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Lost Sound Serial
Topic Started: Mar 7 2018, 02:23 PM (1,163 Views)
MovieMan
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Balcony Gang, Foist Class
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Laughing Gravy
Mar 9 2018, 10:21 PM
A reminder: if anyone sends me a Grood serial, I will burn copies and mail them to any Balconeer, gratis.
You once said you were against movie piracy!
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rodney
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MovieMan
Mar 20 2018, 10:31 AM
Laughing Gravy
Mar 9 2018, 10:21 PM
A reminder: if anyone sends me a Grood serial, I will burn copies and mail them to any Balconeer, gratis.
You once said you were against movie piracy!
At this stage, Serial Squadron are releasing titles that are owned by other companies. They're the pirates.
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MovieMan
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rodney
Mar 20 2018, 10:53 AM
MovieMan
Mar 20 2018, 10:31 AM
Laughing Gravy
Mar 9 2018, 10:21 PM
A reminder: if anyone sends me a Grood serial, I will burn copies and mail them to any Balconeer, gratis.
You once said you were against movie piracy!
At this stage, Serial Squadron are releasing titles that are owned by other companies. They're the pirates.
And nobody here has reported them to the authorities?
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turan38
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rodney
Mar 20 2018, 10:53 AM
MovieMan
Mar 20 2018, 10:31 AM
Laughing Gravy
Mar 9 2018, 10:21 PM
A reminder: if anyone sends me a Grood serial, I will burn copies and mail them to any Balconeer, gratis.
You once said you were against movie piracy!
At this stage, Serial Squadron are releasing titles that are owned by other companies. They're the pirates.
I was under the impression that all of the titles that Squadron offered had fallen into the public domain. Which titles are still in copyright?
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Laughing Gravy
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This is the list Grood sent me of what he believed was and was not in Public Domain. I know he is not an honest person, of course, so take this with a grain of salt. RiddleRider would be the person I'd ask.

Public Domain serials

MovieMan: Nobody gives a shit. But if you want to, go right ahead.
"I'm glad that this question came up, because there are so many ways to answer it that one of them is bound to be right." - Robert Benchley
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rodney
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turan38
Mar 20 2018, 04:50 PM
rodney
Mar 20 2018, 10:53 AM
MovieMan
Mar 20 2018, 10:31 AM
Laughing Gravy
Mar 9 2018, 10:21 PM
A reminder: if anyone sends me a Grood serial, I will burn copies and mail them to any Balconeer, gratis.
You once said you were against movie piracy!
At this stage, Serial Squadron are releasing titles that are owned by other companies. They're the pirates.
I was under the impression that all of the titles that Squadron offered had fallen into the public domain. Which titles are still in copyright?
Eric used to have a pinned post on the message board saying that the only way to legally get most Republic serials on DVD (this was before Olive and Kino started releasing them) was to buy the VHS set and burn a copy for your own personal use. This seems to have changed since he is now releasing tons of Republic product. Unless, of course, he is licensing these titles from Paramount. I don't own any, so I can't say for sure, but I doubt it.

He also claimed that we'd never see any officially released Republic serials on DVD because people were selling copies of them.
Edited by rodney, Mar 21 2018, 04:44 AM.
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CliffClaven
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Am I missing some nuance here? VCI still offers a bunch of Republics and some Universals and Columbias.
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rodney
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Eric always claimed that they were violating copyrights too. As I recall, that was one of the reasons why Gravy created this site.
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Laughing Gravy
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Not exactly... VCI definitely has rights to release the material they've released, though.

I haven't told this story in a long time, but the short version is that Eric was upset that he was submitting material to DVD companies that wasn't being accepted. He claimed Republic "stole" his design for their Cap'n Marvel DVD (which was basically just a revamp of their VHS design) and when VCI rejected his design for The Phantom DVD, he told me to stop reviewing their product because they were "pirates." I ignored him and continued to review whatever the hell I wanted to. He began censoring my stuff and deleting my posts.

