Captain Kidd ( Black & White movie)

[Candle]

Might like this old movie I found online.

"Captain Kidd" (1945)

The notorious pirate played by Charles Laughton tricks King William III into letting him escort treasure-laden merchant ships to India. Co-starring Randolph Scott and an especially menacing John Carradine.

Director: Rowland V.Lee
Producer: Benedict Bogeaus
Production Company: United Artists
Audio/Visual: sound, black and white
Keywords: pirates; drama, action, Charles Laughton; John Carradine

Run time: 81 minutes

http://emol.org/movies/captainkidd/index.html

[Shane 'ProgZmax' Stevens]

or

http://www.publicdomaintorrents.com/

[Steel Drummer]

Isn't this piracy?

[Evil]

Public Domain means that it's free to use. People buy the rights to the product (music, movies) and let anyone do whatever with it. Well, sort of.

[Shane 'ProgZmax' Stevens]

Well actually in the case of PDT I think the movies listed have all had their rights expire, and the creators are either a)dead or b)don't care.  They routinely remove movies that are reported as not in the public domain so this site and a few others are perfectly safe and legal.
I recommend The Lost World (a silent film), The House on Haunted Hill or Night of the Living Dead.  Yes, NotLD is public domain because of a mistake the original distributor made.

[vict0r]

Do you mean the newer "The House on Haunted Hill" or is there an old version out  there worth watcing?

[[Cameron]]

Apparently the old one is pretty good, would be considered tame nowdays, but the director was a pioneer of the genre. So might as well get that. Vincent Price is in it too!

[Rui 'Trovatore' Pires]

I'm very curious, Prog - what kind of mistake made by the distributor made NotLD public domain so soon?

[LimpingFish]

I believe the distribution rights to NotLD were void because it never had a copyright notice placed on the original prints.

It's available here, as are the (recommended) following:

White Zombie (1932)
The Last Man on Earth (1964)
Carnival of Souls (1962)
Lady Frankenstein (1971)
The Screaming Skull (1958)
Bloody Pit of Horror (1965)
Nightmare Castle (1965)
The Terror (1963)
Revolt of the Zombies (1936)
The Vampire Bat (1933)
Satanic Rites of Dracula (1974)
Dementia 13 (1963)
Attack of the Giant Leeches (1959)

I say "recommended", but for varying reasons.

[Mr Flibble]

If I recall correctly, the title was changed before release. The original credits were discarded and replaced, but in their haste they forgot the copyright notices.

[Andail]

That's funny. In Sweden you don't have to tag anything with copyright (c). Everything you make which falls under the definition of original artistic material (or whatever the definition is) automatically becomes copyrighted.

[Shane 'ProgZmax' Stevens]

Yeah, what happened was in the original print the title was Night of the Flesh Eaters and it had a copyright notice clearly displayed.  According to the distributors at the time (Walter Reade) when Romero and co. opted for a name change they 'forgot' to put the copyright notice below it, and according to Romero it was intentional so they could later on distribute the movie without paying him a cent.  It's just one of those things Romero probably kicks himself in the rear about regularly since it's still the most popular of his films and has certainly seen the most rentals/sales.  And yeah, I meant the original House on Haunted Hill which is about a million times better than that horrible remake they did.

[scotch]

As in all Berne convention countries, you aren't required to have put to put a copyright notice on anything published in the US either, but that wasn't the case until the 1978 "Mickey Mouse" act.

[vict0r]

And yeah, I meant the original House on Haunted Hill which is about a million times better than that horrible remake they did.

Good! I haven't seen the original, but I saw the newer version and it were the usual Hollywood teenage (bad) splatter. I'll check out my local video shop and see if they have it. I'm a huge fan of thrillers and such, but most of the newer Hollywood ones are pretty darn bad..

[Nikolas]

That's funny. In Sweden you don't have to tag anything with copyright (c). Everything you make which falls under the definition of original artistic material (or whatever the definition is) automatically becomes copyrighted.

This applies pretty much everywhere now, but I don't know at the time of the said film, what the laws were. I can only assume that possibly without the (c) everything was void. Who knows really...

[Steel Drummer]

Is it just me, or are all of the movies offered on these sites pre-90s? 

[Hammerite]

they'd have to be because the creators still own the rights to them.

[LimpingFish]

Is it just me, or are all of the movies offered on these sites pre-90s? 

They would hardly be post-90's, now would they?

For something to go out of copyright "naturally", and thus become public domain, a variety of different factors are needed.

Most movies that are public domain usually involve situations where the copyright has expired (I believe pre-1924, or thereabout, movies are now public domain), or where the copyright has failed to be renewed or voided through mis-labelling or such.

The closer you come to the present, the less likely you are to come across public domain movies, as a movie made in, say, 1990 wouldn't become public domain until sometime around 2070.

By and large, PD movies are limited to pre-1970.