Jonathan Olley/Summit Entertainment

Oh boy. The Bagger thought the last few days of the Oscar beat would be all who-are-you-wearing-and-when-do-we-get-to-clink-Champagne-glasses. Instead we’ve been spending most of our time talking to military personnel and high-powered lawyers. (Attention foreign editors: Look how much time we’re spending talking to military personnel and lawyers! Might as well get embedded next, right?)

The reason for all these interviews, of course, is that “The Hurt Locker” has taken another pounding. On Wednesday, Mark Boal, the screenwriter and a producer of the movie, was named in a lawsuit brought by Master Sgt. Jeffrey S. Sarver, whose Explosive Ordnance Disposal (E.O.D.) unit Mr. Boal embedded with in Baghdad in 2004 as part of an assignment for Playboy magazine.

In the suit, which also names the movie’s other producers, its director, Kathryn Bigelow, its distributors, and Playboy, Sergeant Sarver claims that the character played by Jeremy Renner was based on him and shared many of his characteristics (from looks to personal history). By portraying him as a “messed up” soldier, the “Hurt Locker” team defamed him, Sergeant Sarver says.



The lawsuit, filed in federal court in New Jersey, is based on six counts, including misappropriation of name and likeness, invasion of privacy, infliction of emotional distress, fraud and negligent misrepresentation. It seeks in excess of $75,000 for each count, along with costs, interest and legal fees. It charges that the movie amounted to “the exploitation of a real-life, honorable, courageous and long-serving member of our country’s armed forces, by greedy, multibillion-dollar ‘entertainment’ corporations.” The suit was first reported by Patrick Goldstein of The Los Angeles Times.

“There are similarities, because you’d find similarities to events that happened to lots of these guys,” Mr. Boal told Mr. Goldstein. “But the screenplay is not about him. I talked to easily over 100 soldiers during my research and reshuffled everything I learned in a way that would be authentic, but would also make for a dramatic story.” He declined further comment.

So, where to start?

1. The Timing

Though it comes on the heels of several other “Hurt Locker” brouhahas, the lawsuit was filed the day after Oscar voting ended. This, Sgt. Sarver’s lawyer, Todd Weglarz, told the Bagger, was intentional.

“We could’ve filed it earlier, but decided not to and even represented in writing to Summit and the producers, they had our assurance that we would not file it until after the voting was complete,” Mr. Weglarz said. He added that “The Hurt Locker” camp had been aware of the potential lawsuit “for months.” In a subsequent interview, Mr. Weglarz was unable to specify when exactly his side approached “The Hurt Locker” side — around the holidays was his best guess. But he did emphasize that his side made the decision to wait to file until the voting was closed so as not to create the appearance that he and his client were trying to swamp the competition. Representatives from “The Hurt Locker” did not dispute this, but suggested that the real reason for the delay was to demand a settlement. Mr. Weglarz said there had been “negotiations.”

2. The Facts

In the interest of time and blog space we will not delve into the details of Mr. Boal’s Playboy article, because it is available for your perusal here. The full text of Sergeant Sarver’s complaint is available here. In reading them, there are similarities — Sergeant Sarver says he rolls up his sleeve just like Will James, Mr. Renner’s character, a quirk that some military watchers said was inauthentic — as well as things that seem far-fetched, like the idea that Sergeant Sarver was the sole source of phrases like “war is a drug.” Also, Jimmy Fallon is quoted in the lawsuit (in an interview with Mr. Renner, he described him as a “messed up” soldier). Happy reading.

3. The Legalese

“Claims on films happen routinely,” Steven Beer, a lawyer with Greenberg Traurig who specializes in media and entertainment, told the Bagger. If there is any merit to them, he said, they typically get resolved, because film companies don’t want any negative attention or publicity, especially on a film as highly visible as “The Hurt Locker.”

But, Mr. Beer added, there is a good chance that the folks on “The Hurt Locker” side view the lawsuit as frivolous — Mr. Boal said as much in a statement — particularly because the script has been vetted twice by the Academy and the Writers Guild of America, which both deemed it an original, not adapted, work. (Mr. Boal won the Writers Guild award for best original screenplay.)

“You have two serious organizations that have a stake in the integrity of the award and the film on its own,” Mr. Beer said. “They have done an independent analysis two times, and it was not found to be derivative. That to me signals that the claims may not be of merit.”

In addition, Mr. Beer said, as a pre-condition to getting films made, insurers investigate the potential for claims of this type. “They ask directly if the work is derived from another source,” he said. “That would probably be yet a third entity that reviewed the article against the screenplay and I suspect weighed in on behalf of the writer and supported his claim that this was an independent work rather than an adaptation.” (Yes, you can adapt from yourself.)

One solution for films based on real people is to buy their subjects’ life rights, which Mr. Boal said he did not consider doing because he wanted “the freedom to fictionalize the stories he heard from soldiers he met during his research,” according to Mr. Goldstein at The Los Angeles Times. Mr. Beer said that he and other experts in the field tell their clients to veer on the side of caution and buy life rights it there’s any potential for problems in the future.“The Hurt Locker” had a small budget and a nearly equally small box office take, so its coffers are not exactly overflowing for any kind of extras.

Still, Mr. Beer said, “The decision to go forth without a life rights authorization or agreement, I’m sure it wasn’t casual.”

4. The Aftermath

On Sunday some people will look nice and win awards. Mr. Weglarz’s client will either press on with his lawsuit or try for a settlement. Everyone will forget about this story until 2011, when the next round of Oscar coat-tail riding begins.

Phew! Think that about covers it.