Media Law: A User’s Guide for Film and Programme Makers

From concept to distribution, those involved in film and programme making come into contact with many legal topics. Copyright, moral rights, contract law, libel and slander, employment law, tax law, obscenity and indecency laws, contempt of court and even Official Secrets Act are many perplexing areas of the law that need to be understood and dealt with during the completion of a project. This User’s Guide sets these difficult areas of the law in context and tackles them in practice to acquaint film and programme makers with useful, practical insight into potential problem areas. In accessible non-legal language the book takes a logical approach through a deal-acquiring rights in literary and other material, developing and adapting that material to production stage, raising finance for development and production, concluding agreements with financiers, contracting cast and crew, securing locations, obtaining insurance and exploiting the finished production. It also includes an advisory section on setting up and running a company.