The estate of William Faulkner is suing Sony over a line in Woody Allen's Midnight in Paris movie.

According to news reports, film star Owen Wilson loosely quotes a line from Faulkner's 1950 book, Requiem for a Nun. Wilson says, "The past is not dead. Actually, it's not even past. You know who said that? Faulkner. And he was right. And I met him, too. I ran into him at a dinner party." Faulkner's often quoted line actually said, "The past is never dead. It's not even past."

Despite attributing the line to the Nobel Prize laureate, Faulkner Literary Rights, which represents Faulkner's estate, is suing on the grounds that Sony did not have the "consent to appropriate William Faulkner's name or his works for Sony's advantage" and that the studio's "actions in distributing the Infringing Film were malicious, fraudulent, deliberate and/or willful."

The estate is suing for copyright infringement and is asking for "damages, disgorgement of profits, costs and attorneys fees."  Midnight in Paris is Woody Allen's highest-grossing film, with box-office returns of $151 million worldwide.

"This is a frivolous lawsuit and we are confident we will prevail in defending it," the studio said in a statement. Sony is defending the quotation as "fair use" under copyright law.

—Source: CNNEntertainment