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Essay: An Introduction to Moral Rights: Understanding the Protection of Author’s Honor and Reputation

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Paste your essay in here…A General Introduction to Moral Rights

Moral rights have been recognized in the Berne Convention since the Rome Act. They are now protected under Article 6bis of the Paris Act under the following terms:

(1) Independently of the author's economic rights, and even after the transfer of the said rights, the author shall have the right to claim authorship of the work, and to object to any distortion, mutilation or other modification, or other derogatory action in relation to, the said work, which would be prejudicial to this honor or reputation.

The TRIPS agreement  expressly excludes moral rights from its scope. The WIPO Copyright Treaty maintains silence on the matter, however all the contracting parties are obliged to comply with Article 1-21 of the Berne Convention. An implied requirement to protect moral rights can also be found in UN Universal Declaration on Human Rights.

It has long been believed that author’s rights have a non-economic dimension. The relationship of authors to their works, whether they be writers, painters or composers, has been the main concern of the law. Works are seen as a manifestation of the author’s personality, popularly called his/her spiritual child. This child needs the protection from distortion, mutilation and claims of false paternity.

France became the first country to protect moral rights in a practical way. However it was done in a very loose and piecemeal fashion, and the court judgements not legislation were the main vehicle of law. It involved a wide interpretation of 1791 and 1793 decrees and in some particular instances Article 1382 of the Code Civil was also relied. On the other hand, in Germany the ideas of philosopher Immanuel kant were at work. As a result, a more comprehensive conception of moral rights emerged in legal writings but there was hardly any legislative or judicial support for it. Two distinct views emerged as to the nature of moral rights in Germany. One view saw moral rights as another aspect of author’s economic and patrimonial rights, while the other view thought of moral rights as distinct from economic rights yet falling under the umbrella term ‘author’s rights’. Despite these differences, there was a general consensus on the need of moral rights and as a result limited protection was provided under the German laws of 1870 and 1876.

By the time of Rome convention, many Berne Union countries had given protection to moral rights or was in the process of doing so. However there was no uniformity among them as to the nature and extent of these rights. Yet they were universally treated as inalienable and exercisable even after death of the author. The right of attribution, integrity and disclosure were the main rights protected.

However common law countries have not been very receptive of moral rights because of the functional approach they take towards author’s rights. The judicial and statutory development of moral rights in common law countries has been impaired by the philosophies of Freedom of contract and laissez faire. But it doesn’t mean that moral rights of author’s were entirely unprotected in these jurisdictions. The Fine Arts Copyright Act of 1862 in the UK provided protection against unauthorised alteration and distortion of artistic works  while the common law remedies of passing off and defamation secured patrimonial rights of authors. The common law right of first publication also to some extent secured the author’s divulgation right.

United Kingdom which is one of the original member of the Berne Union and signatory to the Rome Act failed to make Article 6bis a part of its copyright law for a very long time. It was generally believed that the obligations under Article 6bis were impliedly complied through the common law torts of passing off, injurious falsehood and defamation and to a limited extent by the law of contract.  It was in 1977 that the Whitford Committee made it clear that these indirect measures were not sufficient to comply with Article 6bis and as a result the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act of 1988 expressly provided for four categories of moral rights for the first time in UK’s copyright history which included- the right of paternity, integrity, protection against false attribution and privacy of certain photographs and films. The latter two rights do not strictly fall under continental definition of droit moral, as they do not concern the author of the work. Moreover in contrast to the droit d’ auteur approach, the 1988 Act allows authors to waive their moral rights by formal or informal waiver and authors are also required to assert their paternity .

EU HARMONISATION AND MORAL RIGHTS

The harmonisation process initiated at the EU level don’t presently cover moral rights. Though moral rights were included by the European Commission in its working programme in 1990, but it was believed that moral rights were not much of a concern as far as the integration of markets was concerned. The Commission reached the decision that the time was not ripe for an EU wide legislation in this domain. Article 9 of Term Directive  and recital 19 of the Information Society Directive  further confirms that presently moral rights are not effected by EU Directives. However, the European Court of Justice in its judgement had held that the protection of moral rights forms part of the fundamental scope of copyright protection and hence the moral rights protection must be considered when deciding the market integration issues under the FUE treaty.

