I can confirm that RU.08 is absolutely right about the Telecine process. I just finished reading two books about the it because I wanted to better understand how the pros do it (since I’ve been doing a lot of film to digital these days):

and

To quote from the first book:

Low-Contrast Print

A low-contrast, or lo-con, print is a special print for telecine transfer, made by printing onto low-contrast stock.
The characteristics of this film stock intentionally reduce the contrast range, making it more suitable for the video system. Because the entire contrast range is shifted, lo-con prints are difficult to evaluate by direct projection; they have a washed-out look in a viewing room or theater. Video transfer prints of feature films and virtually all prints of film-produced television series programs are lo-con prints because these prints produce the best results in video transfer.

… Theatrical release prints are less than ideal for telecine transfer because they are high-density, full-contrast prints optimized for theater projection.

It’s easy to forget that (in the 80s and 90s) all TVs were CRT and they just didn’t have the color and contrast range of modern televisions. Converting film for NTSC and PAL broadcast safe colors and limited contrast was the #1 priority.