New Line being sued by The Tolkien Trust

New Line Cinema has been bad. Very, very bad.

At least, that’s what The Tolkien Trust is trying to say. The Trust is a charity group that manages the J.R.R. Tolkien estate and has filed a lawsuit against New Line Cinema for $150 million.

Oh boy.

According to the article in Variety, The Tolkien Trust claims to have never been paid the gross profit participation payments that it’s owed.

It’s amazing to me that despite the films earning a worldwide gross of around $6 BILLION, New Line has somehow not paid out the 7.5% gross profit earnings they are owed. The terms of the contract date back to 1969 and a deal with United Artists, which has been passed down through the years and ended up with New Line.

The big problem here for those of us who really don’t care about the money, but mainly the films:

The Tolkien Trust is looking for punitive damages and a declaration from the courts that the Trust can terminate any rights New Line has to produce anymore movies based on the Lord of the Rings universe.

This could spell disaster for those of us waiting for The Hobbit films to be made.

What is it with New Line? First they have a suit settled with Peter Jackson over earnings they failed to give him, plus have been sued twice in other areas for these films.

You make SIX BILLION and have plenty more coming, and cannot make promised payments?

Ugh.

We’ll try to keep an eye on this mess as it progresses…there is a chance I guess that if The Trust gets their money, they wont pull the movie away from New Line.