The Red Kimona

The Red Kimona was originally registered for copyright by Dorothy Davenport (credited as Mrs. Wallace Reid) on December 3, 1925, under registration number LP22079. Under the copyright laws applicable to works published between 1923 and 1963, a work required a renewal filing with the U.S. Copyright Office during its 28th year of protection to extend its copyright term to the full 95 years. A search of the Stanford Copyright Renewal Database and the U.S. Copyright Office Catalog of Copyright Entries (CCE) indicates that no renewal was filed for this title. The 28-year renewal window for a 1925 film would have occurred in 1952 or 1953. Because the copyright was not renewed, the film entered the public domain at the expiration of its initial 28-year term in 1953. This status is further supported by the Film Superlist: Motion Pictures in the U.S. Public Domain (1894-1939) and its inclusion in numerous public domain film collections and archives, such as the Internet Archive, without copyright challenge. The film's restoration by bodies like the Library of Congress and Kino Lorber was based on public domain elements.