..Gary Dretzka
..Noah Forrest
..Leonard Klady
..R.J. Matson
..David Poland
..Douglas Pratt
..Ray Pride
..Michael Wilmington

Ahoy! Matey, There’s Gold in Them Thar Nets

For the film adaptation of Pierre Schoendoerffer’s Farewell to the King, filmmaker John Milius spent months scouting remote areas of Southeast Asia for an appropriate location to capture the madness of war. Eventually, he selected an area deep in the jungles of Borneo. According to Milius, the arduous trek to the site involved first flying to Jakarta, then a charter to Borneo and a five-hour trip up river on barges and boats to the location. When he arrived to begin filming in the spring of 1988, what he noticed in the middle of camp was a large satellite dish, a screen and chairs -  a sort of mini movie theater some thousand miles from civilization.

That night, after the cast and crew settled into their makeshift living quarters, the local liaison provided the first evenings entertainment - a screening of Rambo III. It was an ironic choice considering the subject and attitude of the film about to go before the cameras. It was also being seen some six weeks before it would make its theatrical debut in the United States.

A lot of ink has been spilled recently on the subject of piracy as it affects several sectors of the entertainment industry. As the Milius anecdote indicates, it is not a new phenomenon. Various estimates have been made but of late conservatively about $3 billion annually that should be funneling back to the American film industry goes astray. The good news, so to speak, is that it translates to about 8% of revenues generated from U.S. movies globally, a fairly consistent percentage of annual lost revenue for at least 30 years.

So, why the sudden spotlight on a decades old factor that’s historically induced yawns.

Well, consider these three things: Look what theft has done to the music industry; consider how radically improved the bootlegs have become; and grapple with the fact that most people don’t consider obtaining purloined copies of films, regardless of quality, to be a crime.

For the Motion Picture Association of America, stalking and stopping the film thieves has been its top priority for as long as I can remember. It’s fair to say that the trade association has been diligent about containing the problem. However, despite its best efforts including the hiring of a top FBI specialist, illegal activities have managed to keep pace with the overall economic growth in the sector. Certainly, the sometimes half-hearted support of international agencies and governments hasn’t made the task any easier.

But here’s what must be understood. Illegally obtaining and distributing American movies is big business. In order to generate billions of dollars year after year, an organized, criminal group or groups has to be at the helm of this pirate ship. The hackers spending hours on the Internet to download a current film release are amateurs who truly represent the tip of the iceberg in this area. However, they are great end users.

The industry’s recent dog and pony show to curb illegally obtained copies of the likes of X2 and The Matrix Reloaded has been about as convincing as shock and awe. High profile advance press and recruited screenings have included metal detectors and night vision goggles to ferret out suspicious types with concealed camcorders. Now assuming these methods were effective, what can be concluded from the fact that equipment capable of taping off the screen was not found prior to or during any of these projections, yet before each of the film’s commercial releases, one could find copies of varying degrees of fidelity in Bangkok, Moscow and Bogotá.

True believers might assert that the felons snuck in with camcorders that fit into ballpoint pens or the frames of glasses. It’s the sort of scenario Hollywood movies love to concoct. The more obvious conclusion is that advance screenings are not the primary source from which these dubs are derived. Some eager young geek might indeed sneak his camcorder into a theater during a preview and delight his friends with a just barely visible version of an upcoming blockbuster that his buddies will still stand on line for hours to see at the multiplex.

The dirty little secret about film piracy is that it exists, in part, because the industry looks the other way at convenient moments. It is not policy, it is not encouraged but it exists from within and rumors have circulated from time to time that high level executives were receiving sizeable kickbacks for their complicity.

If one is “connected,” virtually any upcoming movie is available through legitimate or semi-legitimate means. Videocassette screeners circulate for consideration at film festivals or to talent agencies as calling cards and those on the Bel-Air screening circuit are delivered pristine 35mm prints of new and forthcoming films on the weekend. I’m not implying that these pathways are littered with larceny but that expression about the effect of one rotten apple comes to mind.

About a decade back I attended a dinner at the Seattle Film Festival and among my tablemates was Samuel Jackson. During the course of the repast he told an amusing personal story about how he had gone to Miramax in New York to get a clip from his as yet unreleased film Fresh to include in his demo reel. The person in charge of that area regrettably informed him that the company had yet to make clips from the movie. Jackson said that he proceeded uptown to 110^th Street and returned to Miramax that afternoon with a copy of the film, telling the person that he felt so bad about the situation he just had to help out.

