Are Auteurs Really All That Special?
Jordan S. Hatcher Ever since 1954, when film critic Francois Truffaut “asserted that the worst of Jean Renoir’s movies would always be more interesting than the best of Jean Delannoy’s,” the director has come to be seen as the auteur of the films she directs. This idea, while fine for film critics, has unnecessarily crept into the law. Directors currently enjoy a unique status under UK law due in part to the idea that they are the sole creative auteur of a film. This article questions this special status and suggests some changes within the framework of existing EU directives...
“For Limited Times”: The Supreme Court Finds the Copyright Term Extension Act Constitutional in Eldred v. Ashcroft, but When Does It End?
Sue Ann Mota In 1993 a European Union directive extended the copyright term to the author’s life plus seventy years. The United States followed suit in 1998 with the Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act, which, like the E.U. directive, extended the copyright term for an individual’s works by twenty years, resulting in a term of the author’s life plus seventy years. It also extended the term for anonymous, pseudonymous, or works made for hire by twenty years, resulting in a term of ninety-five years from publication or 120 years from creation, whichever comes first. The CTEA also applied retroactively,...