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Topic: Uptown Theater ditches quality projectionists in search of a crappy presentation
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Monte L Fullmer
Film God
Posts: 8367
From: Nampa, Idaho, USA
Registered: Nov 2004
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posted 01-10-2005 02:36 AM
quote: George Roher
So the lamp might get struck three times for each show (which would start partway through the first ad). And when I started my shifts I'd find the intermittents cranked
I've severly repremanded booth operators when I have, or have caught them doing this bad operational habit, and warned them that if I have ever caught them doing this again that they will be excused for working in the booth again. Hard on bulbs, and hard on equipment. Very uncalled for.
But, sadly and I agree, it's almost everywhere as well: booth operators ill-trained, yet it's not their fault, for who trained them were ill-trained as well. And these lie within the walls of the "Crapaplex Odeon" Cinemas.
Also, it's also sad about the single screen houses everywhere, whereas with the multiscreens: a single screen house picks up a bad movie, that house dies horribly for a while, whereas the multiscreeners can "buffer" the bad movies with the others and still stay in the black.
Plus, the cost to operate a single screen nowdays is almost out of reach of reality, unless the theatre has such a following, as with the Uptown, to keep the doors open for business and keep the cash flowing through.
Sounds like the Uptown is a fantastic, grand old palace to witness a presentation, either in the 35 or 70mm format. Probably makes one have goose bumps just being inside watching a movie there - Like being back in the "Showman,"or "Roadshow" era of the movies.
For one knows when they enter this building that there is "Pride in Presentations."
thx-Monte
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Leo Enticknap
Film God
Posts: 7474
From: Loma Linda, CA
Registered: Jul 2000
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posted 01-10-2005 02:37 AM
quote: Steve Guttag
Whereas we have the best presentation of any house in the area, including all plattered ones, what are you hoping to prove, a platter can do it as good?
Like I wrote - that, leaving individual theatres and installations out of it, just because somewhere uses a platter doesn't necessarily mean that presentation will suffer. Not ever having visited or worked in the theatre which is the subject of this thread, I'm not going to make any comment or response to other posts about it, since I think there's risk you might mistake them for a personal attack. I was not commenting on, defending or criticising anything which goes on in that theatre, just making a general, related point in response to the topic of this thread.
quote: Steve Guttag
They have already scratched a reel of film...what are you hoping for? The whole film?
Agreed, that is a risk with poorly maintained and operated platter systems (and towers, and making up prints into 4k or 6k reels). The converse of the 'misthread a platter and there goes the whole print' argument, though, is that more threading up means more opportunity for error.
quote: Steve Guttag
I have NEVER found that to be the case and where as you are pissing in my backyard now...
How is it possible for any rational person to interpret the sentence 'My point was that if what a theatre does is to show the same film, four times a day, seven days a week, then a platter might be a better idea than changeovers' as a personal attack?! It was a general statement of my belief in principle, no more and no less.
I take your general points that maintaining the concentration over several hours needed for the routine of a changeover show does encourage projectionists to stay more alert and on the ball, and that long-play and automation systems potentially allow lazy operators more opportunity to get away with bad presentation.
I'd just like to make one more point on the platters/changeovers issue, given that Steve has taken such offence at my raising it in the context of this thread, and then I'll shut up. Throughout my working life I've had to deal with archive access officers and print managers who have been taught the mantra that platters are always at the root of all presentation problems. As a general rule they don't care what goes on in the booths their prints go to, just as long as they don't go on a platter. Many of these people have never seen the inside of a projection booth and I strongly suspect that some wouldn't recognise a platter if they saw one. I even know of the print manager at a major European archive who allows her prints to be run on towers, but not platters!
If you make a list of every possible form of wear and damage that can result from poor film handling in a changeover installation, I've seen all of them, and more, in the 35mm archive prints circulating in Britain and Europe (edge damage on older acetate prints caused by worn, bent or sharp-edged running spools are a particular bugbear of mine). Some of the more heavily shown ones are, frankly, knackered. But they don't have splices on the leaders and tails, so that's alright then!
Once again, I was simply voicing the opinion that as a general rule, a Pavlovian 'platters=bad, changeovers=good' approach isn't necessarily helpful. During the 12 or so years I worked as a projectionist I probably worked about half and half on changeover installations and ones which used some form of long play: both have their pros and cons.