The last straw was when he asked me some questions on the forum, I responded, and then he deleted my responses and demanded to know why I hadn't answered him.

Of course, he and I had argued bitterly over what he'd done to The Phantom Empire and whatever that horrible serial was that he took money for "restoring" and made new footage for.
"I'm glad that this question came up, because there are so many ways to answer it that one of them is bound to be right." - Robert Benchley
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turan38
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The copyright situation for serials - and many feature films of the period as well - can be clouded in that many properties were licensed from the owners for a limited period (I believe often 10 years). The studios only foresaw a limited period of remuneration and presumably got a somewhat cheaper price. After the license expired the rights would revert to the licenser, often including the original negative. It would then be up to the original owner to renew the copyright, and not the studio.

The other factor is that there's probably very little commercial value for serials and whether a company would even bother to send a "cease and desist" letter would probably depend on whether they had an in-house or attorney on retainer. In the case of Youtube, and if I remember correctly, a court case ended the rampant practice of studios - without even checking whether they still owned copyright - to routinely require Youtube to remove videos.

For my part Squadron would have to offer a previously unavailable title for me to bite. I've only bought two titles in the past but for me their video scrubbing and audio noise-gating make the DVDs unwatchable.
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Todd 3D
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From what I understand, the lost serial in question is King of the Kongo (the Karloff version). Grood is working on something involving the sound discs. I'm not very clear on what exactly he's doing yet. Frankly, I can't say that I care much anymore. I haven't seen the man in nearly a decade, so he's a non-factor to me. I get that there's people here who still hold massive grudges against him, but I can't bring myself to get that worked up about him or anyone anymore. Will I see his version of King of the Kongo? Who knows? I haven't seen his version of Tarzan the Fearless yet nor any of his silent releases. Somewhere down the line I might, but then again I don't watch serials much anymore. When 39 O 13 died, my love of the format died, too. I still have three sound serials I haven't seen yet, one of which is Dick Tracy's G-Men. I guess I should watch them just because the first serial I saw was Perils of Nyoka and that was 30 years ago this Christmas.
Edited by Todd 3D, Jun 21 2018, 04:21 PM.
"We cannot defend freedom abroad by deserting it at home"--Edward R. Murrow
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turan38
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Film restorer Eric Grayson had already restored one chapter of King of the Kongo under a Kickstarter initiative. As a backer I received a video of the restored chapter. Only one half of each chapter was filmed in sound. Since originally the soundtrack had been missing the film had been edited to delete the talkie reel of each chapter, converting it to an entirely silent film, and one supposedly that made no sense because of the truncation. Frankly, having seen the one restored chapter hasn't motivated me to want to see the rest. The talkie part of the chapter was, well, talky, with nothing happening and the plot seemingly not advanced an iota. As part of the KickStarter, Grayson posted an excerpt of the chapter with before/after footage: //www.youtube.com/watch?v=2vzmYTazBPU
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John Doe
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turan38
Jun 23 2018, 07:14 PM
Only one half of each chapter was filmed in sound. Since originally the soundtrack had been missing the film had been edited to delete the talkie reel of each chapter, converting it to an entirely silent film, and one supposedly that made no sense because of the truncation.
Only a few minutes of each chapter was filmed in sound, part of a reel, in some cases I think it was a section of each of the two reels of the chapter. I don't think the sections w/ audio were removed from what circulates now on video - they are still there but w/o the sound leaving sections where people are obviously talking but w/ no title cards, so you have no idea what they are saying!

I gave copies of the dialog scripts from the NYS script archive to Eric Grayson years ago. The actual dial of is close to, but not exactly as on the scripts. Its close enough that remaining sections of missing dialog could be subtitles. I'd suggest rather than burning them into the video, make them regular subtitles that are on by default.
Edited by John Doe, Jun 24 2018, 06:48 AM.
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Pa Stark
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I don't know which serial it is, but it isn't KING OF THE KONGO, only that it is a Universal.
Honest and Lovable Pa Stark
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