Public Domain
Doomed to Die
1940 · Monogram Pictures · Dir. William Nigh
Shipping magnate Cyrus Wentworth, downcast over a disaster to his ocean liner 'Wentworth Castle' (carrying, oddly enough, an illicit shipment of Chinese bonds) is shot in his office at the very moment of kicking out his daughter's fiance Dick Fleming. Of course, Captain Street arrests Dick, but reporter Bobbie Logan, the attractive thorn in Street's side, is so convinced he's wrong that she enlists the help of detective James Lee Wong to find the real killer.
Confidence
95
— Legal Reasoning —
Why this status applies
Doomed to Die (1940), the fifth entry in Monogram's Mr. Wong series starring Boris Karloff, entered the public domain in the United States because its original 28-year copyright was not renewed. The film was originally registered with the U.S. Copyright Office by Monogram Pictures Corp. on August 7, 1940, under registration number LP9831.
Under the Copyright Act of 1909, works registered between 1928 and 1963 required a formal renewal filing during the 28th year of the first term to extend protection for a second term. For this film, the renewal window opened in 1967 and closed in 1968. A search of the Stanford Copyright Renewal Database and the Catalog of Copyright Entries (CCE) confirms that no renewal was filed for this title. Consequently, the work fell into the public domain upon the expiration of its first term in 1968. The film is widely available on public domain video labels and through the Internet Archive without restriction.
— Cited Sources —
Supporting facts
- Catalog of Copyright Entries 1940, Motion Pictures, Vol. 13, No. 1, p. 19
- Stanford Copyright Renewal Database
- Film Superlist: Motion Pictures in the U.S. Public Domain (1940-1949)
- AFI Catalog of Feature Films (1893-1993)
Research summary based on cited sources, not legal advice. Always consult a qualified copyright attorney before commercial use.