Ray Bradbury: "Michael Moore is an A*"

http://blogs.salon.com/0001561/2004/06/02.html#a5394

Michael Moore stole the title to his fictuous documentary "Fahrenheit 9/11" from author Ray Bradbury (picture), who in 1953 wrote his dystopic scifi classic "Fahrenheit 451." So what does Ray Bradbury, now 84 years old, think about Moore using his book title for his Bush-bashing movie project?

The answer is, as journalists in the Swedish daily Dagens Nyheter found out when they called the author, that he is mighty pissed off. Here's my translation of the juicier bits of the interview.:

"Michael Moore is a screwed A*, that is what I think about that case. He stole my title and changed the numbers without ever asking me for permission.

Have you spoken to him?

- He is a horrible human being. Horrible human!

That Ray Bradbury thought Moore could take his Palme d'Or from Cannes and stuff it was extremely clear, even if he never expressed himself with those words, when DN reached the author in his home in Los Angeles. [...]

Do you disagree with his opinions...

-That has nothing to do with it. He copied my title, that is what happened. That has nothing to do with my political opinions.

Bradbury said that he had tried to discuss the issue with Moore, but that the director avoided him.

- I called his publisher. They promised he would call me the same afternoon, but he didn't.

When was that?

- A few months ago, when his plans about the movie was first made known.

The conversation touched politics when Bradbury mentioned that Moore had ruined general Wesley Clark's chances to become the democrat's presidential candidate. Like several American commentators Bradbury means that Moore's support to Clark was a kiss of death when Clark did not distance himself from Moore's claim that Bush deserted from his military service.

- He slandered the president to general Clark, and Clark allowed him to do it. Clark should have said: "Don't say that. It is not true." That day Clark lost his chance to become president.

I understand. And you supported general Clark?

- No. I support honesty.

According to Bradbury others have asked him about Moore's use of his title, but "I don't want to make a big story out of it."

- I detest all paparazzi journalism that is so common these days. If I just could make him change his title silently, that would be the best thing.

Do you think that is possible, I mean the movie is very famous under that title now?

- Who cares? Nobody will see his movie, it is almost dead already. Nevermind, nobody cares.

But it won the Palme d'Or in Cannes?

- So what? I have won prizes in different places and they are mostly meaningless. The people there hate us, which is why they gave him the d'Or. It's a meaningless prize.

Ray Bradbury was very clear that he considered Moore a dishonest thief, but refused to answer if he would press charges in any way.

ATTENTION TO RAY BRADBURY: You do not own the fight to any word or phrase. Ok? You must not have payed attention to Al Franken's fight with Fox News. You are also senile in calling Moore a "bad, bad person", and calling him an "A*". Please fade into history before you make a bigger joke of yourself than your stupid book did!

PS I did read his book last year and it was horrible.

Actually I have been a huge fan of Bradbury's writings for most of my life. I might be able to side with him in regards to a possible copyright violation, but its rather sad to see him call Moore names.

Michael Moore knows he should have contacted Ray Bradbury. It is questionable about whether Bradbury could sue him but Moore should have done the honorable thing because the title is derived from his book and Moore acknowleges that.

It is possible that Moore thought Bradbury would say no.......sometimes it is better not to ask and say sorry rather than be told no.

Does using one word of a title infinge on a copyright?

No, probably not legally. But he did play on Bradbury's theme of books burning at Farenheit 451. I am not saying Bradbury needs to sue him, just that Moore should have taken it into account and called the old man.

Not sure if just using a single word or phrase alone could be grounds of a copyright violation, but rather the intent of using a specific phrase. In Moore's case he specifically picked the name of his movie based on the theme of "Fahrenheit 451." Bradbury could argue that Moore is profiting off the name and the theme of his book in regards to the reasonings behind adopting the name "Fahrenheit 911." Of course I am no lawyer, and don't know the ins & outs of copyright law, but I believe this is Bradbury's arguement.