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Monte L Fullmer
Film God
Posts: 8367
From: Nampa, Idaho, USA
Registered: Nov 2004
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posted 01-10-2005 03:20 AM
quote: Leo Enticknap
both have their pros and cons.
True, in 1977, I ran "Star Wars" for six months, went through one print in the middle of the run, because the acetate came from a bad batch and sprocket holes were starting to crack on each reel, yet the presentations were still sharp and clear. And this was in a carbon arc house using XL's.
Twenty years later, in 1997, once again, I ran a print for 8 months called "Titanic" thru Christie equipment. Print came in clean and went out clean.
The simile between these two episodes is that the two film transports above were well taken care of.
Platters and reels can work together, if the units are aligned, maintained and operated in the manner of smooth operation. If the film path and now matter how LONG (as it is presented in Interlock 101, which looks quite fun to operate, in as well as a massive challenge to accomplish) the path is, rollers properly aligned, no film riding on the edge of the rollers-film dead center of the rollers, rollers in a position of straight film travel and spin freely, platters can handle film as carefully as the reel machines-just that you just have to be more attentive with the platters. For they can be your best friend, or your worst enemy.
Yes, we do feel safer when the film is wound on a reel. Film can't get away, can't go anywhere, you can roll that reel down the floor without any worry with the end taped down (as if I have ever done that..lol), can't "fall" off a horizontal platter deck (only if the upper spindle catch opened up and the reel falls off the spindle and hits the floor, which can be the only small worry - for I had that happened once. I then replaced the catch..), and even if it's between a 1k cartoon reel or a 18k reel, the film is definitely secured and we feel safe about that.
Course, the big advantage with reel is that the film travel is completely straight from upper magazine to lower magazine, without any twisting, turning and any other form of travel. Film loves to go in a straight line.
Platters. Well, we know how the film travels, from a horizontal position, feeding from the inside out through a device that has it's PMS days called the "brain" "cluster" "control plate", et.al., travelling across a wad of rollers, big or small, split or solid, with distances close or far away to the projector, then finally travelling in the direction it likes to travel-vertically, then back to a horizontal form with more rollers to travel across then back to a rewound position. Sounds pretty complicated if someone who have never seen one of these devices saw this contraption works.
Yes, definitely pros and cons to this - as with all of the things of life.
Also, I think the "meat" of this whole thread is that the whole of us are a bunch of "old-timers" who love our work, and is committed 200% to our work and trade as the best we know how, plus being converted to the practice of, once again, "perfect presentations".
And when a new idea/method comes in that is saying "I can do the work better than you", we take offense to this knowing that this new idea/method isn't better, just a more unprofessional way of doing the job. And anything related in this field that isn't in a professional way or form, we downplay and almost condemn this idea/method, for it isn't in our calibre of high standards that we placed ourselves with our training, practices, learning the hard way, of this part of the operations.
For we know that we are the best, the absolute best, that can do this kind of job - not anybody else.
Can I safely say that we are "possessive" of our field?
Can I safely say that we don't like it when we are not needed for our trade and skills?
thx-Monte
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Robert Harris
Film Handler
Posts: 95
From: Bedford Hills, NY, USA
Registered: May 2003
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posted 01-13-2005 07:47 AM
A few thoughts from the non-operator side...
Theatre by theatre, we're losing the domestic showplaces that have supported the distribution end of the Hollywood system.
To me, there is little difference between locking out qualified union operators or swinging the wrecking ball.
The Uptown has been one of the remaining (reigning) showplaces in this country. Each and every time I've had something run there, people have gone out of their way to make the presentation as perfect as mechanically and humanly possible.
Filmmakers and actors have viewed their work in awe at the Uptown.
Jean Simmons (not Kiss) was nearly brought to tears watching herself on the Uptown screen. Sir David Lean was thrilled by the size and perfection of the image and the overall projection quality. Omar Sharif felt the necessity to visit the booth.
70mm prints are too expensive and too difficult to produce, check and maintain to allow them to be projected by non-professionals.
I'll do everything in power to keep my work out of the Uptown unless the situation is properly remedied and the booth is back in the right hands. No one in their right mind should allow a $40,000 print, of which only a handful exist, to be projected by management.
As far as 35s are concerned...
focus, framing, tension and stability really don't matter once you've added that emulsion scratch to the center of the image.
If anyone from management happens upon this message, and you don't understand something that's being said here, feel free to contact me for translation.
"What fools these mortals be..."
RAH
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. Good luck and pleaase keep us posted.
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