An update:
I *finally* heard back from the guy who won the auction on this 16mm film. I had suspected that maybe the reason he never responded to anyone was that he's from France and may not know English, and I think I was right. His English is not very legible.
However, from what I am able to understand of what he wrote, he got robbed. He sent the money by PayPal right when the auction ended, and then the seller seems to have disappeared. I think. I am going to write him back in French to see if I can get him to clarify more details. My patchy French will probably be better than his English appears to be.
To be continued...
--SKot