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» Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE   » Operations   » Ground Level   » Looking for thoughts from those who have run a 'Classic Film Series' (Page 2)

 
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Author Topic: Looking for thoughts from those who have run a 'Classic Film Series'
Justin Hamaker
Film God

Posts: 2253
From: Lakeport, CA USA
Registered: Jan 2004

- posted 10-19-2011 01:52 PM      Profile for Justin Hamaker   Author's Homepage   Email Justin Hamaker   Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
@Ed: we are looking at this as a way to grow our business. I don't expect huge returns, but I think the additional concession revenue is where the growth will be. But I'm also looking at this as a way to create a new entertainment opportunity for the community.

In addition to a classics series, I'm also looking to run a few Christmas themed movies on Saturdays in December (Elf, Home Alone, Miracle on 34th Street, and It's a Wonderful Life are my first choices). And we plan to do the kiddie shows next summer.

I realize that much of this will be trial and error to see what works.

@Scott: I like the idea of doing something on an ongoing basis throughout the year, but I want to start with a short series so I can make it something of an event.

I have been soliciting requests through a flyer in our lobby and a posting on our web site, but the response has not been overly enthusiastic so far. And most of the suggestions so far have been for the usual suspects like Breakfast at Tiffanys, Casablanca and so forth.

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Monte L Fullmer
Film God

Posts: 8367
From: Nampa, Idaho, USA
Registered: Nov 2004

- posted 10-19-2011 01:57 PM      Profile for Monte L Fullmer   Email Monte L Fullmer   Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
..maybe, once a month type of scheduling could be something and see what happens there for a few months afterwards..

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Caleb Johnstone-Cowan
Jedi Master Film Handler

Posts: 593
From: London, UK
Registered: Mar 2006

- posted 10-19-2011 05:31 PM      Profile for Caleb Johnstone-Cowan   Email Caleb Johnstone-Cowan   Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
From reading your posts it looks like you need to decide on whether you're doing a 'Classics' season with broad appeal or a 'Seniors' season with classic films. Both are massively different, both from a booking perspective and operationally. With the latter feel free to PM me and I can go in to more detail for you on what I believe works over here in the UK.

I remain to be convinced a regular classics season can work, here in London the Prince Charles Cinema (google and facebook them its worth looking at) do a very good job at it but they're the only ones in a city of eight million people. What Edward writes is very true though, if you're in a position to do it at low risk and have fun then take the opportunity. I'm sure most of us are in the business because we want to watch and play cool movies.

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Keith Paynter
Film Handler

Posts: 7
From: Regina, SK, Canada
Registered: Sep 2011

- posted 10-19-2011 07:07 PM      Profile for Keith Paynter   Email Keith Paynter   Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
Here's a new guy's opinion...

When I was living in Toronto briefly in the summer of '85, I lived close to a repertory theater that regularly ran rock films like 'Pink Floyd: The Wall' and 'The Song Remains The Same' during the evening. Screenings for 'The Wall' were always packed, and the stereo house rig was appropriately loud...a matrixed surround setup if I recall...if you've got a powerful enough sound system, and good promotion, you could probably do well, especially with the film's 30th anniversary coming up next summer, assuming there low-fade prints still to be found...I have an original 35mm trailer on faded Eastman stock, but a 16mm P&S reduction on lowfade LPP, so who can say what type of prints are still available...

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Mark Lensenmayer
Phenomenal Film Handler

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

- posted 10-19-2011 08:13 PM      Profile for Mark Lensenmayer   Email Mark Lensenmayer   Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
GOONIES and PRINCESS BRIDE seem to be very popular with older screenings around here.

Young movie goers like to see things from their childhood. Nickolodeon now has a channel running things like DOUBLE DARE and CLARISA. So, movies from the early 90's or late 80's might work.

