"Ultimate Hitchcock Collection" Public Domain release

Re: "Ultimate Hitchcock Collection" Public Domain release

That's a wonderful question.

The other side of of it should be:

If someone files for GATT and regains their copyright, should they lose it if they do not make any attempt to place people on notice?

There are a number of legitimate distributors which made use of these films before GATT, and when they were in the public domain.

These entities, which played by the rules, and accepted the GATT filing, are now being damaged as they are unable to compete with other companies who ignore GATT.

RAH

Re: "Ultimate Hitchcock Collection" Public Domain release

That's a very good and interesting point.

Synapse Films have gone after a couple PD labels for releasing stuff as PD when in fact Synapse owned them. They are a very small company but it seems like they actually care that there stuff is being ripped off.

If these Hitchcock right owners don't care then there's not much anyone can do. There are certain foreign companies that simply don't care and they don't want to go to the trouble of contracts regarding certain titles so they simply took their films and passed them around to bootleg traders. Some of the smaller studios have asked these producers for the rights but the producer refuse. The guy in question is a VERY rich man who doesn't care about the films so instead of releasing them officially, he took a short cut and passed them around to traders.

Re: "Ultimate Hitchcock Collection" Public Domain release

If the owner doesn't assert his rights, than he will de facto lose them from something as seemingly trivial as the statute of limitations. A general rule of thumb is three years from the time the owner knew or should have known of an infringement. A DVD being sold by a major retailer would obviously qualify. In other words, the clock is ticking. I don't see what the issue is, entities smaller than the Hitchcock copyright holders protect their copyrights all the time. Not only can you stop the sale, but there are damages at stake, statutory damage awards, even legal fees. Everything is in the holder's favor.

Re: "Ultimate Hitchcock Collection" Public Domain release

I'm not really sure how much money they could get from someone like Diamond but it would seem they'd at least want the title off the market. Again, from what I've read, various companies have had items pulled with a simple letter.

Re: "Ultimate Hitchcock Collection" Public Domain release

This is a fascinating thread, guys!

On my "list of things to do" is to write an article about Hitchcock, copyright, and "Public Domain" (partly because I'm fed up of explaining why his films aren't PD to people on Wikipedia!). I'm certainly not a copyright lawyer, so the following is based on research and I'd warmly welcome any corrections!...

As Mr Harris says, Hitchcock's films used to be in the Public Domain in the USA.

This is something I need to double-check, but I believe at the time Hitch made his British films, UK copyright existed for 50 years after the year a film was first distributed, so during the mid 1970s, his films would have started to enter the Public Domain in the UK too.

In the early 1990s, the UK made amendments to it's Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 in order to harmonise UK copyright with other European Union countries. As part of this, the legislation for UK copyright on films was changed so that it became 70 years after the death of the last principle creator (director, writer, composer, etc). Crucially, this was applied retrospectively. Therefore, any Hitchcock films that had become PD in the UK are now back under copyright until at least 2050 (being 70 years after Hitch's death in 1980). In fact, several of his British films should be copyrighted until 2065, as the screenwriter Charles Bennett lived to a ripe old age and died in 1995.

The USA had long refused to adopt the Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works (which effectively says if a work is copyrighted in one country, then it should be under copyright in all countries that have adopted Berne). The US came under increasing pressure to adopt Berne and President Clinton finally signed up on March 1, 1989. This was a major change for US copyright, as it no longer requires you to register for copyright.

As so many non-US works were previously deemed to be Public Domain in the US (e.g. all those VHS releases of Hitchcock films in the 1980s), the US Copyright Office embarked on a lengthy process of allowing non-US copyright holders to re-assert their rights in the US. The two UK companies that owned the copyright on the majority of Hitchcock's British films subsequently filed their "Notice of Intent to Enforce" with the US Copyright Office and the details can be found in the NIE's listed here (most are listed in the Aug 22nd file):

U.S. Copyright Office - Notices of Restored Copyrights

At the time, these two companies were UGC UK and Carlton Film Distributors, Ltd. Through various mergers and acquisitions, these companies are now known as Canal Plus UK and Granada International respectively.

Neither company has so far released Hitchcock DVDs in the US themselves, although both have licensed other companies to do so (e.g. Criterion and Lionsgate). If you find that surprising, then consider that neither company has directly released any Hitchcock DVDs in the UK -- again, they've licensed the films to other companies to release (e.g. Network and Optimum releasing).

To be honest, I was fast giving up hope of Granada ever releasing a Hitchcock film in the UK on DVD since they took over Carlton. Fortunately, Network managed to license 10 titles and their box set is due for release on the 25th Feb.

