a gay and lesbian students’ society at NUI Galway had to be pulled yesterday after organisers received notice from entertainment conglomerate Disney threatening legal action if the production went ahead.

It seems that the play was “loosely adapted” from the Disney film Sister Act, and that that Disney took the view that the production “would breach its intellectual property rights”. Presumably, this means that it would, in particular, infringe their copyright in the movie. My flying question is whether that is actually so? …

From the Contender to the Fall

26 January, 200716 April, 2009

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| Cinema, television and theatre, Irish Society

The Contender. It’s a rather good movie from 2000. It is on RTE1 television tonight. For all its manipulation of the viewers’ emotions, it manages to stay just short of sentimentality, and in so doing creates a parable for our times, not merely in the way in which the film-makers intended, but also in relation to an Irish political controversy that is now more than a year old but which raised significant issues of principle still relevant today.…

cearta.ie

Category: Cinema, television and theatre

“You can’t fire me; I’ve got tenure!”

Filibustering the Defamation Bill? Surely not?

Flying question for copyright lawyers

From the Contender to the Fall