William D McCrum wrote:
By the way, if you put the Digitmovies S&G into a waveform, you'll see why some think the hi-end brittle .... it goes right up to the wire, and is ever so slightly clipped. So I wouldn't blame the elements themselves, which are probably in good enough nick.

The cues were re-equalized by Digitmovies. A good technician would have known that when digitally boosting the high and low end of the audio spectrum, it's important to lower the volume of the cue by 3 to 6 db, maybe more, before you apply the EQ, so that the waveform doesn't clip.