Disney Succeeds in Overturning $600,000 ‘Beauty and the Beast’ Infringement Ruling
Last year, a federal jury ruled that Disney owed roughly $600,000 for its unlicensed use of Rearden LLC’s motion capture technology.
As a brief backstory, inventor Steve Perlman had been suing Disney over the company’s use of his MOVA Contour Reality Capture system for its live-action Beauty and the Beast.
According to Perlman, the technology was stolen by former Rearden employee Greg LaSalle, who then used MOVA at the VFX house Digital Domain.
Photo: Animation Magazine
Eventually, LaSalle sold a license for the technology to Digital Domain 3.0 (DD3), who in turn used it on multiple films, including Guardians of the Galaxy, Avengers: Age of Ultron, and Disney’s live-action remake of Beauty and the Beast.
How the Case Played out
After a messy court battle, Judge Jon Tigar ruled that Digital Domain had never properly owned the rights to the MOVA technology as LaSalle had acted fraudulently.
Rearden then sued Disney, arguing that the success of their live-action Beauty and the Beast was due, in large part, to the use of the infringed upon MOVA technology.
Photo: Disney
Disney argued that they could not know that DD3 had a fraudulent license to use the technology.
In response, Reardon said that Disney should have been aware that Digital Domain did not know the rights to the technology, arguing that they had worked with Disney directly on films including Tron: Legacy and The Avengers.
Photo: Animation Magazine
Eventually, a jury sided with Rearden and determined that Disney owed the company roughly $600,000 for using the pilfered technology in Beauty and the Beast. That brings us to today.
A Reversal
Judge Jon Tigar reversed the jury’s verdict today, ruling that Disney should not have been found liable for infringing on Rearden’s copyrights.
According to today’s ruling, Disney could not have known that Digital Domain 3.0 was missing Rearden’s software.
Photo: Disney
Neither Disney nor Rearden has responded to the latest developments in the case. Previously, however, the two sides settled similar allegations regarding Disney’s use of MOVA in Avengers: Age of Ultron, Deadpool, and Guardians of the Galaxy.
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