markfp2

Movies can become public domain in several ways. If a film was produced by a big studio, say M-G-M, it was possible that through oversight a copyright just wasn't renewed. Now this sounds strange, but you have to remember that back then, there wasn't any real secondary market for movies. No TV. No DVD. No cable. Other than a rerelease from time-to-time of popular films, most older films weren't often shown and were thought to have little commercial value. In fact, many of today's "lost" films were a result of the studios destroying them just to save the storage costs. Today, of course, the film libraries have tremendous value and the studios have entire departments to look after copyrights. Many times, while a major studio released a film, it was really produced by an independent producer who perhaps went out of business and his films passed through many different hands and nobody ever bothered to renew the copyrights. And there could have been "technical" reasons a film wasn't copyrighted. If the film didn't have a proper copyright notice on the credits then it wasn't considered to have a copyright. Likewise, it was a requirement that the producer must deposit a print of the film in the Library of Congress. Many of the smaller studios never bothered to do that because they didn't want the expense of having an extra print made. And sometimes a film would be copyrighted in one country, but not in another. There are other reasons, but these seem to be the most common.

"Hondo" had an intermission because it was released in 3-D which required both projectors to be running in sync at the same time. The large reels only held about 45 minutes of film so there had to be an intermission to allow the projectionist to change reels. All the early 3-D films had intermissions and that's why most of than ran less than 90 minutes.

The simple answer is no. The database is simply a reference tool, and is not a list of what's in the TCM library. If that were the case, TCM would have just about every film ever made.

While I can't be 100% sure, with a running time of around three hours, it's highly likely that it had an intermission. Certainly in it's 70mm roadshow engagements. As with any of these big films once it got down to it's normal 35mm run and especially in second-run neighborhood houses the option of having an intermission or not was up to the management of the theatre. I once saw "Gone With The Wind" shown straight through without one and that was really a bladder-buster.

No, if you're watching satellite "rain fade", as they call it , would cause the picture to freeze up and you'd get a message on your screen "searching for satellite". If you are watching on cable, they don't have that problem since their receiving dishes are far bigger than the home ones and would not be affected by rain or snow.

It has to be at your cable company's end. If the signal was bad when it left TCM everyone would be having the problems you describe. That said, I'll bet if you call your cable company they'll swear everything is ok and will blame TCM. I had that happen to me with another channel. After weeks of being given the brush off by the cable system, I went down to their office and looked at the channel on the TV in the lobby and the picture was just as bad at home. That was the day I ordered satellite service and have never regretted it.

I put this question on another forum and got some many interesting answers I thought I'd ask it here. A friend of mine thinks that if he sees a film and doesn't like it then it's a total waste of his time. My position is that even if I don't really like a certain film I still find seeing it worth my time. Good or bad, I enjoy the experience of watching a film and I always learn something about the actors or the director or whatever that adds to my knowledge of films and filmmaking. I'm sure I've seen a few over the years that I really felt were a waste, but even then I learned something. The movie stank. Any thoughts?

I wonder how you would like it someone made such comments about your appearence on a website. You're being awfully petty. The way I see it is we all tune in to watch the movies and I couldn't care less about how the hosts look. I've never noticed the problem you have, but if indeed he does look like that, I'd say it was more of a problem with how the set was lit than his makeup.

bmovielover: Interesting point. I never thought of it that way.

Go to the top of the page, click on "schedule" and when that page comes up you'll see "Canadian schedule" on the right just below the big graphic. Just click on that and you're there. I've never compared it to the U.S. schedule, but as others have pointed out, TCM may not always have the Canadian rights to films they lease from other companies so there will mostly likely be differences at least a couple of times of the month. Glad you guys are with us now. enjoy. Message was edited by: markfp2

Why Gregg Toland, the cinematographer, who was shooting him dying of course. Seriously, I've wondered about that for years and haven't been able to come up with a logical answer. I guess we'll never know for sure.

Sounds to me like it's Clint Eastwood's "High Plains Drifter" (1971). The only difference is that in "Drifter" you do see his face thoughout the film. If it is, it sure isn't a "B" movie.

