Here’s some great news for epic movie fans…

A largely forgotten 1942 film version of Ayn Rand’s autobiographical novel. we the living has been released on DVD for the first time.

It’s been a long and winding road for this movie.

I think some vital lessons for aspiring entrepreneurs lie along that path. But I’ll get to that in a second.

we the living It was produced in Italy during World War II. But after a brief theatrical run, Mussolini’s government realized that showing a film about a young, independent woman’s struggle against a police state was perhaps a bad idea in a fascist country. So they suppressed the film and ordered it destroyed.

About two decades later, Erika and Henry Mark Holzer, Ayn Rand’s legal representatives, learned about the film. They promised to track down a copy and eventually republish it.

As Henry Mark Holzer has explained, his challenges included locating the film, reaching a settlement with its owners, copying the flammable nitrate negative onto security material, shipping the materials from Rome to New York under intense scrutiny from US Customs USA and re-cut the four-hour movie.

In addition, they had to write subtitles that didn’t exist before, make a deal with the Ayn Rand estate, find a distributor, and promote the film.

“Other than that,” Holzer has said, “it was easy.”

we the living it was finally screened for the first time in over 40 years at the Telluride Film Festival in Colorado in 1986. It has since become an “art house” favorite and, as I mentioned before, is now available to view. at home on DVD.

Well, what are the business lessons we can learn from the Holzer story?

one) A great product, be it a movie, a book, a set of instructional videos, you name it, can and will find its market, despite all odds, if it has a true champion fighting for it.

two) Setting a goal and creating a plan to achieve it is the only way to make the invisible visible. (Or a “lost” movie in an underground classic.)

3) Stubborn determination can overcome almost anything.