Deep Throat lawsuit threatens to swallow Lovelace biopic whole

Deep Throat was a notorious 1970s porn film about a sexually rapacious young woman who swallow all her suitors. Now, four decades on from its initial release, Deep Throat appears to be back to its old tricks. Its current mission: to swallow a major Harvey Weinstein-backed motion picture.

Arrow Productions, which owns the rights to Deep Throat, has taken legal action to block the release of Lovelace, a biopic of the porn star Linda Lovelace. The company claims that the new film uses more than five minutes of unlicensed footage from Deep Throat. It seeks an injunction against the distribution and marketing of Lovelace, together with damages of $10m (£6.4m).

Lovelace, which premiered at the Sundance film festival in January, features Mamma Mia! star Amanda Seyfried in the title role, while the supporting cast includes Peter Sarsgaard, Juno Temple and Sharon Stone. The movie is produced by Millennium Films, while the Weinstein Company is in charge of distribution. Lovelace is scheduled to open in the US on Friday and in the UK on 23 August.

Linda Lovelace became a household name following the break-out success of 1972's Deep Throat, which went on to earn an estimated $600m at the box office. In the 1980s, however, she turned her back on the industry to become a vocal campaigner against pornography. "When you see the movie Deep Throat, you are watching me being raped," she said. "It is a crime that movie is still showing."

Lovelace died at the age of 53 following a car accident in 2002.