watch L. Frank Baum's the Wonderful Wizard of Oz, proof-of-concept

[Keyser Sushi]

When I wrote Prather a fan letter in 1995 he had recently
moved from California to Sedona, AZ. I drove there in April
of 1999 to meet him and his wife. To my delight we became
friends and I visited twice a year until his wife died in 2004.
I only saw him twice after that. I did a screenplay adaptation
of one of his books and he loved it and asked me to do another
one. By that point the copyrights of most of his books had been
rewarded to him in a lawsuit so he sold the adaptation rights
to four of his book to me for $100 and a bottle of 12 year old
Scotch. I wish I had that in writing.

Good luck with your Oz project.

Oh man...Shell Scott movies, how amazing would that be...dunno who in the hell would play Shell, though.

How amazing that you got to know RSP and have a friendship with him...was he as funny and personable as his writing would seem to suggest? It sounds like maybe yes?

Edit: Thank you for the luck...miles to go before I sleep!

 

[Aspiring Mogul]

I wish you well - I would like to see a Wizard of Oz that's true to the novels.

That said, I thought, in film, a POC was a script, as opposed to a short. Rik, any thoughts on that?

 

[Jsthompson79]

Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow, 300, and Sin City were all shot in front of a greenscreen with almost all backgrounds and props computer generated. All three used proof of concept short films. In the case of Sin City, the short film was used as the prologue of the final film. From RtBot.net

 

[Keyser Sushi]

I wish you well - I would like to see a Wizard of Oz that's true to the novels.

That said, I thought, in film, a POC was a script, as opposed to a short. Rik, any thoughts on that?

A script we have...I wrote that a long time ago. My concern was that even if I could somehow sell it, I'd have no control and it would be butchered into something almost entirely unlike the book. When I met Clayton, my co-producer and the director of this strange cruise, it was clear that he had a vision not unlike my own, and we started trying to figure how to do this ourselves.

We've been fortunate to have found a lot of good people with tons of talent who want to help us out for one reason or another. Most of the vfx on the forest scene were handled by Drew More, who was part of the VFX team on Hunt for Gollum. Turns out he likes the book and wants this to happen as much as Clayton and I do...so most of what's onscreen there is the three of us pushing to make this thing real.

We figured having a sample that shows a CGI character, a puppet, our Dorothy, and the WWW as realized by our makeup effects man, would serve to show what this movie is going to be like when it's done -- in a way that the script alone, or even with some concept art, just can't. Our fundraiser planner wasn't even convinced, when we described it to her, that this footage was going to be enough. We'll see what she says when she's seen it...

 

[Keyser Sushi]

Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow, 300, and Sin City were all shot in front of a greenscreen with almost all backgrounds and props computer generated. All three used proof of concept short films. In the case of Sin City, the short film was used as the prologue of the final film. From RtBot.net

A perfect example...and in this case both scenes from this short are scenes from the film, so they represent not only the concept, but actual progress on the film as well.

 

[Aspiring Mogul]

What about copyright? As Rik has shown, you may not have the right even if you got the funding.

 

[Keyser Sushi]

What about copyright? As Rik has shown, you may not have the right even if you got the funding.

The copyright has long-since passed into public domain...the only thing you can't do is be like the MGM film...can't use their designs, their songs, or their script. And such was never our intent.

My script is registered with the WGA and we have the approval of LFB's great-grandson, Robert Baum.

 

[Aspiring Mogul]

OK, as I understand it, since the books have passed into the public domain, the film adaptations have also done the same, so Disney's rights have lapsed. That's my understanding, but I'm not an intellectual property lawyer.

 

[Keyser Sushi]

OK, as I understand it, since the books have passed into the public domain, the film adaptations have also done the same, so Disney's rights have lapsed. That's my understanding, but I'm not an intellectual property lawyer.

Disney did "Return to Oz" in a hurry before their rights went public, but they never owned the rights to Wonderful Wizard...those belonged to MGM, but those rights have since passed; Warner's owns the MGM film, but the rights are now public as there have been adaptations by other studios, as far back as the animated series in the 60's and as recently as John Boorman's failed CGI animated feature from a couple of years ago (his funding never fully materialized and the film looked rather dull).

All indications are that we're in the clear. Also, given that our stuff is all over YouTube and no WB lawyer-ninjas have slain us in our sleep (nor served us with cease-and-desist orders) I'd say we're okay. WB are notoriously hardcore about protecting their properties.