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Topic: Intermissions...

Alexander Smith
Expert Film Handler

Posts: 128
From: Walney Island, Barrow-in-Furness, Cumbria.
Registered: Jun 2003

posted 03-31-2004 05:43 PM

Regarding Jack Ondracek's post about an accidental brain suck just before the closing credits:

I had something very similar happen to me recently, although it was caused by receiving a "re-furbished" print late and not having enough projection staff to rehearse the show. The film was "Under The Tuscan Sun" (also distributed by BVI).

When the automation stopped the show (platters, tension device) I was at the other end of the building doing a little electrical work. So by the time I had got back to the booth and sorted it out e.t.c. some of the customers had wandered off, some had come out in to the foyer to complain (and in doing so, missed the end which I ran).

After explaining to my manager what had happened and why (and ordering a replacement reel) there was no fallout (investigation, disclipinary action e.t.c.).

In light of Jack Ondracek's post, I'm now half expecting BVI (UK) to be contacting either my manager, or the manager of the entire cinema chain at head office.

We'll see if BVI want to make an issue of it.

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Frank Angel
Film God

Posts: 5305
From: Brooklyn NY USA
Registered: Dec 1999

posted 04-07-2004 07:42 AM

quote:
Seven Samurai is also supposed to have 4 minutes or so of walk in music at the start of the second half. When we ran it earlier this year, we discovered that it had been removed. (There was a handwritten note on the reel bemoaning the fact) Is this a common occurrence for movies that are supposed to have music attached to the intermission?

Unfortunately Daniel, this is a common occurrence on older titles. You could ask for another print, but usually in art houses and non-theatrical situations where a print is being run only once or even just a few times, you can rarely get a better print shipped in time for your playdate -- if, indeed, there is a complete roadshow print available.

As for putting in an intermission, well, for all the hootin and hollerin about the integrity of the filmmaker's artistic vision and the distributor's master contracts, none of this matters when the huge foreign markets are concerned. It seems not to matter a bit to the distributors that intermissions are put into films that play the thousands of Indian cinemas. Could it be because that market is a massive income generating machine? Where money is concerned, what's a nice 45 min intermission between friends? Of course over there, it is part of the culture and the audiences would riot if they didn't get their intermission in which they go out to have lunch. But then again, it sounds like your audiences were accustomed to an intermission and would not complain about it.

As for the holier-than-thou Master Contract....you are not a first run or even a subrun house. In all but the first run major markets where the studio and everyone involved with the film are putting their best face forward, they are very much sensitive to anything that will put egg on it. But once you get into the hinterlands and the sub and underbelly runs off the break, like all things Hollywood, they prostitute themselves for anything that brings in a buck. I have seen blockbuster pictures -- the Academy Award winning top films of the year....the studio's pride and joy of the moment, play in theatres that I wouldn't let a dog go into. Even the self-proclaimed we're-better-than-everyone-else Disney/BuenaVista booked BEAUTY AND THE BEAST, one of their biggest, most acclaimed titles to come along in many a year, into some of the filthiest dives with the worst presentation imaginable. So all the chest-beating that studios do is a lot more for show -- like Lucas saying he would never let STAR WARS I or II play in Drive-Ins because they didn't meet his high standards, and then after all the press coverage died down, it play in any DI that wanted it. High standards my ass --it's grosses that rule the day.

Is that cyncial enough for ya? I wish I were exaggerating, but sadly, I don't think I am. If I were, you would have a studio complaining that you DIDN'T run the overture or entr'acte music and they would rush you a print that has everything the filmmaker originally intended the audience to see and hear....they would be concerned that your showing be "rue to the filmmaker's vision." Try telling that to the distributor's booker. Maybe the Master Contract should include in that section that says the exhibitor must play the film in its entirety without cutting anything out of it, an additional paragraph saying that it's the distributor's responsibility to supply an ENTIRE print that has nothing cut out of it!

I need a cup of coffee.

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Christopher Seo
Jedi Master Film Handler

Posts: 530
From: Los Angeles, CA
Registered: Jun 99

posted 04-07-2004 12:31 PM

quote:
...it's the distributor's responsibility to supply an ENTIRE print that has nothing cut out of it!

