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Topic: Be Glad This Wasn't You...

Randy Stankey
Film God

Posts: 6539
From: Erie, Pennsylvania
Registered: Jun 99

posted 09-29-1999 11:47 PM

I have actually had a couple of reels that the HEADS & TAILS of the print were mixed up. (NOT the bands) When my co-worker told me this I thought he was just pulling a bone-headed excuse on me but I checked and it was true! (I'll have to ask him which movie, I forget -- Ted, if you're lurking POST IT!)

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Tim Reed
Better Projection Pays

Posts: 5246
From: Northampton, PA
Registered: Sep 1999

posted 10-10-1999 03:54 PM

Seems like I remember an Elvis picture that had a changeover in the middle of the opening credits... (maybe it wasn't Elvis, but it was around that time)

Also during that time, it wasn't unusual to have a changeover in the middle of a song or music. "The Sons of Katie Elder" had one.

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Bruce McGee
Phenomenal Film Handler

Posts: 1776
From: Asheville, NC USA... Nowhere in Particular.
Registered: Aug 1999

posted 10-10-1999 04:11 PM

Didn't "Charlotte's Web" have several reel changes in odd places? Seems like I remember the first bar of a song on the end of R2, and the rest on R3? We ran Disney's "Robin Hood" that had a trumpet fanfare that started on one reel, and continued on the next.

My print of "A Boy Named Charlie Brown" has a short R1, R2, R3. I joined R4, and 5, on one reel, and R6 is full. Kinda silly for an 85 minute movie.

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Rick Long
Jedi Master Film Handler

Posts: 759
From: Toronto, Ontario, Canada
Registered: Nov 1999

posted 10-10-1999 09:42 PM

In the 1970 film "Elvis - That's The Way It Is", there was a changeover during a live performance (reel 3 to 4, if I recall).

There was no sound at the beginning of reel 4. It was not until Elvis started shaking a defective mike that I realized our sound system hadn't failed. Some film editor, somewhere, had a vicious sense of humour.

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Scott Norwood
Film God

Posts: 8146
From: Boston, MA. USA (1774.21 miles northeast of Dallas)
Registered: Jun 99

posted 10-11-1999 11:42 AM

There are a bunch of films that have reel changes in the middle of a piece of music. Gone w/ the Wind and Vertigo come to mind, but there are others.

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Gordon McLeod
Film God

Posts: 9532
From: Toronto Ontario Canada
Registered: Jun 99

posted 10-11-1999 01:42 PM

I aways think of the tightest changeover is the end of reel one of the 70mm Sound Of Music
Reel 1 ends with Julie Andrews singing
"The hills are alive-" changeover to reel two "with the sound of music"
Considering the pull ups on 70mm mag that was always a close changeover

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Brad Miller
Administrator

Posts: 17775
From: Plano, TX (36.2 miles NW of Rockwall)
Registered: May 99

posted 10-11-1999 10:41 PM

Got a print in just last Friday (yes, another used TES print...big surprise) and there were NO LEADERS! The show had to go on screen in less than an hour from receipt! The ends of the film were NOT taped down, creating a real mess of tangled film, and without labeling of any kind, this was one hell of a nasty print to build in a frenzy.

In reel 2, there was a masking taped splice reversing the soundtrack followed later by another masking taped splice flipping the soundtrack back again. What would've happened if I had not've inspected this!?!?

Another reel featured a theater splice, out of frame. And all the while, what order was this thing supposed to be assembled?

I finally got the thing put together by visually reading the soundtracks and looking for a reasonable match. I can hardly believe I got the damn thing right and the show ran without a glitch, at the last possible second of course.

If ONLY the studios would charge FULL PRICE for this sort of nonsense, perhaps this would stop.

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Rick Long
Jedi Master Film Handler

Posts: 759
From: Toronto, Ontario, Canada
Registered: Nov 1999

posted 10-11-1999 11:33 PM

You can actually read the dialogue from the soundtrack? Amazing. Please teach us how.

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Brad Miller
Administrator

Posts: 17775
From: Plano, TX (36.2 miles NW of Rockwall)
Registered: May 99

posted 10-11-1999 11:37 PM

Yes, can't everyone? I mean it's so easy. It helps to censor bad words too.

Seriously, what I mean is by looking at the soundtrack closely, it isn't too hard to figure out what is dialogue and what is music and what is explosions and such. But for putting together a leader-less print, one only needs to find similar waves between heads and tails.

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Rick Long
Jedi Master Film Handler

Posts: 759
From: Toronto, Ontario, Canada
Registered: Nov 1999

posted 10-12-1999 12:16 AM

Provided, of course, that one can simultaneously read the minds if the director and editor of the film.

Admit it, Brad, you got lucky.

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Joe Redifer
You need a beating today

Posts: 12859
From: Denver, Colorado
Registered: May 99

posted 10-12-1999 01:35 AM

Oh, c'mon Rick! Who hasn't read the soundtrack this way? I've watched entire movies like this! In some movies the dialog track is so bad that I can't understand what they are saying at all unless I physically look at the optical track. The Dolby Digital track is even easier to read. It doesn't leave anything to misinterpretation. But if you are groggy or anything like that, you will only get an error rate of 6-F at best.

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Joe Redifer
You need a beating today

Posts: 12859
From: Denver, Colorado
Registered: May 99

posted 10-12-1999 01:38 AM

Oh yeah---almost forgot:
Don't try to read the SDDS track-- it's like reading a sentence with random missing letters and words.

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Rick Long
Jedi Master Film Handler

Posts: 759
From: Toronto, Ontario, Canada
Registered: Nov 1999

posted 10-12-1999 05:10 PM

.sdrawkcab kcart eht dah I. eoJ ,thgir e'ruoY

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Mark Lensenmayer
Phenomenal Film Handler

Posts: 1605
From: Upper Arlington, OH
Registered: Sep 1999

posted 12-21-1999 05:34 PM

Well, more misadventures at the AMC Planet Movies (Easton) 30. They had a special screening of TITUS, with the director Julie Taymor in attendance. About 50 minutes before the show, I saw some test film run through. Picture on the 60' screen was very good, BUT, there was no left channel sound. Center, right and split surrounds worked fine, no left. I was in the middle of the row, and didn't want to disturb those around me, so I just tolerated it. You would think that they would pay at least a little attention to the public premiere with the director there, but I guess not.

Too bad this screening wasn't at the local Marcus operation, where I have never seen a poor presentation (other than a 35mm film on the Imax screen, which is a whole other story!)

It should be interesting to watch this facillity as things become clearer with Planet Hollywood...there is a Planet Hollywood AND an All-Star cafe in the same aircraft-hangar-like building as the AMC.

Oh, I forgot to check to see if they had installed the water fountains yet...they "forgot" them in the original plans.

Mark Lensenmayer
Columbus Ohio

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