Legal aspects of Relationships during Creation and Use of the Objects of Copyright and Related Rights in the Movie / Cinema Sphere

Movie sphere is one of the most demanded domains of entertainment industry which leads to the high relevance of its legal regulation issues. The specificity of cinema sphere is reflected in each element of the legal relationships during creation and exploitation of a film. Therefore, the main aim of the present paper is analysis of the legal relations regarding creation and exploitation of copyright and related rights in the movie sphere particularities. In order to achieve this aim the following objectives were accomplished: 1) determination of the legal nature of a film as the main object of the legal relationships in the cinema sphere; 2) identification of the special features of the subjects of the rights to a film; 3) analysis of the substance of the legal relationships and examination of requirements of exclusive rights to the objects of copyright and related rights acquisition by the producer, specificities of the exploitation of a film and certain issues of protection of the film author’s moral rights. The methodology applied consists of both theoretical (analysis, synthesis) and legal methods (method of interpretation of law, formal and comparative method). The research leads to the conclusion that the specificities of subjects and substance of the relationships in cinema sphere are preconditioned by legal nature of a film, which is a complex audiovisual work based on the creative vision consisting of a series of related images imparting an impression of motion accompanied or not by the sound. Complexity of a film leads to existence of its multiple authors as defined in the Civil Code and of a producer as a person accumulating exclusive rights to the various objects so as to exploit a film. Analysis of the special features of the substance of the legal relations considered highlights complexity, ambiguity of the application of the Civil Code legal rules with regard to the movie sphere and the necessity of the further improvement of its legal regulation.