Moral rights and cinematographic works

The droit moral doctrine is expressed and defined in general words and is universally applicable to all categories of work. However, there are two issues specific to the moral rights of makers of cinematographic works –

First, The nature of cinematographic works and the considerable alterations and modifications it may require in relation to both pre-existing works and contributions made in the course of making it, make this category of works a constant source of concern and dispute to film-makers as well as legal scholars. The question that arises is: To what extent moral rights restrict or allow making of these changes? There is no universal answer applicable to all countries in all situations. Instead specific provisions have been provided in national laws of member states which though allowing indispensable changes to be made for the completion and successful exploitation of the work, lays down obligations for the recognition of author’s contribution to the work.

All these issues were considered extensively in the preparatory work for the Stockholm conference. However after detailed discussion the Committee of Film Experts concluded that the issues involved were too detailed to be provided in an international convention and national legislation will be more suitable tool to deal with such matters. This matter was never taken up for discussion again and as a result cinematographic works receive no special treatment as far as moral rights as provided under Article 6bis of the convention are concerned.

Second, the philosophy and content of article 6bis ensure that moral rights will be protected at least for the life of the author by pegging moral rights with economic rights which are generally protected fifty years post mortem auctoris. But we should remember that the term of economic rights is not always calculated on the basis of life or death of the author but also from the date when either the work came in to existence or was made available to public.  The latter is the case for cinematographic works. Article 7(2) of the convention provides a term of fifty years from making available or making of the cinematographic works. Therefore there is a possibility that moral rights which are tied to economic rights may expire before the death of the maker of cinematographic work.

These issues are a serious impediment to the exploitation of cinematographic works. In comparison to other areas of copyright works, there is wide possibility of conflict not only between contributors and producers but also between authors of cinematographic works and authors of pre-existing or adapted works in regard to cinematographic works. The result has been that many European Countries have created special solutions to deal specifically with the moral rights claims of authors of cinematographic works organising, reducing and sometimes even denying moral rights protection to authors.

THE AUTHOR’S RIGHTS AND COPYRIGHT TRADITIONS

The author’s rights countries in giving protection to moral rights of authors rely on a limited number of legislative provisions while giving judiciary a broad discretion to provide and fashion details. As a result the nature and extent of moral rights in these countries to a large extent have been determined by judiciary through its judgements and opinions.

On the other hand, in copyright tradition countries such as United Kingdom and Ireland the tradition has been to formulate detailed provisions of law covering most of the potential issues. As a result the courts have to limit themselves to the statutory provisions before them in interpreting moral rights of authors.  Because of the different set of approaches taken by author’s rights and copyright tradition countries, an entirely different set of rules emerged. Therefore it will be more appropriate to deal with them separately.

The Author’s Rights Tradition

It is well known that author’s right countries such as France and Germany take a pro-author stance as regards moral rights. This overwhelming protection granted to authors has been a source of concern for foreign film producers. The Huston case by confirming that foreign authors of cinematographic works could claim protection in member states despite contractual agreements entered in the country of origin of work, further intensified the insecurities of producers of such works.

Who is the Author?

The droit d’auteur system regards both the economic and moral interests of the author as part and parcel of a single unified author’s right. As a consequence the same criteria are applicable to both moral rights and economic rights in determining the first author of the work. This leads to a long list of moral rights holders in cinematographic works.

In countries like France and Belgium the director, the author of the script, the author of adaptation, the author of music commissioned for inclusion in the work are all treated as co-authors and hold moral rights in the work. In Germany the list is limited to the director, the director of photography and the editor. While Greece has to some extent simplified the situation by regarding the director as the sole author and owner of moral rights.

Conflict among Authors

The multiplicity of authors naturally results in conflicts among co-authors. To resolve these conflicts the rules on joint authorship have been made equally applicable in relation to moral rights also. These rules try to ensure free exploitation of works by providing for example that any co-author may object to a particular treatment of the work but he may be required to call his co-authors in the proceedings and the consent of all co-authors to such treatment is mandatory.  Additionally, these rules require that each author must also consent to the divulgation of the work. This may create impediments for the exploitation of certain categories of work such as cinematographic works. To remedy the situation some countries for example France, Belgium and Spain have provided national courts with the power to authorise divulgation of the work in case of conflict. A special provision can also be found in the copyright laws of some author’s rights countries such as France, Belgium, Italy and Spain which ensures that an author who refused to complete or could not complete his contribution to the audio-visual work is not allowed to object to the use made of his incomplete contribution in the making of the audio-visual work.

