legal questions shooting in another country
 

hi,

I'm planning a (low budget) documentary to be shot in a south american country, it will include reenactments, so apart from interviews release forms I must contract actors.

I was told that a release form to a company name is not valid if the company has no legal presence in the country. Doing the releases in my own name is not an option cause if the doc gets any money there is a nice probability of being sued for anything.

So may be release forms and contracts can be done through a local company, really it is very cheap to set it up so this is not a problem. And later transfer all the rights to another company out of the country in which I will make the doc with the filmed material .

there is something that must be added to a release form/actor contract to allow the rights to be transfered to another company? or simply the usual release forms are valid to be transfered?

I think it is important, also cause as soon as you want to sell a doc or film a bunch of lawyers will be studying all the papers looking for any legal weakness

thanks in advance
best regards

You summed it up right there in your last sentence - if you're concerned about a gaggle of lawyers going over the papers to ferret out any weaknesses, make sure YOU have a lawyer advising you from the very start who's drawn them up to make sure they don't HAVE any weaknesses for them to find. And while he's at it, maybe he can advise you on how you can structure your documentary so you get your point across without drawing the barrage of lawsuits you think will come your way from it. After all, while you might not have any assets you worry about them getting from you, those lawsuits could prevent anyone from ever seeing the results of your labours, making it pointless to even make the documentary in the first place. Does you no good to make it if the outcome of the suit is a court ordering you to destroy all copies of the production or barring its distribution.

thanks I'm consulting lawyers, but I would like to check the point of view of filmmakers who probably had to deal with this before,


regards