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Geoff Jones
Jedi Master Film Handler

Posts: 579
From: Broomfield, CO, USA
Registered: Feb 2006

- posted 10-19-2011 08:44 PM      Profile for Geoff Jones   Author's Homepage   Email Geoff Jones   Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
quote: Justin Hamaker
All titles will be shown on Blu-Ray when available through our digital projectors.
I do hope that your advertising will let folks know up front that you will be presenting a home video format.

I once drove an hour to see Jaws in the theatre, only to discover that the place was showing it on DVD. I felt deceived and cheated, and would never return to that place again.

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Justin Hamaker
Film God

Posts: 2253
From: Lakeport, CA USA
Registered: Jan 2004

- posted 10-19-2011 09:16 PM      Profile for Justin Hamaker   Author's Homepage   Email Justin Hamaker   Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
quote: Geoff Jones
I do hope that your advertising will let folks know up front that you will be presenting a home video format.
I ran Avatar on Blu-Ray a few nights ago. There is absolutely no apparent difference between the Blu-Ray and our regular DCI movies. Granted, Avatar is probably not the best movie to use for this test, but the point still stands.

More to the point, this is about seeing the movie up on the big screen - most likely at a huge discount from our regular ticket price. Most moviegoers won't notice.

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Aaron Garman
Phenomenal Film Handler

Posts: 1470
From: Toledo, OH USA
Registered: Mar 2003

- posted 10-20-2011 01:11 AM      Profile for Aaron Garman   Email Aaron Garman   Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
We run classics often as part of our programming. They can be hit or miss, but overall, they do decent. Some popular ones include:

Casablanca
The Godfather
Lawrence of Arabia
It's a Wonderful Life
Jaws

We've also had some moderate success with a midnight movies series:

Rocky Horror Picture Show
Monty Python and the Holy Grail (this did exceptionally well)
The Big Lebowski

All of the above were run on film, with most prints looking rather good. Sadly, Casablanca was a bit rough but watchable. The Godfather (I and II) were from the most recent Harris restoration and looked drop dead amazing.

AJG

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Martin McCaffery
Film God

Posts: 2481
From: Montgomery, AL
Registered: Jun 99

- posted 10-20-2011 09:30 AM      Profile for Martin McCaffery   Author's Homepage   Email Martin McCaffery   Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
quote: Justin Hamaker
More to the point, this is about seeing the movie up on the big screen - most likely at a huge discount from our regular ticket price. Most moviegoers won't notice.
True, but as we've gone into in previous threads, there is always the one who will and will be pissed off. The average movie goer kinda thinks movies are on DVD's now anyway. You can advertise "In Glorious Blu-Ray" and not chase anyone away other than the one purist who will be a pain.

Honesty is often a good policy [Wink]

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Scott Jentsch
Phenomenal Film Handler

Posts: 1061
From: New Berlin, WI, USA
Registered: Apr 2003

- posted 10-20-2011 10:06 AM      Profile for Scott Jentsch   Author's Homepage   Email Scott Jentsch   Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
I understand that some people might get peeved about a Blu-ray being shown instead of film, but personally, I think that's focusing too much on the media and not enough on the end result.

For example, is a badly scratched film print of Casablanca better than a great Blu-ray transfer? How bad can the film print be before the audience deserves some sort of disclaimer about what gets put on the screen?

Some on other threads have said that Blu-rays on the big screen have color space issues and other picture quality problems. If that is so, then I think there is a valid point.

In the case of a classic B&W movie, it may be part of the charm to have a beat-up print, but I say put up the best possible image and don't let people know about the magic that makes it happen. As long as you're not advertising it as a film presentation and then showing a Blu-ray, I see nothing wrong with putting forth the best presentation possible, no matter what the medium used.

If you are going to use a Blu-ray, don't make them see the menu and on-screen displays and such. That's not classy for a theater to do, and it takes the viewer of the special experience they came to have. I don't expect to see cue tape or leaders or anything else used to present a movie during a normal film presentation, so the same care should be used to avoid those items as well.

