MovieCrow's Verdict on Thaandavam Script Issue

PUBLISHED DATE : 04/Oct/2012

MovieCrow's Verdict on Thaandavam Script Issue

Final Editorial Opinion on Thaandavam Script Issue


At this point, we have extensively covered this topic and we would like to give it a closure based on facts and evidences collected from both sides. As the saying goes "There is always 3 sides to every story. Your side, their side and the Truth". We will try our best to present the elusive third side in this article.

 

Also Read, Chronological presentation of Thaandavam Issue - Is Thaandavam Script Copied?

 

On Legal grounds, Ponnusamy's side of the story is WEAK


  • First and foremost, Ponnusamy's script "Vikramadityan" has NOT been registered at South India Writer's association until now. This substantially weakens the copyright claim by the assistant director (caveat:In order to register the script, it costs Rs.50,000 to even join the writer's association. This is a different topic for another day)
  • International Copyright laws are intentionally very relaxed to encourage creativity by allowing for adaptations and inspirations. If these copyright laws happen to be strictly enforced, even Shakespeare would fail the copyright tests as many of his classic writings were based on greek-roman and British mythologies as noted by the court. So, the resemblance between "Thaandavam" and "Vikramadityan" fail the test conditions for copyright violation.
  • Ponnusamy in his synopsis emails and script had not mentioned "Echolocation" and the concept of blind man taking revenge is not entirely unique either. Since, popular Hollywood movies such as "Daredevil" and many more documentary movies have explored the concept of echolocation in the past. Conceptually speaking, Thaandavam has more similarities to "Daredevil" than Ponnusamy's "Vikramadityan"
  • It is common to see a flood of copyright complaints for big movies filed in the court as we have seen in the past for Enthiran, Dasavatharam and recently with Ek Thaa Tiger. In movie making, execution and visualization matters more than the script similarities on paper. So, court has large number of cases as precedence to refer in this copyright topic and the decisions have almost always gone against the petitioner.

 

On Moral grounds, UTV, AL Vijay and Vikram side of the story is WEAK


  • The foundation of Ponnusamy's script is now dead in the water and cannot be commercialized anymore since Thaandavam has already given life to this concept. Apart from conceptual similarities, there are also certain noticeable character resemblances in Lakshmi Rai's character, Santhanam's as taxi driver, look-alike named Kenny, another visually disabled person training the protagonist. These similarities are hard to ignore as just coincidence or parallel thinking.
  • First written proof produced in the court from UTV side showing Vikram's role as blind man was on August 17, 2011 when AL Vijay contacted Daniel Kish. However, Ponnusamy had narrated his avenging blind man script to UTV Consultant Ramya on July 5, 2011 and had submitted the bound script to UTV on August 4th. Thaandavam team claims that Vikram, AL Vijay, Dhananjayan and Nirav Shah had discussed the blind hero script even before Ponnusamy interacted with UTV on July 5th. But, no written proof has been submitted in court to prove that the genesis of this blind man script in AL Vijay's mind was before Ponnusamy's interaction with UTV.

 

Giving the benefit of doubt, there are chances that AL Vijay may have narrated the echolocation based script to Vikram and Nirav Shah on March 5th 2011, well before Ponnusamy came into picture. Unfortunately, conclusive written evidences do not exist to prove this in favour of Thaandavam team.

 

Our Conclusion


Legally, this is a straight forward case and believe the court verdict do justice to this case. But, one may argue that the real issue of this matter is a moral question to be answered from deep down -- Only Vikram, AL Vijay, Dhananjayan and Nirav Shah would know the real truth. We will have to leave it at that!

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