The tape of Fresh was likely not close to commercial quality and in North America or Western Europe the allure of securing an advance copy of a hot film is just in having it. In parts of Asia or countries with strict film quotas, it might be the only way to see certain films. There are tapes for the desperate that are made by shooting at a regular movie theater screening. However, more commonly criminals trafficking in this area find a way to get to the source. It only takes a couple of hours to make a duplicate from a print that might be sitting around a lab or on its way from Culver City to Burbank for a screening.

From time to time the MPAA issues a statement about smashing a smuggling cartel or working with another country to stem the flow of illegally manufactured movies. What’s changed and has the association anxious is the fear that what happened to the music industry could similarly occur with movies now that they can be digitally codified and transferred at the speed of light via the Internet.

In the past three years, sales of top music CDs have declined somewhere between 20% and 30%. Now the technology and time to download music is much easier and quicker than for a feature-length motion picture. That the ability to obtain movies on the web faster and of better quality will steadily improve is a given. So, the MPAA has to be concerned that there’s a generation out there that is able to do this with great facility and see nothing wrong with copying from the net.

To understand why particularly American attitudes have changed about white collar and so-called victimless theft is too complex to contain in a column. However, a history of payola and the gross advantage taking of such artists as John Foggerty and Peggy Lee by the record labels has done little to endear its faceless senior management to the public. Historically, musical artists have been cheated of their fair share of record revenues and lived and died on hits that allowed them to command top dollar on tour. And when a top recording artists commands $75 or more a ticket, fans do not consider them charity cases.

Similarly, in the film industry, decades of top stars charging the majors with short payment accountings and the Buchwald-Bernheim vs. Paramount trial have provided studio executives with a black eye. Couple that with chronicles of $20 million fees for people named Tom, Jim and Julia and the notion of the movie business in a state of financial crisis doesn’t seem credible to civilians. They feel emboldened, even justified, in swiping, by whatever means, new movies and foregoing the $15 per person cost of a ticket and visit to the concession stand.

The situation today between Joe or Jane and a movie star recalls what happened to baseball (and other sports) according to Ken Burns. Somewhere toward the end of his mini-series, Burns observed that the game changed when its players began to command super-sized salaries. The connection between the ball player and the fan eroded once the former started to be paid more than seven times the wages of an average American. Our icons were getting more money a season than most would earn in a lifetime. They were pampered, spoiled and disconnected from the rigors of daily life. The manifestation of that situation was declining attendance and a shift from the national pastime to a national pastime.

There’s an engrained American perspective that wants to believe its heroes and idols would be great company at the backyard barbeque. I’d love to know what an Entertainment Weekly poll would generate to a question like: Which American celebrity or public figure would be most comfortable at your summer hamburger and weenie roast?

Not to sound too schoolmarmish, but I’m a believer that an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. What that entails is some sort of educational process that doesn’t come off as merely self serving and not the sort of sacrificial lamb act in which some poor slob user is dragged through the courts because he’s easier to charge than the more elusively shrewd supplier. That tact simply underlines the well-deserved reputation big business has earned for being rapacious, cold hearted and ruthless. It’s the very thing that turned Robin Hood, Jesse James and John Dillinger among many others into romantic folk heroes though their true natures were considerably less altruistic.

It would probably be a wise step to eliminate the word piracy or film pirate from the vocabulary of cultural theft. Pirates are handsome, swashbuckling heroes that help the oppressed and rescue damsels in distress. Similarly, bandits and outlaws conjure up romantic thoughts. Perhaps the criminals behind stealing film elements to illegally make and distribute copies are “terrorists.” It’s difficult to find a word that is the embodiment of evil; whose very sound is repulsive and discordant to the human ear. Film Fascist? Cultural Rapist? Cinematic Pedophile?

The prospect of a nation or universe so repelled by the breaking of the law that it would shut the door on theft exists possibly only in the Twilight Zone and probably not even there. People love the prospect of getting something for free whether it’s a toaster for opening a bank account or the complete oeuvre of Oliver Stone downloaded from a file-sharing site. All the MPAA has to get across is that the latter is against the law, hurts people financially and is bad for the soul. And for its next trick it will make an elephant disappear.

- by Leonard Klady