Posted on 12/09/2004 10:41:31 PM PST by PetroniusMaximus
Monday, October 4th 2004 ended a six-year dispute involving Sophia Stewart, the Wachowski Brothers, Joel Silver and Warner Brothers. Stewart's allegations, involving copyright infringement and racketeering, were received and acknowledged by the Central District of California, Judge Margaret Morrow residing.
Stewart, a New Yorker who has resided in Salt Lake City for the past five years, will recover damages from the films, The Matrix I, II and III, as well as The Terminator and its sequels. She will soon receive one of the biggest payoffs in the history of Hollywood, as the gross receipts of both films and their sequels total over 2.5 billion dollars.
Stewart filed her case in 1999, after viewing the Matrix, which she felt had been based on her manuscript, "The Third Eye," copyrighted in 1981. In the mid-eighties Stewart had submitted her manuscript to an ad placed by the Wachowski Brothers, requesting new sci-fi works.
According to court documentation, an FBI investigation discovered that more than thirty minutes had been edited from the original film, in attempt to avoid penalties for copyright infringement. The investigation also stated that "credible witnesses employed at Warner Brothers came forward, claiming that the executives and lawyers had full knowledge that the work in question did not belong to the Wachowski Brothers." These witnesses claimed to have seen Stewart's original work and that it had been "often used during preparation of the motion pictures." The defendants tried, on several occasions, to have Stewart's case dismissed, without success.
Stewart has confronted skepticism on all sides, much of which comes from Matrix fans, who are strangely loyal to the Wachowski Brothers. One on-line forum, entitled Matrix Explained has an entire section devoted to Stewart. Some who have researched her history and writings are open to her story. Others are suspicious and mocking. "It doesn't bother me," said Stewart in a phone interview last week, "I always knew what was true."
Some fans, are unaware of the case or they question its legitimacy, due to the fact that it has received little to no media coverage. Though the case was not made public until October of 2003, Stewart has her own explanation, as quoted at daghettotymz.com:
"The reason you have not seen any of this in the media is because Warner Brothers parent company is AOL-Time Warner... this GIANT owns 95 percent of the media... let me give you a clue as to what they own in the media business... New York Times papers/magazines, LA Times papers/magazines, People Magazine, CNN news, Extra, Celebrity Justice, Entertainment Tonight, HBO, New Line Cinema, Dreamworks, Newsweek, Village Roadshow... many, many more!... They are not going to report on themselves. They have been surpressing my case for years..."
Fans who have taken Stewart's allegations seriously, have found eerie mythological parallels, which seem significant in a case that revolves around the highly metaphorical and symbolic Matrix series. Sophia, the greek goddess of wisdom has been referenced many times in speculation about Stewart. In one book about the Goddess Sophia, it reads, "The black goddess is the mistress of web creation spun in her divine matrix."
Although there have been outside implications as to racial injustice (Stewart is African American), she does not feel that this is the case. "This is all about the Benjamins," said Stewart. "It's not about money with me. It's about justice."
Stewart's future plans involve a record label, entitled Popsilk Records, and a motion picture production company, All Eyez On Me, in reference to God. "I wrote The Third Eye to wake people up, to remind them why God put them here. There's more to life than money," said Stewart. "My whole message to the world is about God and good and about choice, about spirituality prevailing over 'technocracy'."
If Stewart represents spirituality, then she truly has prevailed over the "technocracy" represented in both the Terminator and the Matrix, and now, ironically, by their supposed creators.
Stewart is currently having discussions with CBS about a possible exclusive story and has several media engagements in the near future to nationally publicize her victory.
Where's the evidence? Nowhere in the article whatsoever?
The lady's website is here
http://daghettotymz.com/matrix/matrix.html
(sould like a slightly strange person)
They are part of the matrix... ENDTHEMATRIX
Interesting - I remember reading about this lady some years ago. This story doesn't go into much detail, but I do remember thinking at the time that she might seriously have had a case - I can't remember what the details were that caused me to think that, but I do remember thinking that...
The story is not about evidence, the case was. The story was about the results of the case.
She won the cast and stands to pick up a large part of 2.5 billion dollars
"..allegations, involving copyright infringement and racketeering, were received and acknowledged by the Central District of California, Judge Margaret Morrow residing."
So how does The Terminator fit into all this?
And if Warner Brothers' lawyers knew who originally worte the works knew referenced it during filming, it tells me such things must happen infrequently and somehow studios get away with it.
What the article doesn't detail is how the Wachowski Brothers defrauded her. Did they just sit on her work and figure that a "statute of limitations" had passed?
Personally, If it were me and I had finally won back all that money, I'd be too jaded to turn around and spend it all on media ventures. But the best of luck to her!
There's 30 minutes missing from the original "Matrix?"
Wha?
The commonality between Terminator and Matrix is a dystopic future when
machines created by man become too smart for us and turn on humanity.
But...but...Stephen King (writing as Richard Bachman) did the same thing-- with 18 wheelers! :-D
Next time read the whole story. Obviously she had the documentation she won the case and the people involved in making the movie knew of her prior work. Do you guys work for ViaCom????
Actually, there was a film in the early 70s called Colossus: The Forbin Project that presaged them all.
Interesting.
They left that out of the "printer-unfriendly version"
It is done more frequently than most realize. One of the worse perps of this kind of purloin is The Walt Disney Company.
Re: Do you guys work for ViaCom????
No. They are part of the "matrix" too...UPN, MTV, VH1, Simon & Shuster, Paramount...(TV, Radio, dot-com, etc.)
http://www.ketupa.net/viacom1.htm
Then again the Wachowski Brothers are pretty anti-Reagan.
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