Quentin Tarantino's lawsuit against Gawker dismissed by federal judge

LOS ANGELES, April 23 (UPI) -- A California judge dismissed Quentin Tarantino's lawsuit against Gawker for linking to a leaked script of the director's planned film The Hateful Eight.

Judge John F. Walter of the Central District of California said Tuesday that the Oscar-winning filmmaker failed to prove that Gawker's post was an act of direct copyright infringement. Walter gave Tarantino's attorney until May 1 to amend his arguments and refile the complaint.

While Gawker did not post the script to its own site, Tarantino's attorney claims the site's post encouraged audiences to read it and that the script would not have been widely accessible if Gawker hadn't linked to it.

The 51-year-old director sued the publication in January claiming that it went out of its way to publish the script in its entirety rather than reporting the fact that it had been leaked.

The Django Unchained writer and director said he only gave the script to six people before it leaked and Gawker encouraged audiences to read it.

"Gawker Media has made a business of predatory journalism, violating people’s rights to make a buck," Tarantino says in his lawsuit "This time they went too far."

Although Tarantino said he would shelve the Western following the leak, he held a three-hour live reading of the script over the weekend and told the audience he would make some changes to the story.