I was handed a rough edit of a film in July and asked to finish it, I was told no-one wanted to spend anymore time on it and no-one wanted to spend there own money on it. I was very close to the project the film was based around and was happy to except the title of executive producer. I was already doing the media and PR for the individuals the Documentary was about and was excited to be a part of the film as well. I took the film everyone else went on holiday and put 200hrs in post production and a few thousand dollars into getting it set up & on film festivals tour. I will say again no one at this point gave a shit about it anymore, emails even went unanswered. Then it was the premier we won best of Fest and People choice, at the same time we got excepted into a very prestigious world tour film festival. I was excited.
All offers we directed to me and I got a DVD production offer! I was already dealing with media attention from a large broadcasting company so i presented the idea of getting it on TV and there was intrest.
All of sudden with the success and proposition of making money off the film i never even got a thank you from the team. I was told not to take the deals yet let it run in the festival scene so thats what i did. I have now found out that they re-did the film themselves, have contacted the TV company are about to make a deal, and with that they will make a commercial DVD for sale... All of this without my name or the postproduction editor who worked with me.. They are claiming that their film was the award winner and one out on the world tour but actually it is the film I produced that is out there...
What do i do? Do i have any rights? We all agreed to work on this for free as no-one anticipated such success. There is no contracts however i have every email communication including ones admitting me as Ex Producer and my editor as post production.. I dont care about getting any money back i gave because i believed in sharing my friends story however i do not appreciate spending all the money and time and then getting my credit cut out... Or them jumping on a broadcast deal that i inspired... Any advise helps....