Koos Kombuis Plays Small but Critical Role in Tess Gerritsen Suing Warner Bros Over Gravity

A blog post Koos Kombuis wrote back in January for Channel24 about the similarities between the film Gravity and Tess Gerritsen’s novel of the same name has proved prescient, as the Chinese-American author is pursuing legal action against Warner Bros., makers of the film.

The film, a science fiction thriller starring George Clooney and Sandra Bullock, won seven Oscars, including a Best Director gong for Alfonso Cuarón, and a Golden Globe, also for Best Director. In his January article for Channel24, Kombuis calls it “one of the best damn movies that had ever been made”. However, a chance purchase in a second hand bookshop raised his suspicions that the film’s premise might not be an original one:

Then something happened which, unfortunately, completely changed the way I saw the film.

I bought a paperback. In a small Book Exchange in, of all places, Jeffrey’s Bay. A novel by Tess Gerritsen, also called Gravity.

I have read other books by Gerritsen. She is an accomplished author, and her books have been translated into many languages. Yet after reading the book, Gravity, I must admit I felt cheated. Cheated, not by Gerritsen, but by the guys in Hollywood.

• Complete article: Channel24

Kombuis goes on to say of the incident: “In my mind, this could very well be one of the most blatant and brazen acts of plagiarism ever seen in Hollywood!”

Despite Gerritsen’s response in September 2010 – “I have to admit, these coincidences do happen sometimes” – she released a statement in April confirming that she was planning legal action.

At the time, Ms. Gerritsen was unaware of any connection between those persons responsible for the film and those who had worked to develop her novel into a film. Ms. Gerritsen believed that as improbable as it appeared, it was at least within the realm of possibility that an independent storyteller could come up with the same specific setting, character, situation, and give it an identical title.

Then, in February 2014, Ms. Gerritsen received startling new information from a reliable source. She was told that at least one individual who was key to the development of the film Gravity had also been connected to her project while it was in development, and would have been familiar with her novel.

• Complete article: tessgerritsen.com

As the case slowly progresses, Gerritsen has written to Kombuis thanking him for “speaking his mind” when even she did not believe the accusations, and the two authors have been discussing the case on Twitter. Kombuis tells Books LIVE the incident “has got me really excited”, especially “to have received a letter from the great author herself!”

This is not the first international literary incident Kombuis has found himself involved in this year. He recently unknowlingly caused Cambridge students “sheer terror”, when they were faced with his “Tipp-Ex-Sonate” – a poem without words written in protest against apartheid censorship laws – in their exams.

• Read: Cambridge Students Filled with “Sheer Terror” by Koos Kombuis Protest Poem With No Words

Book details

• I-Tjieng: ‘n GPS vir verdwaalde siele by Koos Kombuis
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  EAN: 9780143538462
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• Gravity by Tess Gerritsen
  EAN: 9780671016777
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