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Legal Advice courtesy of David Surgess

I think the author's lawyers are trying to limit your copyright in the work by giving you license to produce your work under the conditions you have stated - i.e. as a non-profit making film. It would seem that they are doing this to protect their rights to exploit the work commercially in the future. Without this you would have copyright on your film / script to which they would have no claim.

Re the agreement. The simplest way - assuming you are happy to cede your underlying rights to the project - would be to write these conditions up: eg....We the producers of...(Name of film). hereby acknowledge that we grant all underlying rights to our production based on the work ...(name of book) by (author) to the author and undertake that we will not seek to exploit in any way (you should probably reserve the right to use the film for your personal promotional purposes eg. showreels etc) the production except for with the express permission of the author or his/her authorised agents.

We are grateful to the author for his/her permission to adapt the literary work for the purpose of the production - subject the above conditions - and undertake that any profits (are you taking any expenses out here? If so state) derived from the making, distribution or public exhibition of the production will be returned to the author for distribution to his/her named charity.

Signed (all producers / script writers)

Dated:

Signed by Author (or agent)

Dated:

Keep copies!!

I'm not a lawyer, and the above is based on my personal knowledge as a media professional and is not to be taken as legal advice, but given that this is going to be checked by the author's lawyers a 1 page agreement should suffice. The questions you must ask yourself is are you happy to give away all rights or do you want to try and negotiate the retention of future exploitation of your work? If the former then sign - if the latter then you need to re-think this agreement. I would always advise getting your final draft agreement checked by your own lawyers (or at least read by someone with specialist legal knowledge - from you email you are in a college - is there a law department?)