It amazes me how the Asylum can make movies like 'Transmorphers' and 'The Day The Earth Stopped' without getting into serious legal trouble. Do these movies even make money?
I seem to remember reading that 20th Century Fox, or whichever studio produced the "Day That Stood Still" remake w/Keanu Reeves, filed a cease-and-desist order against the Asylum over their "Day The Earth Stopped" flick but I don't know if anything ever came of it. Maybe the "real" studio watched the Asylum version and decided it wasn't worth going to all the lega trouble...
Also, awhile ago after Asylum's "Battle: Los Angeles" ripoff, "Battle
Of Los Angeles," (note the "Of" in the title, people... totally different movie!) aired on SyFy Channel, it turned up in the On Demand offerings on my Cable TV under the new title "
Attack: Los Angeles".... I can only assume that the makers of the "real" movie must've made a few phone calls and forced a name change....
As for whether or not they make money, the Asylum's web site claims that they've never lost money on a film... most of their flicks cost less than a million (most are somewhere between a quarter million to half a million budget, I believe) so between RedBox rentals and selling broadcast rights to the SyFy Channel they seem to have got a pretty good racket going.