Song -> Film screenplay rights?

Hello guys, I am a student of film directing and I have to do an exercise which is to direct a short film (and write a screenplay for it).

I always loved a song from some band and I thought it has a great potential to be made into short film.
What I want to do is film my own interpretation of this song and also use some lines from the lyrics in the screenplay. Do I have to ask the writer of the song for permission to create this film? I am filming this just for the exercise and to show it to my mentor, not publicly (except college vimeo page). I won't be sending it to festivals, since I have no rights from the writer of the song. I have absolutely no intention to earn any money from this film. I am just a huge fan of band & song and want to create my interpretation of song for college means. Of course, the song writer and band would have all the credits and in the end it would also say that the story is inspired by this song.

Do I still need the rights from the song writer to film this?
 
Hello guys, I am a student of film directing and I have to do an exercise which is to direct a short film (and write a screenplay for it).

I always loved a song from some band and I thought it has a great potential to be made into short film.
What I want to do is film my own interpretation of this song and also use some lines from the lyrics in the screenplay. Do I have to ask the writer of the song for permission to create this film? I am filming this just for the exercise and to show it to my mentor, not publicly (except college vimeo page). I won't be sending it to festivals, since I have no rights from the writer of the song. I have absolutely no intention to earn any money from this film. I am just a huge fan of band & song and want to create my interpretation of song for college means. Of course, the song writer and band would have all the credits and in the end it would also say that the story is inspired by this song.

Do I still need the rights from the song writer to film this?

Yes
 
The owner of the right to copy (copyright) holds that right regardless
of your intent. Money isn't the issue - the rights of the owner is. So
technically you cannot use their material without permission. Ask
your mentor what the college's standards are for a project like this.
In some cases permission may not be needed from the copyright holder.
Ask about vimeo's rules regarding copyrighted material. Perhaps you
can us the song for your class exercise but not put it on the college
vimeo page.
 
Technically I'm sure you do, but you only need to look at YouTube to see how freely people use lyrics/footage from copyrighted material.. and a lot of those DO make money off it. If you made the film and put it on YouTube with the entire song as background audio, chances are nobody would care, or even notice. If you're just going to use a couple of lines from the lyrics, and show it to a handful of people in college, I doubt you have much to fear.

Please note, though, that I am not a law-talking guy...

EDIT: The advice above is probably the best: ask the college. If nothing else, you don't want to fail for not following the correct procedure in that circumstance!
 
Ok I'll ask the mentor, but still, I'll most likely just get idea of this film being made out of my mind and make another film. Getting rights from everyone would probably take way too much time and I don't have that much of it. Also, I have no idea how to get in contact with any of them (musicians, record company). I would most likely get permission from the songwriter (as much as I know him) but not from the record company.

Also, how come are there so many unnoficial music videos on Youtube for songs?
 
Yes, there are many parodies indeed, but also so called "unnoficial music videos" that also rank very high and contain music of famous bands. I don't believe that they actually ask anyone for permission to do it. Youtube then either blocks the video, allows it, or just types under the video who is the owner of the song. Youtube is very hard to understand when it comes to copyrights (at least for me).
 
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