PRODUCERS AND THE droit d’auteur TRADITION

In most of the author’s rights countries, the producers of cinematographic works don’t hold moral rights. However to protect producer’s interests and the investment made by them in the creation of the work, some countries such as Germany under Article 94 of the German Author’s Rights Act  and Austria under Article 38(2) of the Austrian Author Rights Act  provides the producers of cinematographic works with the right to object to any distortion or shortening of their work which may affect their legitimate interests. Luxembourg on the other hand, can be considered as one of the exceptional author’s rights countries which regards the producer as one of the co-author of the cinematographic work and holds all the moral rights in the work.

Now I will consider the specific moral rights given to authors of cinematographic works in author’s rights countries-

1. The right of Integrity

The moral rights provisions introduced by most of Author’s rights countries such as Belgium, Denmark and Finland were in identical or similar terms to article 6bis of the Berne convention. German and Spanish acts used slightly different language by requiring that prejudice has to be to ‘the legitimate intellectual or personal interest’. France and Greece designed the provision in more broad terms and don’t mention the condition that the infringing acts be prejudicial to the honour, reputation or legitimate interests of the author.

As a direct consequence of the broad terms used to define the scope of the right of integrity, French and Greek courts employ a subjective test to infringement and courts are precluded to substitute their own judgement to that of the author.  This approach has given a discretionary character to moral rights. Refence to ‘honour and reputation’ or ‘legitimate intellectual or personal interests’ in laws of other countries require a greater degree of judicial scrutiny and a sense of objectivity. However, despite the subjective approach of the French law where courts don’t concern themselves with the motivation of the author, the French courts have consistently held that the authors cannot be allowed to abuse their position and moral rights cannot be used as a pretext to fulfil monetary interests. Moreover, the claims raised with the sole purpose of harming the producer or co-authors of the cinematographic works are considered an abuse of the right.

When it comes to the application of moral rights in relation to cinematographic works, it has been generally observed that the Author’s right countries adapt and in most cases limit the horizon of these rights. Article L. 121-5 and L. 121-6 of the French intellectual property code  are the prime example. These provisions ensure that a claim by one co-author doesn’t restrict or hinder the exploitation of the entire work to the prejudice of other co-authors. The paternity and integrity rights can only be exercised over a complete version of the cinematographic work as provided under Article L.121-5. It obliges the co-authors to wait until the completion of the work before exercising their moral rights. However the co-authors have the right to agree or disagree as to the final version of the book. A final piece of work comes in to existence with the agreement between the producer and co-authors. Belgium and Spain establish a similar regime as to the one in French Code.

Germany on the other hand take a more straightforward approach towards limitations on the exercise of moral rights in relation to cinematographic works. The right to prohibit any distortion of the work that has the ability to harm just and reasonable interests in the work of the author has been provided under Article 14 of the German Author’s Rights Act. Article 93 however restricts this right to only gross distortions or other gross injuries to the work. While exercising this rights the co-author is obliged to take in to consideration the legitimate interests of the producer and other co-authors. Moreover, the author’s rights of withdrawal of the work for change of opinion and revocation of transfer of rights for non-exercise are excluded by the German Author’s Rights Act.

The position of the producers has been reinforced in Netherlands. The Dutch Author’s Right Act  presume that all the contributors to the making of cinematographic work, unless otherwise provided in explicit terms in writing, have waived their right to object to any modification made by the producer. However this waiver doesn’t cover gross distortions and mutilations. Moreover it has been left to the complete discretion of the producer to decide when the cinematographic work will be considered complete.

Now I will mention some French cases concerning the right of integrity to better explain the existing situation-

The Court of Cassation in France in Colet case, which concerned a film created by a salaried director which was edited by his employer to make it suitable for commercial exploitation, held that the author’s right to object to and protect integrity of his work remains unaffected from any contract which authorised the assignee of copyright to alter the title or even edit the film. Accordingly the author has the right to claim infringement of his moral rights if the public was not informed as to the abridged nature of the work presented.

In our next case the Tribunal of First Instance of Paris was asked to decide whether the German distributors infringed the moral rights of the director when they reduced the duration of German version of a French film from 131 minutes to 119 minutes. The Tribunal found French and German distributors jointly liable and enjoined them from releasing the modified version without the consent of the director.

The most famous of all the ‘Asphalt Jungle’ case established that colourisation of film, even for obvious commercial reasons, without authorisation and control of the authors or their heirs infringed the right of integrity. The broadcasting of the colourised version also constituted infringement of the moral right of integrity.

