Shira,

Thanks for bringing this to my attention. I used you website as a resource while I was in Pre-production on my film, so thank you so much for having such a wonderful resource! I did see about the documentary that you are referring to, but I thought the title was “Belly: Overcoming Bulimia”. Either way, after researching it, I don’t think there will be in conflicts with both of these films having the same title. It is impossible to copyright a title. The larger studios, do register their titles and there is lawsuits all the time about titles and copyright infringement, and laws of unfair competition. But these usually only have to do with titles that are household names, like Star Wars. “Laws of unfair competition” are the only thing for me to be concerned about and they more have to do with similar movies coming out at the same time that may be confused for one another other. There are a few similarities with our films, like belly dancing, but there are more differences. Theirs is a short film, mine is a feature, theirs is mostly about bulimia, mine is all about the personal experience of being a belly dancer, and most importantly theirs was released 14 years ago in 1995, and mine will be released in 2008 or 2009. Also both of our films have different target markets, and paths of distribution.

I do think it is important to consider ALL these things as a performer and film-maker, so I do appreciate your “heads up”.