Well, this is interesting. Went back to the translated file, and, not only was there the fill pattern problem, but also the grouped shape that uses the fill pattern. So, tried several earlier versions of the V2007 file, and all exhibited this behavior.
Today, I looked at the landscape version of this photoframe template. It translated just fine. No issues. At this point, I'm guessing there was an early corruption that didn't impact V2007, but does when converted to newer format, and that it had propagated into each updated file. Other than that, no clue.