----

I would welcome any comments about the above, especially if you think I've misunderstood any aspects of copyright (very possible!) or just plain got it wrong! :-D

Dave

Re: "Ultimate Hitchcock Collection" Public Domain release

Granada International's 'in-house' label is ITVDVD and they have been steadily working their way through the old Carlton catalogue re-releasing them under that label with new covers; The 39 Steps is one, and Jamaica Inn is another (even though that's getting a stand-alone release from Network later this year - whether that will prompt the ITVDVD disc to go OOP is anyone's guess, though I note it's 'out of stock' at several etailers).

Re: "Ultimate Hitchcock Collection" Public Domain release

Just some quick notes after perusing what you've posted. I specifically quoted the above, as noting that your assertion that Bill Clinton was president in 1989 might tip you off that you've gotten a few historical bits wrong.

Although the US joined Berne effective March 1, 1989 (with the Berne Convention Implementation Act of 1988, signed into law by President Reagan on October 31, 1988), but actually failed to properly implement Berne. Rather than retroactively restoring copyrights, Berne was only applied to works published on or after March 1, 1989. As a result, no PD works had their copyrights restored. In fact, the Berne Convention Implementation Act, at Section 12, actually says: "Title 17, United States Code, as amended by this Act, does not provide copyright protection for any work that is in the public domain in the United States."

Eventually, the US passed the Uruguay Round Agreements Act, implementing the Uruguay Round of GATT. Signed into law by President Clinton, and efective January 1, 1995, the US finally granted copyright restoration to foreign works (from countries that are members of Berne, the WTO, or certain WIPO treaties) that had fallen into the PD in the US.

These restorations were immediate and automatic. The US Copyright Office was not responsible for allowing foreign rights holders to assert their rights in the restored works. The purpose of the Notice of Intent to Enforce was strictly for notification to parties, so-called "reliance parties," already making use of the PD works as of January 1, 1995 (or the later date that the work's country of origin joined Berne/WTO/WIPO). Rights holders for restored works needed to provide a Notice to reliance parties in order to get such reliance parties to stop making use of the PD work; without a Notice (either actual or as publised in the Federal Register), a reliance party can continue to make use of a restored work indefinitely. However, as to parties that made unauthorized use of the foreign work after January 1, 1995 (or the later date that the work's country of origin joined Berne/WTO/WIPO), a Notice of Intent to Enforce is not necessary.

I hope this helps.

Damin

Re: "Ultimate Hitchcock Collection" Public Domain release

Thanks for that Damin -- I'd definitely got the two presidents well and truly mixed up there :-D

It also clears up the Copyright Office's involvement and the NIE's. I hadn't appreciated that copyright to PD works had been automatically restored (without any action required by the non-US rights holder) and had guessed wrongly that filing an NIE was required to make that happen.

John -- I'd not spotted any ITVDVD had repackage The 39 Steps. I did pick up a copy of that a few months ago from Amazon UK when they had it on offer and the packaging was still branded Carlton (just double-checked and there's no mention of Granada or ITV). However, I did notice that Granada had resubmitted several Hitchcock films for classification at the BBFC awhile back.

Re: "Ultimate Hitchcock Collection" Public Domain release

Here's a shot of the The 39 Steps re-package; the ITVDVD logo is top left, as it appears to be on all their new packaging.

Re: "Ultimate Hitchcock Collection" Public Domain release

Cheers John! I actually ordered that DVD from Play.com when I spotted the different packaging. When it arrived and it was the old yellow Carlton packaging (which matched the one I'd just bought from Amazon UK), I complained and sent it back. Within a couple of days, Play updated their site and changed the packaging shot back to the Carlton one (which is the one they're still using now).

Have you actually seen the ITVDVD packaging in any shops? I'm wondering if Granada created a new packaging shot, but have actually been shipping out the remainder of the old Carlton stock to retailers? It seems strange that Play and Amazon UK are both shipping out (or at least have been in the last few months) the old yellow Carlton DVDs :-S

Re: "Ultimate Hitchcock Collection" Public Domain release

In a HMV; but you're right, they are undoubtedly still using up old stock. Most of these repackages are just that, but I'm told - though I can't confirm it because I can't find it anywhere - that the repackaged '78 'The Thirty Nine Steps' is now anamorpic.

Re: "Ultimate Hitchcock Collection" Public Domain release

"I guess irony can be pretty ironic at times"

Just loaded up the Mill Creek "Alfred Hitchcock: The Legend Begins" set and was amused to see this (the "Ultimate Hitchcock Collection" also contains a similar FBI warning). By the way, if anyone is thinking of buying the Mill Creek set then beware -- 2 out of the 4 discs in my set refused to play at all.

Getting back to the original topic, the "Ultimate Hitchcock Collection" is the usual collection of poor quality transfers (which St Clair say they have digitally restored). The claim of "20 Movies" is misleading -- there are only 18 movies in the set. The audio on some is poor (even for a "PD" transfer) and several of the films have appalling contrast levels. In fact, poor contrast dogs most "PD" transfers -- see these three examples from Vintage Home Entertainment release of Secret Agent for a particular bad example!

