In both the 1974 original and the 2000 remake of Gone in 60 Seconds, a gang of accomplished thieves attempts to steal dozens of classic cars in an implausibly short timeframe. Each car is assigned a code name – a woman's name – because ... well, that's the sort of thing that wheel bandits in a heist movie do. A Corvette becomes "Pamela." A Cadillac Eldorado is "Madeline." And the Ford Mustang? She's "Eleanor."
But is Eleanor just a car with a name or a copyrightable character?
That question was at the heart of a long-running dispute between Denice Halicki, who owns the rights to the Gone in 60 Seconds films, and Carroll Shelby Licensing and Classic Recreations, which began producing customized Mustangs allegedly modeled after Eleanor. Halicki claimed the cars copied Eleanor's distinctive design and character traits in violation of her copyright. She also alleged breach of a prior settlement agreement. The parties sued and countersued.
Last week, the Ninth Circuit rejected Halicki's claims, concluding that Eleanor does not qualify as a character eligible for copyright protection.
Determining whether a character is independently protected by copyright – separate from the copyright in the book, film, or other work in which the character appears – is not always straightforward. Copyright protection does not extend to ideas themselves, only to the original expression of those ideas (17 U.S.C. § 102(b).) At higher levels of abstraction, all fictional characters can be reduced to general archetypes (i.e., ideas) – such as debonair spy, quirky sidekick, or jaded cop. Granting overly broad protection for characters would stifle creativity and limit the use of common storytelling elements. (See this post.) For this reason, copyright protection arises only when a character is developed with sufficient specificity and consistency (typically over multiple works) to transcend generalities. The challenge lies in identifying the point on the spectrum of abstraction where a character's depiction becomes detailed enough to qualify for copyright protection.
To address whether Eleanor was eligible for copyright protection, the Ninth Circuit panel applied the three-part framework set forth in DC Comics v. Towle, 802 F.3d 1012 (9th Cir. 2015). Under the Towle "test," to be protectable, a character must:
- Have "physical as well as conceptual qualities";
- Be sufficiently delineated to be recognizable as the same character across appearances, with consistent, identifiable character traits and attributes; and
- Be "especially distinctive" and contain unique elements of expression.
The court found that Eleanor failed to meet all three prongs.
With respect to the first prong, the panel held that Eleanor lacked conceptual traits like personality, agency, or sentience. The car was always driven by human characters, never acted independently, and was just one of many named cars in the films. As the court put it, "Eleanor is more akin to a prop than a character."
Eleanor failed the second prong because its physical appearance varied significantly over the the films. There were eleven iterations of the car over four films (the original, remake and two sequels), and they included several different models, with different paint jobs, in different conditions (pristine vs. wreck). Despite these differences, Halicki claimed that Eleanor exhibited consistent traits across the films, including that she was "hard to steal," "always incurring severe damage," and "good at evading police" and "surviving spectacular jumps." The court disagreed, finding that many of these alleged traits were not consistently portrayed in the films and, in any event, were "more readily attributable to the films' protagonists driving the cars, not to Eleanor."
As for the third prong, the court held that "nothing distinguishes Eleanor from any number of sports cars appearing in car-centric action films" (cleaned up). Eleanor lacked the distinctiveness of the Batmobile (with its "bat-like appearance," "jet engines and flame-shooting tubes," and "ability to maneuver that far exceeds that of an ordinary car"), which the court in Towle found was protectable as a character. Even the name "Eleanor" was intentionally generic – part of the film's conceit of using women's names as code.
The court's conclusion:
"In sum, Eleanor is not really a character. And even if Eleanor were a character, it is not entitled to copyright protection under Towle."
While the claim that Eleanor was a protectable character was a stretch, it's not hard to come up with other fictional cars that would qualify, including Herbie (The Love Bug), the sentient VW Beetle; Lightning McQueen (Cars), the red race car with a big personality; and Christine (Christine), a 1958 Plymouth Fury with a deadly mind of its own.
But Eleanor? At least according to the Ninth Circuit, she's just a fast car with a name.
Carroll Shelby Licensing, Inc. v. Halicki, __ F.4th __, 2025 WL 1499052 (9th Cir. May 27, 2025)
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