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» Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE   » Operations   » Film Handlers' Forum   » Hey you, you suck! (AKA: Outing bad film handlers) Part 2 (Page 20)

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Author Topic: Hey you, you suck! (AKA: Outing bad film handlers) Part 2 Galen Murphy-Fahlgren Master Film Handler Posts: 405 From: Canton, MI, USA Registered: Oct 2007 posted 08-26-2008 04:31 PM                     The leader I use is, I believe, Xelar type b leader. It comes with, ostensibly, two "leaders" printed together with a big hunk of clear film with "Xelar" on it in big letters, but the clear part in the middle is not consistent in length. Presumably, it is such that you can cut it in half and have TWO leaders, but it is too short to do this if your platter is more than an arms length from your projector, so I leave it in one piece. Therefore, I have to thread past the mid "cut" point on the leader to assure accurate framing. I suppose I could cut and splice all of my leaders such that the two halves are in frame with each other, so to speak, but the only time it would be useful to do so would be if I were trying to do as you say, which I have said I do not feel is an advantageous way of threading the correct print. Since my leaders are expected to last much longer than I think they should be, I'd rather not compromise their integrity with a splice for the one in a million chance that this situation occurs such that I feel the need to hack things up in order to get the right show on screen. I'm not trying to say that your method isn't good, but this has happened to me, and I found the method I'm describing to be quite effective when you catch your mistake as early as I did, and it avoids any cutting, which is always a plus in my book. Each booth, projectionist, and individual projector setup is different, and reasonable, well-meaning men can disagree on methods, as long as the end result of good, clean, and timely presentation is met. Now I have to go to work at the theater.  |  IP: Logged Patrick Dunn Expert Film Handler Posts: 120 From: newark, DE, United states Registered: Aug 2005 posted 08-26-2008 07:35 PM                        Why wouldn't you cut the splice that connects the leader to the movie? That would save your leader from having cuts in it if thats what you are trying to do.  |  IP: Logged Chris Slycord Film God Posts: 2986 From: 청주시, 경북도, South Korea Registered: Mar 2007 posted 08-27-2008 03:28 AM                     Exactly, I meant you would cut the end of the leader and attach the 2nd print to that. Though it seems too late for that since he apparently was forced to quit. And I actually never had thought of using this method until it was suggested earlier and I thought "Damn that's a really good idea."  |  IP: Logged Robert John Jeromson Master Film Handler Posts: 264 From: Auckland, New Zealand Registered: Jul 2004 posted 08-27-2008 05:06 AM                     Thanks a lot to the site that had our print of "My Brother is an Only Child" prior to us, you suck, actually no, you super suck as you apparently can even get the basics right like being able to tell a head from a tail and splicing leader back on with the soundtrack matched up. And, I always appreciate the pre-scratched and soiled with dirty fingerprints look provided for my patrons entertainment pleasure.  |  IP: Logged Aaron Sisemore Flaming Ribs beat Reeses Peanut Butter Cups any day! Posts: 3061 From: Rockwall TX USA Registered: Sep 1999 posted 09-05-2008 06:33 PM                     Whomever had my print of Singh Is Kinng before me... YOU SUCK! -NO cores (this really pisses me off - are some places really THAT cheap?!?) -Reels 1 and 5 had a really beat up 100' NT-style leader on the head, reel 8 had its original tail leader. NONE of the other head or tail leaders were to be found. -Reels 6 and 7 were in each other's cans (reversed) Luckily the scissor cuts (see below) made it easy to discover this. -Reels were scissor-cut in random places, and the 'genuine' mid-reel splices were made with super-gooey yellow opaque tape. At least the print is going to leave me with the reels on cores, reel breaks in the proper locations and some kind of leaders on the heads and tails... -Aaron  |  IP: Logged Chris Slycord Film God Posts: 2986 From: 청주시, 경북도, South Korea Registered: Mar 2007 posted 09-05-2008 11:12 PM                     Just to be sure, since that's a Bollywood film it may very well be that it was originally sent out w/o cores so perhaps no film handler or projectionist did anything to make the print be w/o cores.  |  IP: Logged Joe Redifer You need a beating today Posts: 12859 From: Denver, Colorado Registered: May 99 posted 09-06-2008 12:56 AM                        I always wonder how they can get the film to not be on cores. Do they just wind it onto air? Is India near bankrupt? What the hell? They need to invest in reels. Morons.  |  IP: Logged Jim Cassedy Phenomenal Film Handler Posts: 1661 From: San Francisco, CA Registered: Dec 2006 posted 09-06-2008 02:47 AM                     Thank You TES for delivering my print of "Bottle Shock" less than two hours before my first screening Friday. Thank you, whoever last used this print for the lame job you did re-attaching the head & tail leaders. You actually saved me some time since I didn't have to carefully un-do splices, but I had to use most of that time cleaning adheasive residue off of the first 4inches of picture on every real from the crappy tape you used. And whatever became of the tail for Reel 6? I can almost understand how a head or tail can get lost from one of the mid-reels. But how did you lose the tail off of the last reel? A sincere Thank You (really) to the floor staff who filled in for me while I was away projecting at the Telluride Film Festival. I actually managed to come back to a booth that was cleaner than I left it. Not a very easy task, since I usually keep the booth pretty clean. OK- - so the last couple of days before I left I did not have time to do a good "going away" cleaning- - but you guys still did a great job straighting things up. I'm still looking for some tools and my back-up splicer, but I'm sure they are there somewhere. Unfortunately, you were so busy cleaning you didn't notice the sratch you were putting through all 6 reels one of the films that was playing. But that's ok. I forgive you. But I'm not sure the distributor will. > And who ate the last of my peanut M&M's in the office???  |  IP: Logged Frank Angel Film God Posts: 5305 From: Brooklyn NY USA Registered: Dec 1999 posted 09-06-2008 06:45 AM                        So Jim, you are outing your own guys? Man, you're strict!  |  IP: Logged Joe Redifer You need a beating today Posts: 12859 From: Denver, Colorado Registered: May 99 posted 09-13-2008 02:06 AM                        I don't know specifically who to blame for this, but here is tonight's tale: We get in an Indian print (not Bollywood) for a one-night screening... tonight. No cores, no heads and no tails. Awesome. But at least each individual can was numbered, 1-8. I had no choice but to build them in the order of the cans. It has worked for me in the past. And it did work tonight for the first part of the movie. Then people started wondering why some guy in the movie who had previously died was now alive. You guessed it, the order was all screwed up! There really wasn't anything I could do. The guy had me stop the show so he could make an announcement and then continue. Everyone stayed. According to the guy who was doing the auditorium rental, some theater in LA was the last to handle it and he said the "guy who handled it was new". OK. I felt bad for the guy but at the same time we can't be responsible for other theater's mess-ups. I hate prints from India. I hope that we didn't give him any partial refund. I was able to discern the proper order with his help as they played and I put the reels in the correct cans when I broke it down, with heads and tails and cores. I still cannot comprehend the whole "no cores" thing. The entire print was in horrible shape.  |  IP: Logged Monte L Fullmer Film God Posts: 8367 From: Nampa, Idaho, USA Registered: Nov 2004 posted 09-13-2008 03:08 AM                     Remember when IB and Metrocolor prints actually had the roll numbers printed on the outboard side of each roll - to really help eliminate these build errors?  |  IP: Logged Brad Miller Administrator Posts: 17775 From: Plano, TX (36.2 miles NW of Rockwall) Registered: May 99 posted 09-13-2008 02:45 PM                     We've been doing tons of screenings lately for independent films and it's amazing that NONE of these are coming in on reels. Some do come in on cores (permitted to bang around inside a couple of cans) but many don't even come in on cores. Then the director who is there is all freaking out why his one and only print of a movie has only been played 3 times is all scratched up, so I have to bring the dips into the booth and explain what the purpose of cores and reels are and why he cannot permit his prints to bang around inside the cans without any sort of protection for him to "get it". The worst was a print with no reels, no cores broken down from a Strong-type platter so it was all loose and unraveling. It was a horrendous mess! I've been donating a lot of reels lately and a ton of cores to these prints.  |  IP: Logged Frank Angel Film God Posts: 5305 From: Brooklyn NY USA Registered: Dec 1999 posted 09-13-2008 05:47 PM                        Welcome to my hell. Bollywood, foreign (and I don't mean Europe....I mean FOREIGN....the Congo, Thailand, Malaysia, etc), indies, etc. If you like surprises, THESE are the titles to run. You never know what you are going to find when you open those cardboard boxes held together with miles of shipping tape and barely any cardboard! quote: Brad Miller I've been donating a lot of reels lately and a ton of cores to these prints. That's very good of you Brad, but I learned early on, if we were going to continually run this type of film as our staple fare, then you just can't keep handing out your stash of cores and leaders and certainly not reels, if you want to have any left for yourself. I have taken now to 1) grabbing those independent producer/director/owners, whenever they are on site for the screenings, and like you said, dragging his arse up to the booth and show him the gawdawful mess his precious, one-off print is in. They really seem to respond to that and what surprises me, seem to have no clue whatsoever that this is what happens to their prints once they leave the labs. One gave me excuses how his print is mistreated, the cores are stolen, the reels are stolen, etc. To which I told him, so what?!; it's much more an expensive proposition to have that print replaced than it is to replace cores or plastic reels when they are stolen. I also told him he should send a bill to the theatre from whence said property showed up missing. If no one from the production is there for the screening, I stick a pre-printed insert sheet in the print shipping box..... Dear Producer, Director and/or owner of ________________________, Print #________; it arrived without [ ]REELS [ ]CORES (projectionist checks one) which can easily lead to severe, permanent damage to your print.. Then it goes on to say how cheap these items are compared to replacement print costs etc., basically what I would tell them if they were on site. It's printed on bright red glow paper and 22pt typeface so they can't miss it. Also, I send these inserts along with the projection report to wherever the thing came from. Hopefully any owner concerned about their print (which they usually seem to be), will heed these warnings and do something about it.  |  IP: Logged Joe Redifer You need a beating today Posts: 12859 From: Denver, Colorado Registered: May 99 posted 09-13-2008 07:47 PM                        quote: The worst was a print with no reels, no cores broken down from a Strong-type platter so it was all loose and unraveling. It was a horrendous mess! YES! I have determined that they have either not yet discovered or cannot afford backtension in India.  |  IP: Logged John T. Hendrickson, Jr Jedi Master Film Handler Posts: 889 From: Freehold, NJ, USA Registered: Apr 2001 posted 09-19-2008 03:17 PM                     Here's one I have not run across. New print of Igor, from DeLuxe depot. Reel two came in tails up (all others heads), so I rewound it on the bench, and surprise! No head leader. Then, about six feet of damaged film that was STAPLED to the rest of the print with FIVE staples placed in an "X" pattern in the picture area. This reel had not been plattered, since there was no splice on the tail. Somebody sure goofed somewhere along the line from the time this baby popped out of the printer. Called Deluxe for a replacement. Someone called from LA and I explained the problem. Said they would call us back. Never heard from them by the time I left for the day. Guess we got the replacement this morning, since my phone didn't ring today.  |  IP: Logged

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