‘Moana’ copyright infringement case goes to jury

LOS ANGELES (CN) — A federal jury will decide whether animator Buck Woodall proved Walt Disney Co. stole its 2016 blockbuster "Moana" from a pitch he created years earlier for a movie about the mythical journey of teenage surfer on Hawaii.

Woodall and Disney each made their closing arguments Monday in downtown Los Angeles. For the plaintiff to win, jurors must decide he made his case first that the makers of "Moana" had access to copyrighted materials for his movie, "Bucky the Surfer Boy," and second that "Moana" is substantially similar to his treatments and script.

"How many coincidences are too many?" Gustavo Lage, Woodall's lawyer, asked the jury. "When does a coincidence stop being a coincidence? There's no 'Moana' without 'Bucky.'"

Lage, of Sanchez-Medina Gonzalez Quesada Gomez and Machado in Miami, went through a long list of similarities between the two movies, like the physical setting of Moana's island, which looks very much like Hanalei Bay on the Hawaiian island of Kauai where Bucky's story starts off; the use of shapeshifting and supernatural creatures in both stories; and the personified ocean who helps both Moana and Bucky on their respective journeys to save their communities.

"This isn't about money," Lage said. "This is about righting a wrong."

Woodall waited too long before he filed his lawsuit in 2020, and most of his claims were barred by the statute of limitations. The only ones to make it to trial where those against Disney's Buena Vista Home Entertainment division, which distributes DVD and Blu-Ray discs of "Moana." His potential damages award is no more than $10 million. However, Woodall in January filed a new lawsuit, seeking $10 billion in damages over "Moana 2," Disney's 2024 sequel.

Moez Kaba, Disney's attorney of the Los Angeles firm Hueston Hennigan, said in closing that Woodall failed to make it across the first hurdle: proving that Walt Disney Animation Studios and "Moana" creators John Musker and Ron Clements had even heard of Woodall and his story, let alone had access to it.

In the millions of emails and other documents Disney turned over to the plaintiff, Kaba argued, Woodall and "Bucky" were never mentioned as Disney's writers cobbled together the story of "Moana."

Jenny Marchick, the stepsister of Woodall's brother's wife, testified that she met with Woodall as a favor to her sister and brother-in-law sometime in 2004 while she worked as an assistant at Mandeville Films on the Disney Studio lot in Burbank, California.

According to Marchick, she made a call to the Disney animation studio only to find out they didn't take outside pitches, and she helped Woodall meet with an unidentified assistant at Disney TV animation who had no interest in his project.

Marchick didn't hear from Woodall again for years, until late 2011 when she was working at Sony Pictures. He sent her a full-length screenplay for his "Bucky" movie. At that point she told him she wasn't interested in the story; she testified that she thought it was simplistic and juvenile.

Disney's attorney also recounted in his closing argument that Woodall had forged Marchick's name on a non-disclosure agreement that had been signed by someone else and put a 2003 date on it. He filed the forged document in court and only confessed to his forgery after Disney determined it was signed by a Hawaiian teenager who had done some modeling for Woodall.

As for the substantial similarities between "Bucky" and "Moana," Kaba said the purported original elements from Woodall's work can be found in numerous Disney animated movies that preceded "Moana," including previous works by Musker and Clements like "The Little Mermaid," "Aladdin" and "Hercules."

Moreover, Kaba said, Woodall, a native of New Mexico, doesn't have a monopoly on themes and mythological creatures from Hawaiian and Polynesian culture — such as the volcano goddess Pele — that he claims Musker and Clemens stole from him.

"'Moana' is inspired by the Polynesian people," Kaba said. "It's not Buck Woodall's story — it's Ron and John's story. It's their love letter to Polynesia."

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