http://www.indiewire.com/film/biz/biz_010121_briefs.html

>> Defiant Levin Screens "Babylon" at Slamdance After All

(indieWIRE/01.21.01) -- Slamdance's promised "surprise" opening screening yesterday turned out to be the originally scheduled "Brooklyn Babylon" by Marc Levin which was pulled Thursday under a cloud of legal threats from distributor/producer Artisan Entertainment. After a morning meeting between festival director Peter Baxter and Levin, Baxter told indieWIRE, "We're aware that there may be legal consequences but we want to stand by the filmmaker."

"There is no resolution on the situation between the two parties and it appears that the filmmaker has taken the matter into his own hands," an Artisan spokesperson said.

Communications broke down between Levin and Artisan president Amir Malin months ago. The filmmaker says they haven't spoken in more than six months. He reports making repeated attempts to contact Artisan in the last few days but without success except that, "They've added on that I'm damaging their reputation."

When Levin arrived in Utah yesterday he says he was so exhausted he didn't know if he had the strength to screen the film, but after sleeping for 12 hours, he turned on the TV. "I saw the inauguration happening and I knew we I had to go through with it," Levin explained.

Both Levin and Baxter are predicting that there will be an outpouring of support from other filmmakers in the next few days. "In the true indie spirit of helping the filmmaker as much as we can we decided show the film," Baxter said. "We won't be intimidated."


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