Nothing Sacred (Wellman, 1937) - who owns it?

[dadaistnun]

Does anyone know if this film is PD, and if not, who currently owns the rights? There are some discs out there from the likes of Alpha and Sling Shot (this one I do have and it looks like shit, though it does have a couple of Mack Sennett shorts). It's been a while since I've seen the print TCM runs, but I recall it as looking pretty decent.

[dadaistnun]

A little more poking around and I find out that apparently I do own the best available dvd (it's from Lumivision as it turns out). I'll have to go digging for it & see if it's really as bad as I remember.

HTF thread here, primarily about the '37 Star is Born but with some discussion about NS, including a link to an article about a restoration done in 1999. Someone in the HTF thread mentions a VHS release by Anchor Bay that may be taken from said restoration, but nothing is confirmed.

The restoration article is just a bit more technically-minded than I'm able to deal with at the moment, but I'm sure others here will find it informative.

edit: another version of the restoration article, with illustration

[zedz]

I was going to post that a lovely restoration was done of this a few years ago and was doing the festival circuit. Like David, I'm not a huge fan of this film, but you'd think that whoever went to the trouble of restoring it would want to get their work out on DVD.

[souvenir]

I don't know if this will help anyone, but TCM has a month of 34 Wellman movies lined up for December. Nothing Sacred is scheduled for the 19th.

[dadaistnun]

I posted some captures over in the appropriate thread, including a few shots from the Mack Sennett shorts and the home movies.

Apparently my memory was locked onto how bad one particular reel looks (1b, I guess). The back of the dvd case (dated 1997 by the way, so pre-dating the restoration) says, "During one scene, shrinkage of the original 3 strip technicolor materials has caused an uneven line-up of the colors." This is when March first gets to Warsaw, is bitten by the kid, is looking for Lombard. The rest of the film looks surprisingly good. I'd still love a spruced-up new disc of the restoration, though.

[Jameson281]

The film's legit rights are owned by ABC/Buena Vista as part of the Selznick library. It was one of the ABC/Buena Vista titles licensed to MGM but no DVD was ever released by them.