Post by douglaswulf on Feb 3, 2007 23:24:10 GMT
I believe it was in 2002 that I saw a brief mention that a film archivists has stumbled across the trailer for the first Warner Oland Charlie Chan film from 1931. For fans of this film series, it would be an interesting find since the film itself (along with three other early Chan films) is considered lost with no known existing prints. The catch was that the trailer was on 35mm nitrate film stock and was described as highly degraded to the point where the film itself might just be thrown away rather than be a possible candidate for restoration.
I wrote an email to the archive and asked for news on whether the print would be restored or not. I received a reply stating that the film was unfortunately highly degraded and so was destroyed. This was obviously unfortunate news and I knew nothing more about it until yesterday.
Following a link that someone had posted to a Library of Congress website, I discovered that this 35mm print had actually been shown in public on July 26, 2005 at the Mary Pickford Theater in Washington, D.C. (near where I live).
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Chan Carries On [trailer] (Fox, 1931) With Warner Oland. (3 min, 35mm) … To provide historical context, the evening begins with several trailers from the 1930s Hollywood Asian detective series, including the Pickford premier of the Library's restoration of the trailer of Charlie Chan Carries On, the first of the series to star Warner Oland. The trailer is all that survives of this now-lost Chan film, which marked Oland's switch from starring in a series on the villainous Fu Manchu to the sagacious, just Chinese immigrant detective of the Hawaiian police.
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The official story I had been given was false. The print was not destroyed. It still existed, was restored, and was later shown in public. However, believing that I knew for a fact that it no longer existed, I had stopped even looking for any further information. Why bother? I knew it was gone. But I had been given misinformation.
What I think had happened was this: The person I contacted probably didn’t have any more information than I did. It would have taken effort to figure out the status of the print and be in a position to answer YES it would be restored. The person either didn’t have the time or inclination to make this effort. Saying I DON’T KNOW would have been honest, but wouldn’t have answered my question. The easiest thing to say was NO the print was destroyed.
The same phenomenon occurred with Doctor Who episodes in Hong Kong. After replying that nothing existed to be returned, the Hong Kong archive located Web of Fear 1. Again, there was supposedly nothing more to find. However, some time later, all four episodes of Tomb of the Cybermen surfaced in this archive. Now again, nothing more exists there (but perhaps it is true this time).
It is an interesting psychological phenomenon that those who should either make an effort determine if an answer in the affirmative is possible or who should otherwise admit no ability to confirm either way, instead confidently answer in the negative.
Was the person who replied to my email about the 1931 trailer a bad person? Probably not. The response I received was prompt and politely worded. However, it was also incorrect. I only wish to say that it could be possible that prompt and politely worded responses from archives stating that episodes were definitely destroyed could eventually prove to be incorrect. It would really take some extraordinary efforts to make an exhaustive search and officials probably do not want to admit not knowing, thus the path of least resistance is to state, “Those prints were all destroyed years ago.” I don’t know what might be done about this, but this might be cause for retaining a small amount of hope.
I wrote an email to the archive and asked for news on whether the print would be restored or not. I received a reply stating that the film was unfortunately highly degraded and so was destroyed. This was obviously unfortunate news and I knew nothing more about it until yesterday.
Following a link that someone had posted to a Library of Congress website, I discovered that this 35mm print had actually been shown in public on July 26, 2005 at the Mary Pickford Theater in Washington, D.C. (near where I live).
********
Chan Carries On [trailer] (Fox, 1931) With Warner Oland. (3 min, 35mm) … To provide historical context, the evening begins with several trailers from the 1930s Hollywood Asian detective series, including the Pickford premier of the Library's restoration of the trailer of Charlie Chan Carries On, the first of the series to star Warner Oland. The trailer is all that survives of this now-lost Chan film, which marked Oland's switch from starring in a series on the villainous Fu Manchu to the sagacious, just Chinese immigrant detective of the Hawaiian police.
********
The official story I had been given was false. The print was not destroyed. It still existed, was restored, and was later shown in public. However, believing that I knew for a fact that it no longer existed, I had stopped even looking for any further information. Why bother? I knew it was gone. But I had been given misinformation.
What I think had happened was this: The person I contacted probably didn’t have any more information than I did. It would have taken effort to figure out the status of the print and be in a position to answer YES it would be restored. The person either didn’t have the time or inclination to make this effort. Saying I DON’T KNOW would have been honest, but wouldn’t have answered my question. The easiest thing to say was NO the print was destroyed.
The same phenomenon occurred with Doctor Who episodes in Hong Kong. After replying that nothing existed to be returned, the Hong Kong archive located Web of Fear 1. Again, there was supposedly nothing more to find. However, some time later, all four episodes of Tomb of the Cybermen surfaced in this archive. Now again, nothing more exists there (but perhaps it is true this time).
It is an interesting psychological phenomenon that those who should either make an effort determine if an answer in the affirmative is possible or who should otherwise admit no ability to confirm either way, instead confidently answer in the negative.
Was the person who replied to my email about the 1931 trailer a bad person? Probably not. The response I received was prompt and politely worded. However, it was also incorrect. I only wish to say that it could be possible that prompt and politely worded responses from archives stating that episodes were definitely destroyed could eventually prove to be incorrect. It would really take some extraordinary efforts to make an exhaustive search and officials probably do not want to admit not knowing, thus the path of least resistance is to state, “Those prints were all destroyed years ago.” I don’t know what might be done about this, but this might be cause for retaining a small amount of hope.