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Post #684391

Author
TServo2049
Parent topic
Movies with wrong color grading *** UPDATED ***
Link to post in topic
https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/684391/action/topic#684391
Date created
19-Jan-2014, 12:06 PM

The catch-22 is that if all these films were public domain, we wouldn't get these 4K original-negative restorations of them. The studios would still have the original materials, but would probably be unwilling to loan them out for some outside release that wouldn't make any money for them.

Culturally significant old PD films do sometimes get great restorations, but also keep in mind that films whose copyrights lapsed in the States, like Metropolis and the British Hitchcock films, always looked like absolute shit until we got restorations bankrolled by the German or British rights-holders.

It's certainly a double-edged sword, but the modern near-perpetuity copyrights at least keep them secured under the control of deep-pocketed entities that can fund restorations.

It's not the studio who is to blame in this case - it's the director, and that has nothing to do with copyright, and everything to do with how prominent directors are given control to tweak their earlier works due to their high regard in the industry and the film culture.