Wallace Reid

[drednm]

My restoration of the Wallace Reid film The Valley of the Giants (1919) will get its first big screen showing at the Autry Museum of the American West in Los Angele on Feb. 11.

https://theautry.org/events/film/silent ... iants-1919

[EP Millstone]

My restoration of the Wallace Reid film The Valley of the Giants (1919) will get its first big screen showing at the Autry Museum of the American West in Los Angele on Feb. 11.

A tragic footnote about The Valley of the Giants: it was the movie that led to Wallace Reid's fatal addiction to morphine.

[drednm]

And the irony is that the train accident that injured Reid as they were transporting crew and equipment to the lumber camp in Korbel, Calif. was virtually re-created in the film because it was part of the storyline. And so Reid had to re-live the nightmare.....

[scsu1975]

My restoration of the Wallace Reid film The Valley of the Giants (1919) will get its first big screen showing at the Autry Museum of the American West in Los Angele on Feb. 11.

I'd be curious to know more about the restoration process. Since the film was in the Gosfilmofond in Russia, how does it get to the Library of Congress? And once here, how do you obtain rights to the film? Thanks.

[txfilmfan]

My restoration of the Wallace Reid film The Valley of the Giants (1919) will get its first big screen showing at the Autry Museum of the American West in Los Angele on Feb. 11.

I'd be curious to know more about the restoration process. Since the film was in the Gosfilmofond in Russia, how does it get to the Library of Congress? And once here, how do you obtain rights to the film? Thanks.

Any film made in 1919 is in the public domain in the US, so there are no longer any rights to the original film.

[scsu1975]

The Library of Congress lists the Famous Players-Lasky Corporation as the Copyright Claimant for Valley of the Giants. I assume the corporation no longer exists. So was Lasky claimant for a time, and then the copyright expired? I assume that is the case.

[txfilmfan]

The Library of Congress lists the Famous Players-Lasky Corporation as the Copyright Claimant for Valley of the Giants. I assume the corporation no longer exists. So was Lasky claimant for a time, and then the copyright expired? I assume that is the case.

Copyrights aren't indefinite. Current expiration is 95 years (but it's a bit more complicated than that, due to various extensions that were made to copyright laws over the past 50 years and when the original copyright was issued). By default, any film copyrighted and exhibited prior to 1928 is now in the public domain in the US. Each year a new set of films enters the public domain.

Complications can arise (w.r.t. public domain) if the underlying work (play, short story, novel, etc) on which the film is based is still protected. The score/soundtrack can also be separately protected. This is why you'll see a PD film released with a different soundtrack sometimes. A company did this with some old John Wayne films, where the film was colorized, the dialogue was re-recorded with a Wayne sound-alike and a new score was provided.

Famous Players, as I understand it, eventually got folded into Paramount.

[jamesjazzguitar]

The Library of Congress lists the Famous Players-Lasky Corporation as the Copyright Claimant for Valley of the Giants. I assume the corporation no longer exists. So was Lasky claimant for a time, and then the copyright expired? I assume that is the case.

Copyrights aren't indefinite. Current expiration is 95 years (but it's a bit more complicated than that, due to various extensions that were made to copyright laws over the past 50 years and when the original copyright was issued). By default, any film copyrighted and exhibited prior to 1928 is now in the public domain in the US. Each year a new set of films enters the public domain.

Complications can arise (w.r.t. public domain) if the underlying work (play, short story, novel, etc) on which the film is based is still protected. The score/soundtrack can also be separately protected. This is why you'll see a PD film released with a different soundtrack sometimes. A company did this with some old John Wayne films, where the film was colorized, the dialogue was re-recorded with a Wayne sound-alike and a new score was provided.

Famous Players, as I understand it, eventually got folded into Paramount.

I thought it was 75 years which is why movies from 1948 are now in the public domain. (the classic movie station TCM is having a tribute about these now public domain films).

[txfilmfan]

The Library of Congress lists the Famous Players-Lasky Corporation as the Copyright Claimant for Valley of the Giants. I assume the corporation no longer exists. So was Lasky claimant for a time, and then the copyright expired? I assume that is the case.

Copyrights aren't indefinite. Current expiration is 95 years (but it's a bit more complicated than that, due to various extensions that were made to copyright laws over the past 50 years and when the original copyright was issued). By default, any film copyrighted and exhibited prior to 1928 is now in the public domain in the US. Each year a new set of films enters the public domain.

Complications can arise (w.r.t. public domain) if the underlying work (play, short story, novel, etc) on which the film is based is still protected. The score/soundtrack can also be separately protected. This is why you'll see a PD film released with a different soundtrack sometimes. A company did this with some old John Wayne films, where the film was colorized, the dialogue was re-recorded with a Wayne sound-alike and a new score was provided.

Famous Players, as I understand it, eventually got folded into Paramount.

I thought it was 75 years which is why movies from 1948 are now in the public domain. (the classic movie station TCM is having a tribute about these now public domain films).

Films from 1948 aren't automatically in the PD. For anything created/registered before 1978, the maximum is 95 years, if it was renewed properly. The latest durations are either: 70 years after the death of an author, or for corporate/"for hire" works, 120 years after creation or 95 years after publication, whichever is shorter.

The Sonny Bono Act, passed in 1998, extended the terms to their current levels.

[drednm]

Copyrights have ended for all American films 1927 and before. The only "control" anyone has over the films in the public domain is if they are in private archives (like Eastman) of if there are donor restrictions (some of these go back to the 1970s) on films that have been donated. If film X has a donor restriction of it, Library of Congress cannot copy/sell it without the donor's permission. If film X is the only print of the film known to exists, that locks it up. If prints exists elsewhere and can be accessed, then they are fair game. Cohen Media Group, Paramount, and Warners (includes MGM films) are famous for their donor restrictions.

In 2010 the Russian archive gifted 10 American films to Library of Congress (those were the days) and The Valley of the Giants was one of them. It had been presumed lost up til then.

Library of Congress sat on the films for years because they all had Cyrillic intertitles. I finally pried Valley out of them this summer since it was obvious they were never going to do anything with it (or any of the films). What the Library got was digital copies made from the 35mm films (who knows when these were made or if the 35mm still exists). Valley was in pretty good shape and needed only a little work on the contrast and such but I suspect there are some bits missing (probably from the 35mm because of decomp). Still, we're lucky to have the film at all.

Another interesting title in the batch is Ramon Novarro's 1924 film The Arab. But I'm not planning on another translation project for a while.

[Allhallowsday]

Fantastic! I have a couple of vintage publicity photos of WALLACE REID.