We must not forget that the right of integrity in author’s rights countries is not limited to modification or alteration of the work but also includes misleading, disparaging and derogatory presentation of the work. The context in which a work is presented is held to be sufficient to constitute infringement of the right of integrity. The French court of appeal in the Saint Sainte Thérèse de Lisieu case dealt with this aspect of the right of integrity. This case concerned a film director who objected to the broadcasting of his film as part of a television programme which involved a religious discussion following the film. However the court did not agree with the plaintiff that a mere association of the film with the theme of the debate can be held to amount to an infringement of the integrity right.

Certain forms of association may in some cases amount to infringement. The tribunal of first instance in Fontaine case held the unauthorised reproduction of the décor of a silent film by a restaurant in Paris to be an infringement of integrity right.

Adaptation of pre-existing movies has been the subject of a plethora of cases. Generally adapters have a certain degree of liberty in adapting a pre-existing work as far as the spirit of the pre-existing work remains unaffected. The French case concerning Victor Hugo’s Les Misérables is an appropriate example. In this case a descendant of Hugo objected to the publication of a sequel to Hugo’s Les Misérables. The Court of Appeal after extensive discussion concerning the extent of right of integrity of authors and the general right of adaptation of existing works held that the writing of sequel to a work of great prominence in world literature, which was in itself a completed work constituted infringement of the moral rights of the author. However the Court of Cassation on appeal quashed the judgment and remanded the case back to the Court of Appeal after observing that general motives, without examining the way in which the sequel may have altered or affected Hugo’s work cannot be the basis of moral rights infringement.

On remand the Court of Appeal allowed the publication of sequel and held that an author cannot prevent his work to be subjected to any adaptation by relying on moral rights which are not absolute. However the adaptation should be faithful and must respect the spirit of the pre-existing work.

The Right of Paternity

As mentioned above most of the Author’s Rights Acts defined the right of paternity in similar terms as to article 6bis of the Berne Convention. However countries like Portugal, Netherlands and Italy in their acts provide for the specific right of the film author to be credited on the work. The right of paternity has traditionally been considered as less of a concern for the film producers and distributors as the paternity claims are far less disruptive of the economic exploitation of the work in comparison to the moral right of integrity.

It is well established in the case laws of author’s rights countries that authors have the right to have their names mentioned in the credits of the film, however an issue that has remained unsettled is whether the attribution right of the author extends to require his name to be displayed on the secondary copies of the work, such as videocassettes. In France, it has been held that, in the absence of the contract to the contrary, the director of the film may claim damages for the infringement of his right of paternity if his name is not mentioned on the cover of videocassettes made available to public for sale.219

The right of paternity of the authors of cinematographic works will also be infringed by wrong or incomplete identifications in the credits of the work. The name of the author must be clearly stated which doesn’t leave any scope for confusion as to authorship of the work and clearly associates the author with his work.

A new issue has emerged in the recent texts relating to possessory credit. Whether the right of paternity of the author of the cinematographic works includes the right to claim a possessory right i.e. to claim a work as- a film by XYZ. No clear answer is available at this stage as the issue is relatively new and the courts haven’t got the chance to deal with it. As far as my opinion is concerned, I feel it could lead to conflict among authors as to who is best entitled to have such a right.

The Right to Divulge

Most of the author’s rights countries provide their authors with a right to decide when and how a work would be disseminated or published, or whether would it be published at all. This right is generally provided in absolute terms without any conditions to be satisfied, however in cases of conflict among authors the court may grant the permission to make the work available to the public.

There are two ways to look at this right of divulgation. On the one side it provides the author with the positive right of ensuring that his work is properly and sufficiently published by the producer. Most of the case law has been based on this positive aspect of the right. However in many French cases a minimal release of the work has been held to be sufficient to satisfy the condition of divulgation. Moreover the non-exploitation of the work in certain medium, other than the original medium intended by the authors while creating the work, would not be an infringement of the divulgation right.

The other side of the right provide the author with the power to restrict his work’s divulgation. But this has been rare in the case law history of the right, may be because of the contractual obligations and the damages the author may have to pay to the producer for non-compliance with the terms of the contract. In addition, the nature of cinematographic works with multiple authors make the exercise of this right prone to conflict among authors as the non-divulgation right of one co-author will conflict with the other co-author’s right of divulgation and economic exploitation of the work.

The Right to Withdraw and Repentance

Popularly known in the continental countries as the reconsideration right, this right provide an author with the power to revoke the exploitation right of the publisher and withdraw a work from markets, if there has been a change in opinion or some legitimate interests of the author are or may in foreseeable future be prejudiced. The German and Italian Author’s Rights Acts are not very receptive of this right, for the reason of far reaching consequences it may have on the economic and commercial exploitation of the works. The German Act do not provide the authors of cinematographic works with right to withdraw the work by reason of change in opinion. In Italy ‘serious moral reasons’ can only trigger the exercise of the right.

