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Author Topic: Netflix fooling with run speeds and pissing filmmakers off Steve Guttag We forgot the crackers Gromit!!! Posts: 12814 From: Annapolis, MD Registered: Dec 1999 posted 12-02-2019 06:10 AM                     Filmmakers RARELY see their films in actual cinemas. Where they watch them (screening rooms) are masked properly, lit properly...etc. The "horror" only happens when they rarely venture into the world of the commercial cinema. The studio may put more emphasis on the home release but I don't believe that is the same for the director/producer types. Masking, if you don't use it, you are part of the problem and the demise of cinemas. If all you aspire to be is home-theatre level of quality, you've already lost.  |  IP: Logged Frank Angel Film God Posts: 5305 From: Brooklyn NY USA Registered: Dec 1999 posted 12-05-2019 10:46 AM                        Absolutely. Exhibition has been riding their own demise train since they forgot that the product they are selling is NOT the movie -- that's the studio's product. Exhibition's product is the total cinematic experience -- everything from the physical ergonomics of the plant, from the time the patron walks in the door to the quality of the presentation. Cut corners on any aspect of that, ESPECIALLY on the presentation and, as you put it, he's flirting with the demise of cinema...his demise. Scoffing at the need for masking tells you how fast that exhibitor's train is going. And you know me, I was crying foul when they scoffed at the need for screen curtains...you know, old school (and proud of it).  |  IP: Logged Steve Guttag We forgot the crackers Gromit!!! Posts: 12814 From: Annapolis, MD Registered: Dec 1999 posted 12-05-2019 12:55 PM                     I've said it before and I'll say it again. To have a 1st class show, you HAVE to have curtains...without them, you are, at best, 2nd rate.  |  IP: Logged Mike Blakesley Film God Posts: 12767 From: Forsyth, Montana Registered: Jun 99 posted 12-05-2019 01:26 PM                        I've said this before too... I really really wish we had curtains. I priced them out a couple of years ago... in order to do them right, would cost over $24,000. If I wasn't staring at the notion of buying a new projector in the next few years, I'd be saving up for the curtains instead of that. At least we have screen lights, so the audience is never staring at a blank screen. I hate blank screens more than I hate not having curtains. (And we do have masking!)  |  IP: Logged Steve Guttag We forgot the crackers Gromit!!! Posts: 12814 From: Annapolis, MD Registered: Dec 1999 posted 12-05-2019 03:16 PM                     Doesn't your theatre have some physical limitations on curtains, as well? Yes, curtains cost money, they are also a potential point of failure. They also properly finish out the presentation. Some would say there should be, at least two drapes...the grand and the title curtain but I'm good with just the one. Curtains are hand made for the location and anything hand sewn is going to cost...plus all of the rigging. And, if you don't do it right, they will look poor or fail. I've said it elsewhere that I think a problem with the DCinema life-cycle is that this industry has not had to live with short-life equipment (under 3-decades). Projectors used to last the life of the theatre. This 5-15 year equipment, that costs a LOT more is going to be more than most exhibitors can afford based on the revenues a cinema can take in. I can appreciate your financial struggles there. Curtains remains a MUST for me though.  |  IP: Logged Bobby Henderson "Ask me about Trajan." Posts: 10973 From: Lawton, OK, USA Registered: Apr 2001 posted 12-05-2019 08:34 PM                     I prefer movie theaters to have curtains along with proper masking. The Ziegfeld in NYC (RIP) had a nice curtain setup (at least it did 30 years ago when I was visiting the place). It had a 2 layer setup, an opaque main curtain set and a mostly transparent second curtain. Regarding the limited life span of D-Cinema gear, I certainly griped about it here plenty of times over 10 years ago when the industry-wide conversion was getting underway. Big theater chains might be able to stomach the high cost and relatively short life span of a digital projector. It can be a make or break equation to smaller, independent theaters. Just about anything "digital" is going to have a limited life span. At the sign company where I work we got about 8 years of life out of our first large format printer (a thermal inkjet model); it cost about $25,000. The laminator we bought at the same time is still working just fine; it's a lot less computerized. Now we have two Latex-based printers (nicknamed "Cheech" and "Chong") and a new flatbed printer, all of which cost considerably more. We still don't expect to use any of those expensive devices any more than about 10 years tops. Even if the hardware can survive past 10 years the manufacturers will make replacement parts and "consumables" (such ink cartridges) for only so many years before the product line is EOL'd. The cost of a new projector can really hurt an independent theater in a smaller city or town. Theaters in urban centers are getting hit with a different threat: keeping their lease. Landlords don't give a damn about shutting down a popular entertainment landmark if they can make more money converting the property into something else, like a luxury condo tower. Here in Lawton, when medical marijuana became legal in OK, a popular local bowling alley was closed. Its owner converted the bowling alley into a large grow house operation and pot dispensary. I worry we could have a lot fewer high profile "flagship" theaters in big cities and a lot fewer small town theaters in the years ahead. That might do more to erode the length of the already short theatrical release window and maybe force more people to watch movies only on home TV screens.  |  IP: Logged Mike Blakesley Film God Posts: 12767 From: Forsyth, Montana Registered: Jun 99 posted 12-06-2019 09:15 AM                        quote: Steve Guttag Doesn't your theatre have some physical limitations on curtains, as well? Just that the screen is wall-to-wall, so the only way to gather the curtains to the sides was to have them turn the corner and gather along the wall. And, there's not enough room above for a waterfall style - the proscenium is right above the screen and has old air conditioning ducts built into it (which we don't use anymore, we went to a ceiling-vented AC system years ago). The whole project remains on my wish list for when we do have extra money. (It does happen.)  |  IP: Logged Marcel Birgelen Film God Posts: 3357 From: Maastricht, Limburg, Netherlands Registered: Feb 2012 posted 12-06-2019 01:30 PM                     Obviously, I love a theater with proper curtains, but by this moment in time, I'm happy if they get the rest right and I can forgive the absence of curtains... I do notice something of a cultural difference between countries over here: - Netherlands: Almost no theaters have curtains anymore, with the sole exception of some of the last remaining old movie palaces, which really are just a handful. Movable masking used to be a mainstay during the 35mm days, but has vanished ever since the move to digital. - Belgium: Cinema is mostly dominated by the Kinepolis chain, which is known for their humongous megaplexes (even for American standards) at the edge of the city. They gave up on masking back in the 35mm days already, they didn't mind showing fuzzy edges on their wall-to-wall, bottom-to-ceiling screens... None of their screens built since the late 1980s has ever seen a curtain... The little competition there is, usually copies this concept verbatim. - Germany: Many cinemas, even many chains still use BOTH proper movable masking systems AND curtains. Although some of those chains have since dropped the usage of both, especially bottom-dweller chains like CinemaxX (now part of the UK VUE group), the curtain seems to be still alive in German cinema. The major downside: Germans like to watch their movies in dubbed versions. While understanding German isn't really a problem for me, the dubbing causes some major mind-melt for me. Fortunately, the number of "original language" shows seems to be somewhat on the rise. At the border regions with the Netherlands, some cinemas cater to German audiences, who go there to see the movies in their original language.  |  IP: Logged Steve Guttag We forgot the crackers Gromit!!! Posts: 12814 From: Annapolis, MD Registered: Dec 1999 posted 12-06-2019 02:58 PM                     See now, to me it is a different situation. The prevalent non-use of drapery (masking and curtains) has lowered the value of the cinema as just another box to see the movie in. The cinema gets it (maybe) in advance of home release and typically has inferior everything to the home. Sure, you could show that 4:4:4 color with discrete 24 frames is better on paper but it will be lost on most. There is no sense of grandeur to going out to the cinema. You can't just provide McDonalds presentation and expect people to think of it as anything other than junk food. We need to get our presentations back. We need to create an experience that sets us apart from the home...proper drapery and presentations go towards that. If all we are settling for is hitting the screen with some sort of dim image...why would people pay for that?  |  IP: Logged Brad Miller Administrator Posts: 17775 From: Plano, TX (36.2 miles NW of Rockwall) Registered: May 99 posted 12-06-2019 05:33 PM                     Steve, you already know the industry seems to be more focused on "heated recliners" than the actual movie presentation anymore.  |  IP: Logged Mike Blakesley Film God Posts: 12767 From: Forsyth, Montana Registered: Jun 99 posted 12-06-2019 06:23 PM                        A lot of modern theaters still have that grand look on the outside and the lobby, but once you get to the actual movie, it's just a plainish box. In the old movie palaces you felt surrounded by glamour even sitting in your seat, even though the seat might not have been a super comfy chair. They need to make the individual modern auditoriums be as grand as the lobby is.  |  IP: Logged Steve Guttag We forgot the crackers Gromit!!! Posts: 12814 From: Annapolis, MD Registered: Dec 1999 posted 12-07-2019 10:59 AM                     mmmmmm...heated recliners....mmmmmm  |  IP: Logged

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