Rights to George A. Romero's "Night of the Living Dead"
The 1968 American independent horror film, Night of the Living Dead, is (apparently) in the public domain… but the stories of how it got that way range from the age of the film to how he neglected to renew the copyright to "it's not really in the public domain".
The "age" argument doesn't seem to hold water; I can't (for example) broadcast Disney's Snow White (a much older film), nor was Walt Disney Pictures able to adapt the 1939 Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer film The Wizard of Oz unencumbered.
So what's the status/story of the trademark and copyright of the "Living Dead" movies?
Best Answer
None of what you said. It became public domain the second it was distributed/screened to the public due to the US copyright law at the time. You were required to include a copyright symbol on the work to copyright it, per the 1909 Copyright Act and Townsend amendment. No symbol, no copyright, instant public domain. From the mouth of the lich king himself:
"We lost the copyright on the film because we put it on the title," Romero explained in "Night of the Living Steelers," an installment of NFL Films' Timeline series that premiered in October. "Our title was Night of the Flesh Eaters; they changed it to Night of the Living Dead.
"When they changed the title, the copyright bug came off, so it went into public domain [and] we no longer had a piece of the action. Everybody had a copy of Night of the Living Dead because they were able to sell it without having to worry about royalties going to us."
He got screwed by the distributor company, maybe probably accidentally. The distributor made bank, and Romero didn't on it.
None of this affected the other living dead or dead movies.
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Is Night of the Living Dead public domain?
Night of the Living Dead entered the public domain in the United States because the original theatrical distributor, the Walter Reade Organization, failed to place a copyright indication on the prints, and at that time, United States copyright law held that public dissemination required copyright notice to maintain a ...What is the message of Night of the Living Dead?
The Theme Of Fractured Groups The screenplay by John Russo and George A. Romero beautifully hit on the flaws in human nature. Forgoing a zombie invasion, Night of the Living Dead is about how groups of people - no matter how small - typically fail at coming together and successfully completing a task.Who owns the rights to Dawn of the Dead?
As the producer of Dawn of the Dead and co-founder of Laurel Entertainment (which would later become a part of the Spelling Entertainment Group and eventually Viacom), Rubinstein, still owns the rights to the film (just like he did with Dune until recently).Is Night of the Living Dead an allegory?
In American movies, the hero is never killed by the good guys. Writer-director George Romero and co-writer John Russo said the film was not intended to be about race (Kane, 2010). However, it is impossible to deny that Night of the Living Dead has become an American racial allegory.Il giorno degli zombi ( Film Horror completo in Italiano ) di George A. Romero 1985
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