These days, it almost feels like fan films are legal. Almost.

Lucasfilm encourages them, and DC Comics said here on FCT that it’s fine with fan productions, but for every major company that understands the benefits of fans using its entertainment properties, there’s plenty of corporations that just don’t get it.

Hasbro has forced a number of G.I. Joe fan flicks to close up shop in recent years; a massive amateur flick based on the Warhammer 40000 science fiction game was shuttered by corporations last fall; and now a UK fan film, Max Payne: Payne & Redemption, has been shot down by Fox Studios.

In production for more than two years, the film is based on the popular video game series, and has even gotten the support of Max Payne’s creator, Sam Lake, who told the fans/producers, “Payne & Redemption seems very ambitious and impressive. Good luck with your project! Looking forward to seeing it.”

The project was nearly done: The filmmakers only needed to shoot one last scene and a few “pick-ups” (misc. shots to aid in the continuity and flow of scenes) in order to complete production. Celebrating that fact—and killing time until the shots could be done in June due to scheduling issues—the team posted a few online trailers…which soon caught the eye of Fox. The studio has its own Max Payne feature film underway, and apparently didn’t like the competition; as a result, mere days later after the fans’ trailers hit the net, the fledgling filmmakers received a cease & desist order from the studio’s legal department stating in part:

Your activities and materials, including your film, trailers, and one-sheet posters violate Fox’s rights as well as the rights of Take Two Interactive in the underlying video game. As a result, we must demand that you immediately cease all further development and/or distribution of your film and accompanying materials and remove the film and materials, including any clips, trailers, one-sheet posters and other materials bearing the MAX PAYNE mark or elements of the MAX PAYNE property from this website and anywhere else you have posted them on the web.

Subsequent negotiations with Fox resulted in the studio “allowing” the fans to complete the project and have a single private screening of the film. They can not screen it for anyone ever again, distribute it or anything else—a move that has understandably thrown the future of the project in doubt. Writer/director Fergie Gibson commented on the film’s production blog:

I can’t help but feel all this work has been done in vain… Three years of sleepless nights, tens of thousands of pounds spent from my own pocket, promises made to cast & crew, and hope given to a loyal fan-base now kicked in the nuts and just told to “deal with it”… It’s not right, is it?

It’s always sad when this sort of move happens to a fan film, although one wonders if, had the flick appeared after Fox’s feature hits theaters, it wouldn’t have had a better chance of being released to fans unscathed. Many media companies still view fan productions as a threat, despite the fact that a modestly budgeted fan short rarely can compete with a multi-million-dollar feature film.

Moreover—why must they be seen as competing? A fan production is free advertising for a franchise, and when it’s done well, it can serve as a taste of things to come from the “real” movie. An easy compromise for both parties could’ve been a scroll across the bottom of the fan film saying something like “If you like this, wait ’til you see what Fox has in store with its ‘real’ Max Payne movie, in theaters XX/XX/XX.” At least fans would get to see the movie and Fox would get some benefit from it.

Are there other ways that they could’ve negotiated for the film to see the light of day? Is co-opting a fan film like suggested above a potential positive or negative for the fan film community? Throw in your two cents in the comments section.