criterionforum.org

Faux Hulot wrote:

unclehulot wrote:So Criterion would want to spend time and money on a title, only to have their transfer ripped off....I don't think so.

Tell that to Mr. Arkadin.

That's evidence that Criterion is planning an all out PD line?? Am I missing something? If Criterion issues "The Stranger" then I can see where you're going.

Pardon my ignorance, but how does a film become "public domain"? Are these just films without owner/s of rights over the film's distribution? Or the states claims the films and lets anyone distribute them?

kblz wrote:I don't believe any of the current versions contain the complete cut of the film (or does one?).

Depends what you mean by "complete cut". The Laserlight DVD has appalling picture quality but I'm pretty sure it's got the complete American version of the film (except for a missing couple of seconds at a reel change -- it's obviously transferred from a worn print). I don't think it lacks any scenes that were on Columbia's laserdisc, at least. Anyway, the American version and the European version of Beat the Devil are quite different and both contain scenes that are not in the other, so what we really need is a disc that contains both versions.

cinephrenic wrote:Pardon my ignorance, but how does a film become "public domain"? Are these just films without owner/s of rights over the film's distribution? Or the states claims the films and lets anyone distribute them?

Before 1978, the Copyright Act had a two-term system: you received a copyright for X years and after that term ended, you had the right to renew your copyright for Y years. (The length of X and Y were repeatedly extended.) Any copyright that was not renewed fell into the public domain. In 1973, 85% of copyright holders failed to renew their copyrights.

In 1978, the renewal system was abandoned for works copyrighted in 1978 or later, and the term became life of the author plus 50 years (or 75 years for anything copyrighted by a corporation). Then in 1992, the renewal system was abandoned completely, and pre-1978 works still under copyright were given the life-plus-50 term. Now nobody has to renew anything.

This is a long way of saying that many works that are public domain are older titles where someone forgot to renew the copyright, or screwed it up somehow. And since the renewal system is no longer in place, nothing falls into the public domain anymore because the copyright continues automatically, even if you don't want it anymore.

unclehulot wrote:

Faux Hulot wrote:

unclehulot wrote:So Criterion would want to spend time and money on a title, only to have their transfer ripped off....I don't think so.

Tell that to Mr. Arkadin.

That's evidence that Criterion is planning an all out PD line?? Am I missing something?

Who said anything about an all-out PD line? I just mean that they've already issued a laserdisc of Arkadin, and I've heard rumors of a forthcoming DVD (wasn't there talk of a commentary having already been recorded for it?), so obviously they don't mind occasionally tackling PD titles. Plus, I just hope to ever see a decent-quality print of Arkadin in this lifetime.

jedgeco thanks!

Addendum to jedgeco's post: before 1978, you were required to put a copyright notice on the work itself (book, film, whatever) for copyright to apply. Many pre-1978 films that are now in the public domain (such as Charade and Night of the Living Dead) became public domain because no copyright notice appeared in the film itself. In 1978 the system was revised so that a copyright notice was no longer required so long as the work was formally registered; in 1989 the U.S. signed onto the Paris revisions of the Berne Convention, which require neither a notice nor a formal registration. This, combined with the abandonment of the renewal system, means it's pretty much impossible for something to accidentally fall into the public domain due to negligence or incompetence on the part of the rights holder.

Can use a clip from Charade in my own film? (can I use a clip from restored criterion version as well?)

imiba wrote:Can use a clip from Charade in my own film? (can I use a clip from restored criterion version as well?)

This is not legal advice, but (ignoring fair use issues) yes to the first question and no to the second. If Charade is in the public domain, you are free to use it as you wish. However, even if a film is in the public domain, the restoration done by Criterion (or whoever) is still copyrighted.

Put another way, the underlying movie has no protection - if you acquired a print, you could put a clip in your movie, or do your own transfer and sell it on DVD, or do your own restoration if you wanted. But the work that goes into a restoration is a derivative work of the original and can be copyrighted as such. (As an analogy, anyone is free to make a recording of Beethoven's 9th, but that doesn't mean you can buy a copy of the London Symphony Orchestra's performance and start selling bootleg copies.)

Again, this is not legal advice, and if this is more than a hypothetical question, you should seriously consult a lawyer before doing anything.

Is there a website that has the films that are currently public domain? That would help greatly reduce the random speculation going on on this thread.

thanks. All the cheaper editions of Charade don't seem to be restored, so they must have been simply copied from some source. I wonder what/ where that source is.

dx23 wrote:Is there a website that has the films that are currently public domain? That would help greatly reduce the random speculation going on on this thread.

There are a number of public domain film archives that have their catalogs online, which might give an idea of what's out there. But the government does not maintain a registry of copyrights like it does for patents and trademarks, so it is unlikely that anyone ever has (or could) compile a comprehensive list.

pzman84 wrote:I would like to see a Film Noir Box Set with Detour, DOA, the Big Combo and other public domain titles. I already know there is one with Detour and DOA but it is not Criterion (not even Kino or Koch Lorber).

You're probably thinking of the Questar 5 Film Noir Killer Classics set. The set also includes the Stranger, Scarlett Street and Killer Bait. Transfer aren't great but it is a great value for the money.

