U.S. studio Paramount Pictures and Chinese studio 1905 were ordered to pay more than 2 million yuan ($295,000) to a scenic spot in Southwest China's Chongqing Municipality for failing to feature the scenic area's logo in Transformers 4.
The Chongqing No.3 Intermediate People's Court on Thursday morning rejected the Chongqing Wulong Scenic Area's appeal for the court to terminate the contract and have the studios return the 6 million yuan it had paid for the product placement. According to the court, Paramount Pictures and 1905 had taken actions to remedy the situation after they had recognized the mistake, news portal cnr.cn reported.
The two companies were ordered to pay the Chongqing Wulong Scenic Area 1.8 million yuan for losses as well as another 209,000 yuan as compensation for copyright fees.
The Chongqing Wulong Scenic Area filed the lawsuit against the two companies on April 26 stating that the studios had failed follow through on an agreement to feature a logo featuring "China Wulong" in scenes featuring the area in Transformers 4, which caused the scenic area heavy losses, The Chongqing Morning Post reported on Tuesday.
The area claimed that it felt the contract had not been honored as expected as a recent survey revealed that about 86.9 percentage of 551 people in Beijing, Shanghai and South China's Guangdong Province who had seen the film said they did not know in which area in China those scenes had been shot .
The two studios filed a counterclaim requesting that the scenic area hand over a final payment of 1.2 million yuan, as well as another 11 million yuan in late fees, according to The Chongqing Morning Post.
The defendants said that it was the scenic area's delay in payment that led them being unable to complete the post-production work to add the area's name in the movie, according to cnr.cn.
The court rejected the counterclaim claim.
