skyjedi2005 said:

Well that sucks that leaves the film all but lost and no film level restoration can ever be done. Just a video restoration. No wonder its stuck at 1080P.

Having to actually use release prints that is shocking.

Even if only for sections. So what the other sources the IP/IN were unusable?

I suppose what was used to strike the original release prints is in worse or similar shape to the camera negative.

Even if the separation masters were in relatively good shape there would have been no guarantee that it would have saved the day.

A sizable portion of the original negative of Superman The Movie had been lost and had to be salvaged by using the separation elements but it did not yield 100% accurate results:

There was a big chunk that was a dupe negative section, when
Lex Luthor pulls the Kryptonite out of the case all the way until he pushes
Superman into the pool. The original cut negative had been damaged by some lab, and somewhere someone combined YCM separations to make the dupe section. The colors were slightly out of registration. We never did find the negative for that. There was a dupe section for all of that and then there was
damage in other places, torn frames, stuff like that which had been backed by
mylar They would put clear mylar on the back of the negative so that the tear
wouldn't pull any farther and it would hold the film together. "

http://movies.groups.yahoo.com/group/mohenryfanclub/message/298?l=1