I have been told that some of the CC films are Public Domain and that it is legal to copy/sell/trade them for anyone. I googled "public domain movies" and realized that many of the CC films are listed as public domain - i.e. MR. ARKADIAN aka CONFIDENTIAL REPORT 1955 soon to be released on CC. Can someone confirm this?

hammock wrote:I have been told that some of the CC films are Public Domain and that it is legal to copy/sell/trade them for anyone. I googled "public domain movies" and realized that many of the CC films are listed as public domain - i.e. MR. ARKADIAN aka CONFIDENTIAL REPORT 1955 soon to be released on CC. Can someone confirm this?

Just for openers, commentary tracks on such DVD aren't in public domain. Try as you might, you'll never find a teneble justification for copying CC DVDs for friends.

backstreetsbackalright wrote:

hammock wrote:I have been told that some of the CC films are Public Domain and that it is legal to copy/sell/trade them for anyone. I googled "public domain movies" and realized that many of the CC films are listed as public domain - i.e. MR. ARKADIAN aka CONFIDENTIAL REPORT 1955 soon to be released on CC. Can someone confirm this?

Just for openers, commentary tracks on such DVD aren't in public domain. Try as you might, you'll never find a teneble justification for copying CC DVDs for friends.

See my prior post regarding Charade, but short answer, while the underlying film my not be copyrighted, the DVD package (including the transfer) would be copyrighted to Criterion. You can find a print, do your own transfer, and put out your own DVD, but you can't legally copy and sell Criterion's work to someone else.

to not only see a list of public domain films, but also to download at many different levels of quality, go here. they have almost dvd quality mpeg versions of night of the living dead, charade, and carnival of souls for sure, but there are many others too.

the archive.org website also has loads of public domain documents, and music too.

jedgeco wrote:See my prior post regarding Charade, but short answer, while the underlying film my not be copyrighted, the DVD package (including the transfer) would be copyrighted to Criterion.

Transfers cannot be copyrighted unless they significantly change the image in some way (e.g. I recall hearing of a court case where it was decided that transfers that had been panned and scanned were subject to copyright). Certainly the menus, the subtitles (if they did an original translation) and other original elements of a public domain film put out by Criterion would be subject to copyright, but it would be legal to rip a transfer of such a film from a Criterion DVD and burn copies of it (of course, you'd have to remove the Criterion logo at the front, since that too would be subject to copyright), and this has been done by public domain companies with the Carnival of Souls and Most Dangerous Game transfers.

Be warned, though, IANAL and TINLA.

I am not a lawyer?

This is not lawyer advice?

WDYJSOWYWTS?

foofighters7 wrote:WDYJSOWYWTS?

I guess I just wanted to impress the popular kids and feel like a man.

solaris72 wrote:Transfers cannot be copyrighted unless they significantly change the image in some way (e.g. I recall hearing of a court case where it was decided that transfers that had been panned and scanned were subject to copyright). Certainly the menus, the subtitles (if they did an original translation) and other original elements of a public domain film put out by Criterion would be subject to copyright, but it would be legal to rip a transfer of such a film from a Criterion DVD and burn copies of it (of course, you'd have to remove the Criterion logo at the front, since that too would be subject to copyright), and this has been done by public domain companies with the Carnival of Souls and Most Dangerous Game transfers.

Thanks Solaris72! This was exactly what I was told and I just couldn't believe my own ears, but this makes sense to me. Thank you SncDthMnky
for the excellent link!

solaris72 wrote:Transfers cannot be copyrighted unless they significantly change the image in some way (e.g. I recall hearing of a court case where it was decided that transfers that had been panned and scanned were subject to copyright).

Yes, I assumed that CC's restoration work would constitute a signficant change to the image that would be copyrightable, but I could be wrong about that. Not to get too geeky, but I was thinking of Justice Stevens's dissent in the recent case challenging the Copyright Extension Act where he noted "And, of course, any original expression in the restoration and preservation of movies will receive new copyright protection." But if others are ripping off CC's transfers, then some other courts might have found differently.

Just a quick question not pertaining to Criterion.... But I nopticed that a lot of the old MGM titles have gone to WB... Does that have to do with MGM not renewing their copyright? or what? Because 2001: A Spacee Oddyssey, The Wizard of Oz, and How The Grinch Stole Christmas were all on MGM DVd... Then WB came out with them.

LightBulbFilm wrote: ... I nopticed that a lot of the old MGM titles have gone to WB... Does that have to do with MGM not renewing their copyright? or what? Because 2001: A Spacee Oddyssey, The Wizard of Oz, and How The Grinch Stole Christmas were all on MGM DVd... Then WB came out with them.

Doesn't that have more to do with Warner's acquisition of the majority of MGM's library when Ted Turner was brought into the AOL Time Warner family.

LightBulbFilm wrote: I nopticed that a lot of the old MGM titles have gone to WB... Does that have to do with MGM not renewing their copyright? or what? Because 2001: A Spacee Oddyssey, The Wizard of Oz, and How The Grinch Stole Christmas were all on MGM DVd... Then WB came out with them.

Ted Turner purchased the MGM catalog in the 80s, which then passed to Warner when Turner merged with Time Warner. It has nothing to do with the copyright status.