In France, on the other hand, the authors are in a better position in relation to their right of reconsideration. They can revoke the assignment and withdraw the work even after its publication. The motive of the author is irrelevant to the matter. However to ensure that the frequent exercise of this right do not paralyse the publication industry, the author has been required to indemnify the assignee for any economic loss he may suffer for the unexpected withdrawal of the work. In addition, if the author decides to republish his work in future, he is obliged to offer the rights of publication to the original assignee on original terms and conditions. These conditions on the exercise of the right of reconsideration has been provided by the French law to ensure that authors don’t utilise moral rights for their economic gain.

Despite being a powerful weapon in the hands of authors, the right of withdrawal and repentance is rarely exercised for the reason of the requirement of prior-indemnification. Moreover, multiplicity of authors in relation to cinematographic works make is exercise unlikely.

Can Moral Rights be waived?

After considering the moral rights of author, an important question that now arises is- is it possible for authors to waive their moral rights? There is no universal answer to this question. Though it is generally believed in the continental countries that these rights are inalienable, member states take different approach towards the issue.

In France, an agreement granting an exclusive right in general terms to make additions, alterations or adaptations of the work will not be enforceable. However if proper care is given and an agreement is drafted in clear and specific terms which clearly establishes the extent of waiver may be enforced in the court of law as established by the French Supreme Court.236. Belgium and Greece follow the same approach. In contrast, countries like Germany, Italy and Spain take a rigid stand towards waiver of moral rights. Even specific waivers are not allowed.

In Netherlands, contributors to a cinematographic work, unless contrary provided in agreement, are deemed to have waived their right to object to any modification or alteration made by the producer of the work or on his behalf. In Austria, consents drafted in specific terms allowing modifications and alterations of the work are admissible, but there is an absolute bar against waiver of the paternity right.

The Copyright Tradition

As already mentioned above, despite the obligations under Article 6bis of the Berne convention since 1928, UK brought the law providing moral rights to authors only in 1988 with the Copyright, Design and Patent Act. Section 77 to 85 of the act contain moral rights provisions. Four major moral rights have been granted to authors which include- the attribution right (s.77), the integrity right (s.80), the false attribution right (s.84) and the privacy right (s.85). However, the latter two rights don’t strictly fall under the category of moral rights for the reason that they are concerned with the link between the author and his work. They are more personal in nature.

The CDPA Act solves the problem of multiplicity of authors by vesting all the moral rights in a cinematographic work in the director alone. But the directors of cinematographic works are treated as badly as author of any other work. A number of qualifications have been imposed for the exercise of the rights, for example the assertion requirement for the attribution right and a variety of exemptions and limitations are provided which make the UK moral rights regime weak. Moreover, the concept of transitional arrangements in the 1988 Act immune the cinematographic works created prior to 1988 from all moral rights claim. Hence a great chunk of moral rights claims has been debarred.

While considering moral rights regime in UK, we need to distinguish between the moral rights in the cinematographic works and moral rights in the works which have been included in the creation of the cinematographic work. As we already discussed, the director is the sole owner of the moral rights in the cinematographic work, but the inclusion of different nature of works such as musical, artistic or dramatic will not change the ownership of moral rights in those works. The authors of the included works will continue to hold their moral rights in them. However, contributors such as the director of photography or the editor though crucial for the creation of the cinematographic work are not entitled to moral rights as their contribution is not towards the creation of the work.

If we look closely in to the CDPA Act we find that while discussing the provisions regarding copyright entitlement the act use the terms the ‘principal film director’, but in the moral rights chapter the terms used are the ‘the director of the film’. The change in language gives rise to the possibility of there being two directors being co-owners of moral rights in a cinematographic work. Moreover, the CDPA Act, in contrast to many continental author’s rights acts, don’t provide any rules for the settlement of moral rights disputes between co-authors in order to restrict untimely claims which may affect the creation or exploitation of the work.

The Irish Copyright and Related Rights Act of 2000 vests the moral rights of paternity, integrity and false attribution in to the authors of literary, artistic, dramatic, musical or cinematographic works, with no further clarification. In addition, the producer of the cinematographic work has been designated as the co-author with the principal director under section 21 of the act. Hence under the Irish act it is possible for the producer to hold moral rights in a cinematographic work. Similarly, Article 7 (4) of the Copyright Act of Cyprus makes the principal director and the producer of the cinematographic work co-owners of moral rights.

