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Topic: 70MM ad thread
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Robert Harrison
Expert Film Handler
Posts: 239
From: Harwood Heights, Illinois, USA
Registered: Jun 2005
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posted 02-14-2011 01:35 PM
This is one of my all times faves, from a March 1970 re-issue. Note the hyperbole concerning the best 6 track sound systems in the country! The Edens 2 in Northbrook was one of my favorite places to go because it had a huge curved screen, something I was always into. The UA Cinema 150 in Oak Brook was so named because it one of 2 Chicago area houses equipped for Dimension 150 (the other being the River Oaks in Calumet City), although later the place was twinned. The Cinestage Theater in downtown Chicago later became a porn house! All 3 houses are now long gone.
In case you can't see it too well, here is the text:
RETURN TO THE "2001" EXPERIENCE. The UA Cinema 150, Edens 2 and Cinestage Theatres are equipped with the best 6-track magnetic stereophonic sound in the country. You will hear "Zarathustra," "The Blue Danube," and Gyorgy Ligeti's electronic compositions from surrounding overhead speakers and five frontal console speakers (4' high, 3' wide, 3' deep). The screen at the Cinestage is 70' across, UA Cinema 150 is 70' across and the Edens 2 is 60' across (combined that's longer than a city block). You will see "The Dawn of Man" and "To Jupiter and beyond" projected from the finest 70MM equipment in super-panavision and metrocolor. RETURN TO "2001" EXPERIENCE.
This ad is from October 1972. The Michael Todd Theater was in downtown Chicago, at one time a "brother" to the Cinestage before ownership changes. This particular "fest" appeared a few times, but sometimes was only known as "The Fabulous Three" and others as "The Fabulous Five." I forget which one they added when it was five, it was either "Grand Prix" or "Ben-Hur."
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Frank Angel
Film God
Posts: 5305
From: Brooklyn NY USA
Registered: Dec 1999
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posted 02-15-2011 06:19 AM
Lets see -- Showmanship.....More MONEY; Showmanship....More MONEY; Showmanship....MORE MONEY. Doesn't take a genus to see which one wins, even in the golden age of the single screen. Now admittedly, most of the time it was the studios, not necessarily the exhibitors that did this kind of thing; the studios would go so far as to chop chunks of a film in order to get one extra show a day on re-releases. In the case of the rerelease of CAMELOT, and FIDDLER ON THE ROOF, they went so far as to chop parts of the title song of CAMELOT and a complete song from FIDDLER. So all of them get the BIG DUBAYA on their foreheads; whores all.
tom, I have been trying in vein to find pictures of the Brandt theatre marquees that lined what we affectionatey call Forty-Douche Street, NYC back in the 70s. For each engagement they designed custom graphics with embossed image and lettering cuttouts custom designed to the exact size of the marquees, one for each side -- think huge standees mounted on the face of the marquee and also above the entrances and on the side entrance panels. Mind you, these theatres would change runs pretty frequently, maybe every two or three weeks. Even as a youngster it amazed me how they could produce these things to look so spectacular and within such a short turn-over.
I would really love to find someone who was directly involved with their production to pick their brains for a detailed explanation of how it was done.
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Bobby Henderson
"Ask me about Trajan."
Posts: 10973
From: Lawton, OK, USA
Registered: Apr 2001
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posted 02-15-2011 10:36 AM
quote: Tom Petrov
I wish we would go back to the old style marquees.
As much as I like theater marquees from decades ago, those giant sized displays are mostly a thing of the past and unlikely to return.
The best marquees were typically associated with single screen movie palaces. No one builds single screen theaters anymore, much less auditoriums with anything near or over 1000 seat capacity.
The "megaplex" of today typically has too many screens to allow anything more than plain type listings of the movies playing. The titles are usually in some kind of changeable plastic letter (flat "Zip" style that slide into plastic track or injected molded Wagner letters that sit on metal blades). Some theaters have gone to using LED-based boards to show movie titles. The LED signs are nice in that it's a snap to change listings and you don't have to be out in the weather to do it.
Some newer multiplex sites have somewhat elaborate sign designs, but most are very restrained either by theater executives not wanting to spend a lot of money on signs or their hands are tied by overly restrictive sign ordinance rules in that city or town.
The marquee for the Warren Moore 14 south of Oklahoma City isn't over the top elaborate, but it's pretty big and definitely has that old time look to it, right down to the injection molded plastic Wagner letters used for the movie titles:
quote: Frank Angel
I have been trying in vein to find pictures of the Brandt theatre marquees that lined what we affectionatey call Forty-Douche Street, NYC back in the 70s. For each engagement they designed custom graphics with embossed image and lettering cuttouts custom designed to the exact size of the marquees, one for each side -- think huge standees mounted on the face of the marquee and also above the entrances and on the side entrance panels.
I remember some single screen theaters creating elaborate movie titles for their marquees back when I lived in New York City. City Cinemas' Gramercy Theater on 23rd Street did this all the time, although their custom lettering was some sort of flat, routed plastic attached to the marquee rather than anything "embossed." Custom formed/embossed Lexan faces are made with a vacuum forming machine. A lot of time has to be spent creating the face molds and once the faces are produced just as much time goes into masking and painting the things. It's a lot easier and more cost effective to rout some flat plastic graphics to hang on the existing marquee rails. Most single screen theaters in NYC were just using flat painted/screened faces to display movie titles on the marquees. The Ziegfeld, Loew's Astor Plaza and many others went that route.
The El Capitan Theater in Hollywood (6838 Hollywood Blvd. - look it up in Google Earth Street View) has one of the last really nice single screen theater marquees created in the United States. The sign has lots of neon and chase lights. And it has a large, vertical "blade" sign above the marquee. Disney bought the theater, renovated it and re-opened it in the early 1990s. The sign design won a number of awards. The sign originally displayed movie titles using flat plastic and some type of large format graphics. A few years ago the sign was retrofitted with full color LED "jumbotron" boards to show movie titles and other information.
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