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Martin McCaffery
Film God

Posts: 2481
From: Montgomery, AL
Registered: Jun 99

- posted 10-20-2011 11:04 AM      Profile for Martin McCaffery   Author's Homepage   Email Martin McCaffery   Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
We just did Young Frankenstein on 35mm. Turns out the only print in the country is in English with Spanish subtitles (and, it turns out, a badly under exposed reel 2). We not only notified the audience in advance about the subtitle, we pushed it. The audience thought it was just another bizarre addition and enjoyed them.

I think if we didn't tell them there would be a few annoyed people. And certainly, if we showed the blu-ray with the subtitles on it would just have been annoying. But there was some weird magic about having the only 35mm print that made having the subtitles on it fun.

Ya just never know with people.

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Brad Miller
Administrator

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

- posted 10-20-2011 01:55 PM      Profile for Brad Miller   Author's Homepage   Email Brad Miller       Edit/Delete Post 
quote: Scott Jentsch

For example, is a badly scratched film print of Casablanca better than a great Blu-ray transfer?
That depends on the VIDEO PROJECTOR that is being used. Without knowing that, the question cannot be properly answered. Too many theaters use LCD or single chip DLP projectors for this sort of stuff and it looks terrible. In fact I know of one chain that runs rep stuff and in their one film complex the rep business has dwindled to the point of only having a couple of people show up, while the rest of the locations do quite well (sourced mostly from blu-ray, but through D-Cinema projectors). The crap video projectors at that film complex have TRAINED the customers to not go to them there.

quote: Scott Jentsch
How bad can the film print be before the audience deserves some sort of disclaimer about what gets put on the screen?
At GCC Northpark we did rep shows all the time and if we didn't get a print damn near mint we had a slide we would run before the show, we had a disclaimer at the box office and let everyone know we would issue refunds in the first half hour. Of course we never let anything hit the screen that had much wear at all, we would cancel the show before we would do that. Regardless I'm not aware of anyone actually asking for a refund, but we made it clear and we upheld our extremely high standards of presentation of which our audience came to expect.

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Justin Hamaker
Film God

Posts: 2253
From: Lakeport, CA USA
Registered: Jan 2004

- posted 10-20-2011 02:01 PM      Profile for Justin Hamaker   Author's Homepage   Email Justin Hamaker   Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
Just to be clear, we would be running the Blu-Ray through our DCinema projector. No other option is even available.

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Scott Norwood
Film God

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

- posted 10-20-2011 10:00 PM      Profile for Scott Norwood   Author's Homepage   Email Scott Norwood   Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
quote: Scott Jentsch
If I were running a theater, I would pay Robert Osborne to do the intros for those movies.
He does this for the Sedona Film Fest. This year, he was not available, so he sent DVDs (recorded in a TV studio) of his introductions. In the past, he has been present to do them in person (or so I am told). I don't know who there knows the man or how they convinced him to do this for them.

As for Young Frankenstein--the Loews Jersey had a good print of this a few years ago (2005-ish?). You might check with them and see where they got it.

As for BR vs. 35mm: I have never seen B&W video projection that looked anything like film. An argument can be made for color material, but B&W just never looks right on video.

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Ky Boyd
Hey I'm #23

Posts: 314
From: Santa Rosa, CA, USA
Registered: Jun 99

- posted 10-21-2011 02:35 AM      Profile for Ky Boyd   Author's Homepage     Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
Here's the thing, many times you can license blu-ray/dvd exhibition with less hassle than 35mm. And the print shipping savings can mean the difference between making and losing money. Good quality digital projection (DCI or LCD) is perfectly acceptable with good showmanship. And FYI, you can license dvd/blu-ray exhibition of Fox titles directly through Fox whereas if you want 35mm you have to deal with Criterion. I don't know about most of you but some of the worst rep prints I've ever seen came from Criterion. I've been told by someone who knows that WB has been very busy making DCPs for their most popular repertory titles, so if you have the ability that is also an option.

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