Obviously the production company but assume a bunch of friends get together and make a film. Assume a producer (funder), director, scriptwriter, actors and camera operator. Do they all own the copyright in common or only the producer or someone else?
There can be multiple copyrights and multiple works, some of which are derivative works of others. For instance, the scriptwriter will have a copyright on the script, which was then used to produce the performance which is separately copyrighted.
For most movies, there’s a “work for hire”. If you hire the set painter and the actors and the musician, then (unless the contract says otherwise) you own the final product. that’s why there are not a thousand background painters and inbetweeners claiming copyright on “Snow White”.
IIRC, IANAL, if a group of “artists” collaborate on a work, absent any specific agreement, they own a share of the copyright. Anyone seeking to use that work would have to get agreement from all owners.
There’s a recent article on the ownership of some characters, like Iron Man. Suddenly these Marvel characters created for peanuts in the 60’s are worth serious bucks. I think (IANA Real Geek) it was Jack Kirby who possibly created some of the Marvel Characters, Stan Lee claimed some creative concept input, and Marvel claims “work for hire”, and possibly it was a different artist for some charaters. Basically, I think the law was changed to recognize essential creative input when an artist delivers fully developed works, or something like that. If the contracted artist shows up with a fully developed character - “Here’s my hero Turtle-Man, in his first 3 adventures - do you like it?” - then the work provided goes beyond work for hire.
If they don’t have a contract that specifies it, then whoever can hire the most/best lawyers.
Not usually in most big Hollywood productions. A one-off company is created to make the movie. (Often the movie title is part of the company name.) The financial backers loan the production company the money and at the end they are paid back with a finished film. The copyright is transferred to the new owners, usually the studio. This gives the studio a layer of legal protection when something goes wrong. Best of all, the company that made the movie dissolves and is really hard to sue once it’s gone.
Figure out the person or corporation that’s going to own the copyright. Have everyone else sign a waiver. Get a lawyer to draw up the right papers.
This unfortunately is the best answer.
You can have multiple copyrights on a collaborative effort, but the law doesn’t want to be in the position of deciding who did what. Realistically, somebody in the group should register the copyright and those forms will state who the copyright owner or owners might be.
The Copyright Office pdf on the subject, Copyright Registration for Motion Pictures, doesn’t even mention other scenarios. It does mention that the screenplay is considered separately, but neither the movie nor the screenplay is a derivative work of the other. That doesn’t apply here, and is a technical term of art.
If this isn’t a hypothetical question, then see a good Intellectual Property lawyer. But remember that without having registered the copyright your rights for redress are limited and laughable.