SONY SUED OVER BOGUS MOVIE CRITIC.

Byline: Bob Strauss Staff Writer

Two people sued Thursday over made-up movie critic's quotes that appeared on ads for Sony Pictures' movies, charging the studio with deceptive, unlawful and unfair business practices.

Omar Rezec of Sherman Oaks and Ann Belknap of Sierra Madre are suing Sony for its use of rave quotations from David Manning, a fictitious film critic whose quotes made up by the advertising department appeared on ads for films such as ``The Animal'' and ``A Knight's Tale.''

Kyle Nordrehaug of La Jolla-based Blumenthal and Markham, one of the law firms that brought the suit, called the ads ``a flat-out lie that misleads the public.

``That type of conduct is strictly prohibited by California law, which says that if someone is going to engage in that kind of practice, then they're required to give up all of the profits that they made from that practice,'' Nordrehaug said.

The suit, filed in Los Angeles Superior Court, asks for all the revenue from ``Hollow Man,'' ``Vertical Limit,'' ``A Knight's Tale'' and ``The Animal'' - movies which were advertised with fake quotes. The lawsuit seeks class action status on behalf of all consumers nationwide who paid to see any of those films.

``The policy behind it is not necessarily that this ad caused these people to waste their money,'' Nordrehaug said. ``The point that the Legislature's decided is that if we allow people to get away with this, then what's to stop them from doing it every time?

``How far do we go down this slope? Eventually, could they tell us Tom Cruise is in a movie when he's not in the movie? Where do we draw the line? So the Legislature's decided that a lie is a lie.''

Sony declined to comment on the suit Friday. The studio also refused to identify the two advertising executives who have been disciplined with 30-day, unpaid suspensions over the fake critic fiasco.

While there have been some incidents of movie ads employing fake quotes in the past, they have been of a clearly satirical nature and not paired with actual critics' quotes. The Manning deception was discovered last week by Newsweek reporter John Horn who, while researching a story on movie ad blurbs, could not get the existence of Manning confirmed by other studios' marketing departments.

Sony claimed Manning wrote for the weekly Ridgefield Press in suburban Connecticut. No David Manning has ever reviewed films for the Ridgefield Press, and Connecticut State Attorney General Richard Blumenthal is investigating the situation.

Jeff Blake, president of worldwide marketing and distribution for Sony's Columbia TriStar Motion Picture Group, said in a statement issued late Thursday that ``a new system of checks and balances involving both the publicity and advertising departments is being put into place to ensure the accuracy of quotes contained in future advertising campaigns and to prevent this from happening again.''