Tom Cruise's 'The Last Samurai' wins plagiarism case

PA Images / Ian West/PA Wire

Producers and writers Marshall Herskovitz and Ed Zwick have won in a court trial after accusations of stealing the script for the Tom Cruise drama The Last Samurai.

Aaron and Matthew Benay filed suit in 2005 against the producers claiming that it was based on their script, also titled The Last Samurai. The brothers alleged that they submitted the screenplay in 2000 to Bedford Falls, Herskovitz and Zwick's production company, three years before The Last Samurai was released.

Both iterations of the script are about an American war veteran who trains the Japanese Imperial Army in the methods of Western warfare.

Lead Tom Cruise, who is set to star in Rock of Ages, was also an executive producer on the project.

During the trial, which was held on Friday (April 6), Zwick and Herskovitz maintained that they had never heard of the Benay brothers' script until they were filming their own movie.

The Hollywood Reporter states that after a seven-day trial,! a jury has ruled in favour of Zwick and Herskovitz, stating that the script was never submitted as the Benays have said.

"Ed and I are extremely relieved," Herskovitz said after the trial, "It's hard to live under a cloud of false accusations for so many years. The fact that the jury said we never even saw the script - justice has been done."

Zwick and Herskovitz most recently collaborated together on the Jake Gyllenhaal comedy drama Love and Other Drugs. Their upcoming project is the whaling drama In the Heart of the Sea.

Watch the trailer for Love and Other Drugs below: