2023-4-19 Snapshot and Rights Considerations

In this little moment during a scene, Brad is plummeting over a waterfall because the quick plan he concocted to mess with Tony backfired, resulting in the opposite effect. That is, he wanted to embarrass Tony in front of Mabel, but instead Mabel was compassionate and praised him.

During the waterfall flash scene, a very brief segment from the ‘70s TV show The Land of the Lost plays. Namely, the part in the theme song about the family falling a thousand feet below. Just that one line is sampled and played over a brief loop segment by Roni Size. Both of these extractions are so small that the Fair Use argument can come into play. As I was considering the legality, I reminded myself of all the numerous hip hop songs that take parts from other songs for use in original tracks. Further, I recalled an early ‘90s TV show called “Dream On” in which small segments are taken from other shows and movies.

There is no clearcut answer easily findable online, but certainly credit must always be given to the original work and not very much of it is to be used. An argument that always holds up is that of parody. If it is clear that there is some sort of parody at play and there is no intent to infringe upon the rights of the original artists, then typically a small segment and sample is fair play.