The Court of Appeal has confirmed that there is no copyright in a particular style or technique of film making.
The decision concerns a copyright infringement action brought by Mehdi Norowzian against Guinness and its advertising agency. Mr Norowzian directed a short film called “Joy” featuring a man performing a quirky dance to music. Influenced by “Joy”, Guinness produced a commercial with a dancing man which featured strikingly similar filming and editing styles and techniques.
Although the two films shared certain stylistic features such as jump-cut editing, the Court held that the subject matter had not been substantially or wholly copied.
Using the analogy of the painting technique known as Pointillism, Lord Justice Nourse explained:
“If on seeing La Baignade, Asnières at the Salon des Artistes Indépendants in 1884, another artist had used precisely the same technique in painting a scene in Provence, Seurat would have been unable, by the canons of English copyright law, to maintain an action against him”.
The decision also confirmed that a film can be a dramatic work for copyright purposes. A dramatic work was defined as “a work of action with or without words or music which is capable of being performed before an audience”. “Joy” was, according to the Court, a dramatic work but the Guinness commercial did not copy a substantial part of “Joy”.
The decision means that the style and technique of a work are not protected by the monopoly conferred by copyright. Film makers and other artists may therefore freely share or copy styles or techniques without infringing copyright.