Ahead of its long-delayed American premiere, an unfinished 'workprint' copy of "A Minecraft Movie" is circulating on pirate sites. Warner Bros. is trying to contain this and other leaks, but that may prove difficult. The incident mirrors the infamous 2009 X-Men Origins: Wolverine workprint leak and the involvement of the FBI, which led to the arrest and conviction of an uploader. The source of that leak was never publicly disclosed.

cgiMore than a decade ago, Mojang Studios announced that it was working on a Minecraft movie together with Warner Bros.

The film had been scheduled for a 2022 release, but was delayed due to the COVID-19 pandemic among other factors.

Today, ‘A Minecraft Movie‘ will finally see its American box office premiere. While it’s too early to say whether it will be a blockbuster hit, the film already has the dubious honor of being linked to an extremely rare event; the leak of an unfinished copy of the movie which is now circulating on pirate sites.

It’s not uncommon for popular films to leak online during their theatrical windows. Pirated copies often appear as ‘cam’ or ‘telesync’ releases; both are recorded directly from cinema screens, with the latter’s direct audio the main difference. The Minecraft film is already available online in these formats, seemingly originating from countries where the film has already premiered, as the Ukrainian and French dubs suggest.

‘Workprint’ leak

Circulating alongside these typical pirate releases is a much more unusual leak; an unfinished workprint copy of the movie with its CGI at least partially missing. The copy has an English audio track and is clearly associated with a source with direct links to the movie production chain.

The differences between the unfinished and finished copies are obvious, as the examples below show.

‘Workprint’ leak

minecraft unfinished
While Minecraft is not known for its real-life imagery, the final product – as shown in other leaked releases – is definitely more polished.

‘Finished’ leak

finished
For anyone seriously interested in enjoying movies, these low-quality pirated copies are unwatchable. And that’s on top of the usual legal concerns associated with pirating movies.

Warner Bros. Takedowns

Poor quality or not, Warner Bros. will do whatever it can to limit the spread of these early leaks. The movie studio has sent out several DMCA takedown requests already, including the one below received by Google yesterday.

Takedown notice

warner takedown
The notice above contains various links to sites that posted copies of the leaked film, including cammed versions and the workprint. This list of links is just the tip of the iceberg, as the film is circulating across hundreds of websites now.

The unfinished leak isn’t expected to keep many people away from movie theaters, but it does raise another concern. How was it possible for a workprint to leak and then offered to the public for download? Could it even happen again?

The Wolverine Workprint

These are questions that have to be answered and given what’s at stake, the FBI may be involved already. The same happened when a workprint copy of X-Men Origins: Wolverine leaked in 2009.

The FBI eventually identified Gilberto Sanchez, a glass installer and musician from The Bronx, as a suspect. Sanchez had uploaded the film to Megaupload and pleaded guilty, resulting in a 12-month prison sentence.

Sanchez has always denied being the source of the workprint leak, however, insisting that he purchased a bootleg DVD of the workprint for $5 on the street in New York. The post-production studio from where the workprint copy leaked was never named.

Whether this time will be different is unknown, but the Wolverine case shows that those further down the ‘leak’ chain are far from safe when the stakes are high.

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