Was Quentin Tarantino's 'Django Unchained' a Stolen Idea?; Director Sued for $100 Million

Quentin Tarantino might have a knack for creating award-winning dramas, but this time one of his films has landed him in some legal drama. A father-son screenwriting team have accused the controversial director, The Weinstein Company, and Columbia Pictures of copyright infringement. Tarantino is being sued for $100 million for allegedly stealing the idea behind 2012 movie, Django Unchained.

On Thursday (Dec. 24), a lawsuit was filed in Washington, D.C. against the filmmaker and the film distributors by Oscar Colvin Jr. and his son, Torrance J. Colvin. The Colvins believe Tarantino's Oscar-winning script for Django Unchained shares far too many similarities to their screenplay Freedom.

The plot of Freedom surrounds an escaped slave named Jackson Freeman who's on a mission to buy his family's freedom from an evil plantation owner, with the help of a Caucasian ally. Tarantino's 2012 film features a slave named Django Freeman on the same pursuit.

"There are a plethora of similarities between 'Freedom' and 'Django Unchained,'" the lawsuit states, according to Variety. "Defendants would call them coincidences, however, the intentional use of our work is neither an accident nor coincidence."

For those who have never seen Django Unchained, the movie follows Django (Jamie Foxx) who accompanies a German bounty hunter named Dr. King Schultz (Cristoph Waltz) to capture the Brittle brothers. The two soon find their way to the home of wealthy plantation owner Calvin Candie (Leonardo DiCaprio), where Django's estranged wife Broomhilda von Shaft (Kerry Washington) works as a house slave.

The Colvins allegedly registered their screenplay with the Writers Guild of America in 2004. It was also taken to the CAA, the William Morris Agency, as well as, placed Triggerstreet's official script website. The 52-year-old director's film went on to gross $425 million worldwide, according to the New York Daily News.

The suit states the Colvins are looking for compensatory damages of more than "hundreds of millions of dollars." It was filed the day before Tarantino released his most recent Western drama, The Hateful Eight.

Neither of the accused parties have responded to the allegations.

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