Absolutely agreed. Why should we pay huge rental fees for damaged prints? If there are no good prints, then at the very least a discount is in order. There are, indeed, occasions when I think the distributor should be paying us for in effect "restoring" the film.

So what is the motive for insisting on "no intermissions"? Surely it could not be artistic integrity on the part of the studios... is it merely a ploy to pack in as many shows as possible?

I have also found that music (overtures, intermissions, entr'actes, exit musics) is the first to go on prints. Threaders can't figure out what all the "black film" is for, so it ends up in the trash, or, if you're lucky, spliced into a completely different part of the print.

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Thomas Procyk
Phenomenal Film Handler

Posts: 1842
From: Royal Palm Beach, FL, USA
Registered: Feb 2002

posted 04-07-2004 01:21 PM

IMHO, Studios should print an "Overture, Intermission, etc" tag or title card for the duration of the music for titles that they reprint. That way, Real theaters with curtains and a sense of showmanship can just close the dowser, while threadjocky multiplexes would realize that it's actually a part of the show and it would have less of a chance being removed.

I thought for sure they would add the title cards much like on the VHS/DVD of Gone With The Wind for the re-release in 1998. We ran it with everything intact and the IB prints looked fantastic despite the sheading. I wonder how many of those still exist?

=TMP=

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Carl Martin
Phenomenal Film Handler

Posts: 1424
From: Oakland, CA, USA
Registered: Feb 2002

posted 04-08-2004 01:44 AM

hmm, our ib gwtw looked pretty shitty. lots of color fringing. should have been printed academy as well, though i don't think that would've helped the fringing much.

carl

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Randy Stankey
Film God

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

posted 04-08-2004 10:30 AM

The thing about overtures is that, back in the day, people understood what they were all about. In fact, they expected to see such things.

Nowadays, most people hardly know what an overture IS, let alone what it means.

It's no wonder people cut them off. Their clue meter is reading ZERO!

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Jack Ondracek
Film God

Posts: 2348
From: Port Orchard, WA, USA
Registered: Oct 2002

posted 04-08-2004 11:37 AM

quote:
So what is the motive for insisting on "no intermissions"? Surely it could not be artistic integrity on the part of the studios... is it merely a ploy to pack in as many shows as possible?

I wouldn't go so far as to say I actually know the answer to this. [Big Grin]

...and having said that, I'll be happy to speculate!

It may very well have been "artistic integrity" when that rule was written... or something like it. If the "no modification rule" was not in the contract, it would be left to the theatre to decide where to put an intermission... or even how many to put in there. In the worst case, you'd never know what kind of presentation you'd get from one theatre to another. Ok... maybe that's true now, but you could have every theatre chopping prints up to meet their own artistic or marketing goals... and we certainly can't have that now, can we? [Razz]

The problem is that you're smart... I'm smart... but there are a lot of Redifers out there, so there goes the neighborhood! [beer]

quote:
...As for the holier-than-thou Master Contract....

Now, Frank... you're cynicism is showing!

You are, no doubt, correct about how, or if the studios pay any attention to what the hinterland hardtops do with their prints. However, I wouldn't want my name to be publicly attached to a suggestion that any of those folks violate their legally binding contracts with their vendors... life around here is challenging enough as it is!

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Gordon McLeod
Film God

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

posted 04-08-2004 11:51 AM

many theatres up here and I beleive in the UK that have Cinemecanica towers always have an intermission and I know in the past up here at least they could not legaly be refused a print

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Christopher Seo
Jedi Master Film Handler

Posts: 530
From: Los Angeles, CA
Registered: Jun 99

posted 04-08-2004 12:16 PM

quote:
Studios should print an "Overture, Intermission, etc" tag or title card for the duration of the music for titles that they reprint

Excellent idea, Thomas. That would give theatres without curtains something to show during the music, and it would clue in the film jockeys and the (sometimes equally clueless) audience. (When we ran "2001", at least one patron was heard to remark at the intermission, "Oh, they must only have one projector.")

However, it won't stop the determined. I believe "GWTW" does have an intermission tag, but it was cut out on the print we ran. The music was still intact, though. [Confused]

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