As is usual for unlicensed US transfers, Jamaica Inn is missing a sizeable chunk of footage. The silent films mostly have inappropriate music and are poor framed (intertitles are often cropped with letters missing).

Ignoring the legal aspects of "PD" transfers for a moment, if you're looking for a cheap way of seeing most of Hitchcock's British films and you don't mind substandard audio and video, then this is as good (or as bad) as any of the other plethora of budget unlicensed sets. At least St. Clair didn't go as far as "borrowing" the transfers from the Criterion releases (which Vintage Home Entertainment did!).

If you're a serious collector who demands nothing but the best, then none of the unlicensed sets are even worth considering. Instead, go for the US Lionsgate set or one of the many excellent licensed sets available in Europe (although I'm sure some of the extra Foley effects that appear in the Studio Canal transfers will have you vexed!)

Re: "Ultimate Hitchcock Collection" Public Domain release

Are those Foley effects really on the R2 sets? I thought I heard these were just a rumor.

Re: "Ultimate Hitchcock Collection" Public Domain release

Which sets?

Re: "Ultimate Hitchcock Collection" Public Domain release

I didn't believe it at first, until I did a side by side comparison with some of the previous DVD releases.

Rich and Strange, in particular, seems to have had a lot of sounds added (footsteps, doors closing, etc) that don't appear in the PD releases. I did wonder if the sounds were there, but just quieter or hidden in the background hiss. However, a careful analysis with Cool Edit Pro showed that just weren't there at all -- the "spectral view" in Cool Edit is really useful for doing that.

Anyway, Rich and Strange contains a number of sequences where the sound is poor in the PD releases (and probably was in the original theatrical release) and my best guess is that Studio Canal worked on the soundtrack to isolate the dialogue, then added in new background sound and effects. If my memory serves me right, there's one sequence on the boat where they've added different background music and, in the segments where Joan Barry is talking, you can just make out the original background music(!)

I suppose it's in the nature of restoration (especially with early sound films that are nearly 80 years old) that there are times when you do have to rebuild portions of the soundtrack.

Having said all that, it's worth pointing out that the US Lionsgate set (which contains titles licensed from Studio Canal) does use the original soundtrack. Also, the US set doesn't suffer from any of the video transfer glitches that appear in the UK and French sets from Optimum and Studio Canal.

Re: "Ultimate Hitchcock Collection" Public Domain release

'Video transfer glitches' - can you expand on that Dave?

Re: "Ultimate Hitchcock Collection" Public Domain release

John -- it's mostly colour noise. From memory, it's the Manxman that has it the worst. The quality of the transfer drops noticably during the second half of the film (which doesn't happen with the Lionsgate transfer).

Here's some text & grabs I did for another forum...

When viewed on a PC with WinDVD 4, they are just visible:



If you tweak the hue and saturation in a graphics package, then you can see some of the colour noise -- in particular, there's a persistent horizontal bar about 1/4 from the top (cutting across Ondra's hair):



The default settings of PowerDVD 6 on a PC amplify these so that they are visible without any tweaking of the image:

Re: "Ultimate Hitchcock Collection" Public Domain release

Yikes! Thanks Dave; food for thought...

Re: "Ultimate Hitchcock Collection" Public Domain release

Dave Pattern has some review discs from the new R2 Network Hitchcock set and has posted his thoughts, and some grabs, in his Hitchcock Wiki Forum here.

Re: "Ultimate Hitchcock Collection" Public Domain release

I can echo the thoughts on the Mill Creek set...I purchased it for $5 thinking it was a 'too good to be true' deal for 20 movies. I tried watching the movies on my Pioneer DVD recorder/player which I have never had any problems with, and all four discs (while playable for the 5 seconds I gave them a chance to) caused my player to emit an alarmingly loud 'buzzing' or 'rattling' sound as soon as the discs were loaded. I exchanged the set for a new one at Wal-Mart and this time the first disc was ok (I watched the Lady Vanishes and thought the picture and sound were acceptable considering the price paid) but the other three discs did the same thing as before! So I went back to Wal-Mart and insisted on a refund (I got store credit) and got the St.Clair video set called 'The Best of Alfred Hitchock' 9 movie set for $4. Who would have thought that the 'best of Hitchcock' would not include Rear Window, Psycho, or Vertigo? Anyway, the quality of The Lady Vanishes seems about the same as the Mill Creek version (maybe a little better?). Unfortunately, the 'buzzing' or 'rattling' experienced with the Mill Creek set occurs occasionally, puzzlingly only on the 1st and 3rd movies on each disk, and usually only between chapters 4-7. The rest of the movie and the second movie on all three discs plays perfectly fine. No idea how they are making these cheap dvds but I have never had this problem with any other dvds.

Re: "Ultimate Hitchcock Collection" Public Domain release

Just rechecked my DVD set and it not only plays fine with no rattling, but the Lady Vanishes has a pretty good picture quality.. , .