Kurosawa films and copyright suit

[Mark Nornes]

Toho is suing the DVD distributor that put out those cheap Kurosawa  
DVDs to the tune of $1.2 mil. We have been following this controversy  
a bit on KineJapan, so I thought I'd post this.

I find this pretty perplexing. The argument as it's described in the  
press is that the films fall under the pre-1971 laws, which extend  
protection 38 years beyond the death of the "author" (2038 in  
Kurosawa's case). The distributor has been operating under the  
post-1971 law, which pegs open season at 50 years after release;  
they've put out Kurosawa's first 8 films. Tokyo District Court took  
Toho's side, and the distributor is appealing. But Toho is going ahead  
with a suit.

So what I don't get is how this is actually in the studio's interest.  
They have historically resisted treating directors as authors, right?  
On the face of it, this appears to be a gambit to extend copyright as  
far out as possible. But at the same time, it would seem to expose  
them to demands for profits from directors, either from the past or in  
contracts from here on out.

Does anyone understand the logic here?

Markus
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