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Slumdog Millionaire: £1 DVD fakes flood market
Amar Singh10.02.09
Slumdog Millionaire is set to become one of the most counterfeited movies of all time, anti-piracy experts warned today.
The British blockbuster's award-winning streak means the international DVD black market is flooded with illegal copies of the film, which is still showing in cinemas.
An Evening Standard investigation found that £1 copies of the movie, favourite for an Oscar later this month, are already being sold in London.
Eddy Leviten, of the Federation of Copyright Theft, said: "Any new release is camcordered and duplicated straight away. Slumdog Millionaire has real global mass appeal so is going to be targeted on another level."
He said the mass appeal "massively increases" the number of people who want to watch it illegally as well as legally. "It is a film that's used some relatively unknown talents on a modest budget and all those who worked on it deserve to not be cheated."
Bollywood film expert Anil Sinanan said the availability of 20p copies of Slumdog Millionaire in India meant it failed to do well at the box office. He said: "This film is unique in its appeal to the Bollywood and Hollywood audiences, so it is likely to be counterfeited on a scale we have never seen before."
Gennaro Castaldo, of HMV, the high street giant that has suffered financially by the increase in people buying pirate DVDs, said: "Consumers may think there's little harm in it, but they may unwittingly be funding criminal activities that may, impact on their families in some other way."
The Evening Standard was able to buy three illegal Slumdog DVDs in one hour on a 100-yard stretch of Green Street, Newham. One hawker was also selling copies of other Oscar-nominated hits including The Wrestler, The Curious Case Of Benjamin Button and The Reader. A manager at Music Movers, a popular Bollywood DVD and CD shop, sold the Standard a copy of the film for £2. "We've had to move the pirate DVDS to underneath the counter because the police raided us recently," he said. Several yards away from Music Movers, a market stall owner was selling copies for £2.50 - with another Bollywood film on the same disc.
A spokesman for Music Movers said: "We do not sell pirate DVDs any more. We were raided recently by police and must have had just a few left over, which somebody here must have sold you. All other shops in the area sell pirate DVDs. It is common practice. But we apologise and will not sell pirate DVDs any more."
Movie piracy is estimated to have cost the film industry £486 million in the UK in 2007.