I also watched part of "Bridge" and I recorded "Sunset" and just checked the DVD and both were in perfect synch. Most of the time these things are problems at your cable company's end and involves getting both audio and video from the satellite at the same time (athough they won't admit it and will blame TCM). It's very rare for TCM or any other channel, for that matter, to send out a signal that has audio out of synch with the picture. You might find it on a very old movie where the sound was printed slighty out of sync on the original film print, but there isn't anything that can be done about that and it's pretty scarce.

Last night, I was flipping channels and I saw a bit of "Sabrina" and tonight I'm recording "Sunset Blvd." so I know that they both ran. I don't know what to tell you. Could you be confusing the times for different times zones?

Yes, I do consider myself lucky. Twice I've been there, both times on guided tours and each time we stopped at the village of Cong where much of the movie was filmed. The village hasn't changed that much since the film, although there aren't dirt streets anymore. And just wandering around, it's very easy to spot different houses and other locations in the film. The older folks in Cong have fond memories of the cast and crew being there. Of course, I think the best thing for them was the fact that before the movie came to town, like much of rural Ireland back then, they didn't have electricity. The government installed it so the movie could be made there. It will always be a high spot of my trips.

I was looking up "THEM!" , one of my favorites, on the new database and when I checked the part "AFI Notes" I was shocked to see it stated that it was filmed in 3-D and WarnerColor. That's the first time I ever heard that. While the main title has color lettering that looks like it would work in 3-D, I had never knew of even a suggestion that color and 3-D was the plan.That sure be something if TCM could come up with that version. Anyone else ever hear this? Message was edited by: markfp2

Will all you "Prophets of Doom" please find another channel to watch. Leave TCM to those of us who appreciate its programming. We're sick of hearing you complain over everything TCM does. What's next, you don't like the host's suit? By the way the 1970's are 25-30 years ago and a great film of that era could certainly be considered a "classic".

I find it amazing that somebody would complain about the score having only heard a few seconds of it taken out of context. What the whole thing before you complain. Besides it the composer's choice what he uses.

I always compare watching a full-screen version of a film made in widescreen to reading a book that had every third page ripped out.

I was going to say that TCM has run Bowery Boys films before, but now that I think of it, it may have been AMC before they went down the toilet. In either case, I wouldn't mind seeing some again myself. The were never sophisticated or classy, but always fun.

I year or so ago, I did a major search for this title and couldn't find any listing showing that it had ever been released before on VHS or DVD. One of many that should be.

Sounds like a great idea, but I believe that the cable network "Spike" has a lock on all the Columbia Stooges shorts. From what I understand they are very popular on that channel. Columbia did produced a lot of other shorts besides the Stooges, which nobody ever seems to show, perhaps TCM could get some of those. They may not be "The Stooges", but as I remember they were pretty good.

I've searched a number of databases and on-line movie retailers and it appears that while "Pay or Die" was released on VHS, at one time, it's no longer available and is out of print. You could try e-bay or some dealer that specializes in "rare" tapes, but they tend to be pretty pricey. Good luck.

You have to remember, that unlike Encore's "Westerns" channel which runs westerns and nothing but westerns, TCM has a much broader audience with varied tastes. I'm sure there are as many folks who would like musicals all day saturday or silents on sundays or 1950s sci-fi films all weekend, but TCM has to balance its schedule to try and provide something for everyone and that's a tough job. I, for one, like to see a day devoted to one kind of film now and then, but it would be a turnoff for me to have it that way every week.

As far as I know, they are not related. Maurice Walsh was a popular Irish writer during the first half of the 20th century. I believe he died in the early '50s. Interestingly, John Ford bought the rights to "The Quiet Man" around 1935 and it took him until 1952 to get it made into a movie. None of the studios thought it would be of interest to American audiences. It was only because his three John Wayne cavalry movies made so much money for Republic Pictures, that he convinced the studio boss, Herbert J. Yates, to let him make it. If you can imagine, Yates wanted to shoot it in black and white on the studio back lot using players he had under contract. If Ford hadn't insisted on shooting in Technicolor and on location in Ireland, it sure wouldn't be the classic it turn out to be. Thank you, John Ford.