Sony Must Pay $1.5 Million Due to Fake 'David Manning' Movie Blurbs

[norml]

Sony Must Pay $1.5 Million Due to Fake 'David Manning' Movie Blurbs

By E&P Staff

Published: August 04, 2005 10:10 AM ET

NEW YORK David Manning is back! The antics of the infamous fake movie critic who implausibly raved about Rob Schneider and “The Animal” will cost Sony Pictures Entertainment $1.5 million to settle a class-action lawsuit, it was announced last night.

Moviegoers who feel they were misled by fake blurbs into seeing the films “The Animal,” “Vertical Limit,” “A Knight's Tale,” or “The Patriot” during their original theatre runs must file a claim to be eligible for a $5 per ticket reimbursement, lawyer Norman Blumenthal said, according to AP. He represented a group of filmgoers who sued Sony Pictures in 2001.

It use quotes from “Manning” in ads, listing his publication as the Ridgefield Press, a Connecticut weekly. That paper does exist, but had no Manning, as Newsweek revealed.

Sony Pictures did not admit any liability under terms of the agreement.


snip


http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1001009199

[Droopy]

1. I've wondered

where they find a movie critic to say, "The feel good hit of the summer," when the movie is a dud.

[Beware the Beast Man]

2. I thought it would be funny,

if a studio would take a critic's bad review out of context, such as "It's an edge of your seat thriller...if you think watching paint dry is thrilling" type of thing. It seems they already do that. I remember hearing Roger Ebert on Howard Stern some years back, saying how they took his bad review of "Little Nicky" out of context. He called it "Adam Sandler's best film," which was meant as an insult, but the studio spun it as a positive review. :D

[Droopy]

3. Yeah

I guess they'd have to do things like that because every movie out there seems like it's got some critic saying some nice little blurb about the movie.

[FloridaPat]

4. People are upset about fake movie reviews but not fake news.

My heavens, what happened to word of mouth. These people had no friends that told them the movies were lousy? They didn't tell their friends? Who goes to the movies solely on what critics say? I use to watch Siskel and Ebert and 90% of the time I agreed with them. I saw movies I normally wouldn't have because they made them sound so good. I've also seen movies they panned and I liked. What kind of stupid crap is this? Suing fake movie critics! This actually went to court!

[norml]

5. Web Results 1 - 10 of about 66,100 for "David Manning" . (0.04 seconds)

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David Manning, Film Critic
David Manning's rave reviews might have gone forever unnoticed. ... John Horn
exposed the reality behind David Manning in an article that appeared in early ...
www.museumofhoaxes.com/manning.html - 6k - Cached - Similar pages

David Manning (writer) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
David Manning was a fictitous film critic, created by a marketing executive ...
Several blurbs posted under the name "David Manning" were written for the ...
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Welcome to the David Manning Home Page
David Manning. The last honest critic. News about David Manning ... Recently, it
has come to my attention that people believe that I- David Manning, ...
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Print manning020314.tif (2 pages)
File Format: PDF/Adobe Acrobat - View as HTML
Page 1. Page 2.
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The Iraq Factor: Secret Memo to Tony Blair
FROM: DAVID MANNING DATE: 14 MARCH 2002. CC: JONATHAN POWELL. PRIME MINISTER.
YOUR TRIP TO THE US. I had dinner with Condi on Tuesday; and talks and lunch ...
www.globalresearch.ca/articles/MAN506A.html - 12k - Cached - Similar pages

The Ghost of David Manning will have his revenge | The Onion AV Club
he ghost of David Manning. That 2001 incident serves as a high-water mark ...
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redesign.theonion.com/avclub/node/25357 - 19k - Aug 5, 2005 - Cached - Similar pages

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David Manning is an artist who markets his detailed drawings of military and
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Signs of the Times - Columbia Pictures Fakes Blurbs
... department had invented a critic named David Manning at the real-life Ridgefield
Press ... advertising executive Matthew Cramer concocted David Manning, ...
www.loper.org/~george/trends/2001/Jun/58.html - 11k - Cached - Similar pages

The Hollow Man: The Strange Case of David Manning
Describes the case of a phony movie critic as an instance of the informal logical
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David Manning - Demopedia
David Manning. From Demopedia. Categories: US Official. Sir David Geoffrey Manning,
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