Now I will move on to discuss three categories of moral rights which are commonly found in copyright tradition-

1. The Right of Integrity

UK

Section 80(1) of the CDPA Act, 1988 vests the right to protect integrity of the work in the author of literary, dramatic, musical or artistic work and in case of cinematographic works in the director. The essence of this right lies in the concept of ‘derogatory treatment’, which determines whether the way in which a work has been dealt with is actionable or not. ‘Treatment’ of a work has been defined in section 80(2) of the act to mean ‘any addition to, deletion from or alteration to or adaptation of the work, other than a translation of a literary or dramatic work, or an arrangement or transcription of a musical work involving no more than a change of key or register’.

But it is not sufficient. To be actionable, the treatment has to be derogatory also. A treatment would be considered derogatory if it amounts to distortion or mutilation of the work or is otherwise prejudicial to the honor or reputation of the author or director. It is clear that in Art. 6bis the author can only object to distortion, mutilation or modification of his work if it is prejudicial to his honor or reputation. I do not believe that the framers of the 1988 Act meant to alter the scope of the authors moral rights in this respect. The mere fact that a work has been distorted or mutilated gives rise to no claim unless the distortion or mutilation prejudices the author's honor or reputation.

The use of the term ‘otherwise’ in the second paragraph of section 80(2) ensures that the condition of being ‘prejudicial to the honor or reputation’ governs all derogatory treatment, including distortions or mutilations. In addition, contributors to the film like screenwriters and dialogists have been left unprotected as ‘translation of a literary or dramatic work’ is expressly excluded from the definition of ‘treatment’. It is not possible for them to object to bad translation of their dialogues or subtitles in foreign languages.

An important point to be remembered here is that any modification or alteration made by the director or other authors in the process of making the cinematographic work under the directions or advice of the producer of the work will not constitute treatment under section 80(2), for the reason that the work hasn’t come in to existence yet to attract moral right of integrity.

In contrast to French approach, the UK adopts an objective test to the integrity right. The prejudicial nature of the treatment is evaluated in abstract, with no consideration to the feelings or emotions of the artist towards his work or to the intellectual greatness of the work.

Despite the enactment of the CDPA in 1988 and the elaborate moral rights provisions contained in it, it is generally claimed that the moral rights regime in the UK is weak and insufficient to protect the interests of authors. The reason behind such a criticism is the exceptions and qualifications to the infringement provisions provided in the act. Section 81 of the 1988 act defines exceptions. The exceptions provided for the purpose of reporting current events and for avoiding inclusion of anything which offends against good taste or decency become relevant for cinematographic works.

 Section 82 provides for qualifications to the exercise of moral rights. The right of integrity doesn’t apply to anything done by or with the authority of copyright owner in relation to works produced in the course of employment unless the director or author is identified at the time of relevant act or on published copies of the work. It must be noted here that this exclusion is not limited to the film director, but it equally effects the right of integrity of other contributors to the film as well. The right of integrity will not be applicable to anything done in relation to a cinematographic work in which copyright originally vested in the director’s employer, this includes the acts done to underlying works. This is a serious limitation on the integrity rights in cinematographic works.

Ireland and Malta

The Irish Copyright and Related Rights Act of 2000 under section 109 provides an author of a work with the right to object to any distortion, mutilation or other modification of, or other derogatory action in relation to, his or her work which would be prejudicial to his or her reputation. As we can see, the integrity right is provided in similar terms to the UK Act. Moreover, the exceptions and qualifications are drafted in similar terms. Hence, all the above-mentioned criticism of the CDPA are equally applicable here.

The Copyright Act of Malta under section 12(1) provides the integrity rights to authors in more or less similar terms to UK and Ireland, however it is not subjected to any exceptions or qualifications as provided under CDPA or the Irish Copyright Act. The right to protect integrity of the work is far broad in scope in Malta.

I will briefly mention here the Copyright Act of Cyprus for the reason that it contains a specific limitation on integrity right in relation to audiovisual and broadcast works. It provides that ‘an author who authorizes the use of his work in a cinematograph film or a television broadcast may not oppose modifications which are absolutely required on technical grounds or for the purpose of commercial exploitation of the work’. When understanding the scope of this limitation due consideration is required to be given to the words ‘absolutely required’. The modifications made to the work on technical or commercial grounds must be absolutely necessary, which means that- it must be the only way to ensure the proper exploitation of the work’.

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