Bibliofemme News
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24/02/2004
French author sues Disney
A French children's book author told a Paris court yesterday that the main fish character in the Disney film Finding Nemo, which has so far grossed $850m (£457m), was a direct copy of his own creation, a cheerful orange and white clown fish named Pierrot.
Franck Le Calvez is suing Disney and animation studios Pixar for copyright infringement and breach of trademark. He has applied for all books and merchandise featuring Nemo to be banned from French shops before the main copyright case is heard in November.
A ruling on the injunction is expected on March 12.
The author, a marine biology enthusiast, argued during the seven-hour hearing that he had registered his character and story - which, like Nemo, features a young fish separated from his family - with the French authors' copyright association in 1995.
Lawyers for Le Calvez said the first 30,000 copies of Pierrot the Clown Fish, published in November 2002, had sold out. But a second edition in October last year sold few copies
But Disney's lawyers said Walt Disney Productions and Pixar came up with Nemo independently, and registered their copyright as early as 2000.
A lawyer for Hachette, which publishes the Nemo books in France, said the firm stood to lose €700,000 (£472,000) between now and November.
Disney's lawyers also alleged that Le Calvez and his publishers were guilty of an underhand "judicial manoeuvre" when they logged an illustration of Pierrot as a trademark in February 2003.
Charges of trademark infringement were unfounded because Nemo's likeness could not be considered a brand in its own right, they argued. Disney's counsel, Magali Thorne, said: "It's orange. It has three white stripes ... Everything is already there in nature."
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