Using the title of another published work is not copyright infringement. As an author, you do not own the copyright to the title of your work, only to the contents of your work. I'm a writer, I should know. When I chose the title for my novel Winterkill, I thought it was an original title. Well, Google it or do a search on Amazon, and you'll discover that there are other novels with the same title. One just came out about a year ago, after my book (mine has a 2002 copyright). So, even if Moore had called his movie Fahrenheit 451, this would still not be a copyright infringement, although logic would tell you there are some titles that ought not be repeated--Catch 22, Gone With the Wind, The World According to Garp . . . these titles are unique and well-known and would therefore arguably be titles another writer should stay away from. I suppose Bradbury's title falls under that category, but since Moore changed the number to 9/11, I think he's within his rights and is merely using Bradbury's title as a jumping-off point.

Bradbury should leave this one alone and be grateful for the free publicity he's getting. I sure would be. :rolleyes:

Ray Bradbury ripped off from enough of the classics in his time. He's probalbly mad that he may lose his tax cut if Bush isn't re-elected.

LOL, James. :P

Allright, since your a writer I'll take your word on it. :Y:

Thanks for taking my word on it, but I just thought of an even better example I can give you regarding copyright infringement and titles. How many songs can you think of that have the same title but are totally different? Here are just a few that came to my mind: "Crazy Love" (Poco and the Allman Bros.); "Best of My Love" (the Eagles and the Emotions); "Dream" (Allman Bros., Fleetwood Mac, and Van Halen); "The End" (the Doors and the Beatles). These, of course, are from my generation, but there have been scads of them over the years.

And again, as with books, while the title is not copyrightable, the content is. There have been court cases over the years of artists who've claimed that someone has stolen the basic melody of their song to write their own song. One case in point on that is Joe McDonald's "I Feel Like I'm Fixin' to Die Rag," (Country Joe and the Fish), a 1960s-era Vietnam War protest song that, if Bush is elected in November, we might need to resurrect, with a little tweaking, of course:

In any case, the daughter of famed jazz trombonist Kid Ory brought suit against Country Joe, saying his song used the melody from Ory's 1926 tune "Muskrat Ramble." The suit was found to be without merit.

Similarly, George Harrison's 1971 hit "My Sweet Lord" is said to be a plagiarism of the melody from the Chiffons' 1963 hit "He's So Fine." Harrison was found guilty of plagiarism of the melody and had to pay heavy damages.

To sum it all up: The content can (and should be) protected by copyright; the title cannot be.

PROPAGANDA

That's why he used that word in his movie's title. Pretty shameless, if you ask me.

Moore is an ass, btw. A BIG one. <_<

For the record, Bush was NOT elected in 2000. He was appointed by the felonious 5 and against the will of the people. I can't believe that I have to explain this in a forum for Al Gore supporters. Bradbury sure is clueless about Bush being A.W.O.L. I must agree that Moore is an A. He spent 2000 helping Nader siphon off crucial Al Gore votes with his lies which made it possible for Bush to be able to get close enough to steal the 2000 election in Florida. Now Moore is making millions off of the misery being caused by the stolen 2000 election. I think it's long overdue for Moore's blatant hypocrisy to finally be exposed.

Moore could at the very least have given a credit at the end of the movie to say the inspiration for his title Fahrenheit 911 came from Bradbury's book, Fahrenheit 451. He even used the same inspiration for his slogan. Bradbury's was, "Fahrenheit 451, the temperature at which books burn." Moore's was, "Fahrenheit 911, the temperature at which freedom burns." It is obvious he copied the intent, which would then in my book mean he could have done the gentlemanly thing (regardless of what Bradbury may have done in the past), and given credit for the inspiration. Also, I am not a big fan of Moore's either. While I think his movie hit the nail on the head about Bush and his Saudi sugar daddies, Moore was just on PBS with Charley Rose and was trashing Al Gore. He said Gore never called for a statewide recount in 2000, and that is a lie. He said it was a stupid mistake for Gore not to do that, and basically blamed what happened on Gore. I wrote him a letter about that lie to set him straight (which is in our forum and he never responded to), along with the article telling of how Gore asked for the statewide recount, but was turned down by the fascist Bushwhackers. I too can't believe how people who claim to know the election was stolen are always talking about RE-electing Bush. He was never really elected this time, and it is obvious that more people than Michael Moore need to be set straight on that account. Perhaps had Moore also admitted that one of the reasons Gore lost some votes was because Nader told Americans there was NO difference between Bush and Gore (which we also know is a blatant bald faced-lie), he would look more like he really cares about 2000 and is not just using it like some Democrats to get political mileage. This is too important an issue to just use it as a soundbyte.
Jan