Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE: Down with love in Panavision?

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Posted by Michael Brown (Member # 890) on 05-13-2003, 05:21 AM:

Further to the discusssion in feature info.

So if it's filmed in Pananvision how come 20th Century fox are allowed to put 'Cinemascope' on the opening titles without getting sued by Panavision?

Posted by Steve Kraus (Member # 476) on 05-13-2003, 07:30 AM:

Sued for what? The Panavision rental contract calls for screen credit; their credit is there. I have not personally read their contract but presumably it doesn't insist on exclusivity. Further, even if it did "A CinemaScope Picture" can mean whatever Fox says it does. In the latter years of CinemaScope the process trademark, it did often refer to a film shot with Panavision lenses.

Finally, and most importantly, on this film the CinemaScope card is part of the creative content of the film; not really a credit. I doubt Panavision is going to want to interfere with that.

Posted by Bill Gabel (Member # 1105) on 05-13-2003, 08:47 AM:

Michael

I guess you did not get the joke. [Big Grin]

The movie is a romantic comedy, just like the films Fox made in the 50's. As part of the setting for the film. Fox is using its
own CinemaScope trademark logo, to give it that 50's feel.

Posted by Michael Brown (Member # 890) on 05-13-2003, 08:49 AM:

But it's just if you say something is a shoe when really it is a pair of trousers.

Posted by Michael Schaffer (Member # 1204) on 05-13-2003, 08:55 AM:

It is much more similar than shoes and trousers since the Panavison processes are based on and have developed from the Fox CinemaScope of the 50s.

Posted by John Pytlak (Member # 331) on 05-13-2003, 09:02 AM:

History of the "scope" format:

http://www.widescreenmuseum.com/widescreen/wingcs1.htm

http://www.in70mm.com/newsletter/2002/67/panavision/panavision_invention.htm

http://www.soc.org/opcam/10_jd97/mg10_wide.html

Posted by Gordon McLeod (Member # 33) on 05-13-2003, 10:16 AM:

Many early MGM scope films had the credit
CINEMASCOPE LENS BY PANAVISION

Posted by Bill Gabel (Member # 1105) on 05-13-2003, 10:27 AM:

Wasn't the credit on the Todd-AO movie "South Pacific" lens by Panavision.

________________________________________________________________
Thanks John

I forgot if it was Panavision or Bausch Lomb lens.
Thanks for the correction.

Bill

Posted by John Pytlak (Member # 331) on 05-13-2003, 10:35 AM:

quote:
Wasn't the credit on the Todd-AO movie "South Pacific" lens by Panavision.

Discussion of lenses used for "South Pacific":

http://www.widescreenmuseum.com/widescreen/wingto8.htm

Evidently a Panavision lens was used for the reduction printing of the 65mm to squeezed 35mm for the 35mm prints.

Posted by Steve Kraus (Member # 476) on 05-13-2003, 01:02 PM:

The MicroPanatar is mentioned in conjunction with 65mm and VistaVision effects production on movies into at least the 1980's; perhaps it was a later version. ILM had a custom anamorphic lens ground for the optical printer they built for Empire (and later films) to composite VV down to 4-perf anamorphic. (The pictures of it, showing vertical running projector heads and horizontal running camera, confused me at first til I realized that the image was going sideways through it!)

Posted by Claude S. Ayakawa (Member # 1401) on 05-13-2003, 01:13 PM:

All of Fox's early CinemaScope films did state "CinemaScope Lens (es) by Boush & Lomb (Sp?) in the credits which was at the beginning instead of the end of the movie. I recall Panavision getting credited for the lens many years later.

-Claude

Posted by David Stambaugh (Member # 1102) on 05-13-2003, 01:16 PM:

I still say the Panavision logo (and sound logos for that matter) belong in the opening credits, not the end. [Big Grin]

Posted by Steve Kraus (Member # 476) on 05-13-2003, 01:24 PM:

It would be worth experimenting with putting Panavision into the theatre newspaper ads along with the sound format to differentiate from the competition and see if it lures in a few more customers. But only for true anamorphic films; none of this grainy Super 35 crap.

Posted by David Stambaugh (Member # 1102) on 05-13-2003, 01:32 PM:

Is X-2 Super-35? It looked pretty darned good if it is. Must be at least partly due to being on Vision Premiere?

Filmgoers need to be reminded at every opportunity WHY seeing movies in a theatre is the only REAL way to see them. Shove those logos in everyone's face! [Cool]

Posted by Michael Schaffer (Member # 1204) on 05-13-2003, 01:40 PM:

That would only work if the actual presentation would live up to what all these cool logos promise. Which it rarely does in most places.

Posted by Bernard Tonks (Member # 809) on 05-13-2003, 03:29 PM:

Steve wrote,

quote:
It would be worth experimenting with putting Panavision into the theatre newspaper ads along with the sound format to differentiate from the competition and see if it lures in a few more customers. But only for true anamorphic films; none of this grainy Super 35 crap.

Ten years ago I used to put in the newspaper ads, CinemaScope and Dolby Stereo. I then tried Panavision. Nobody ever commented, and I doubt if it ever put extra bums on seats. I'm sure 70mm would have been an attraction, had I been equipped with.

I’m sure I read somewhere, maybe on Film-Tech, that the CinemaScope copyright had expired, and Fox had only just renewed it in time.

Does anyone remember some B+W western pictures filmed anamorphic, and called RegalScope ? Unless I’m badly mistaken made by Fox.

Posted by Mark J. Marshall (Member # 1409) on 05-13-2003, 09:46 PM:

Did "CinemaScope" originally also imply 4 track magnetic sound with the anamorphic picture?

Probably a moot point now, but I thought I read that somewhere.

Posted by Phil Hill (Member # 371) on 05-13-2003, 10:24 PM:

In GENERAL, I don't think Panavision, CinemaScope, VistaVision, 70MM, DTS, Dolby or any other format influence the film-goers. The exception is the few "in the know" aficionados. The title and cast are the draw...AND/OR the promise of a hot date afterwards.... [beer]

>>> Phil

Posted by Paul Linfesty (Member # 214) on 05-13-2003, 10:55 PM:

quote:
Did "CinemaScope" originally also imply 4 track magnetic sound with the anamorphic picture?

Yes. The original specifications drawn up by Fox included a mag stereo ONLY policy for their films. When trans-lux theatres got around this by installing a mixing box to make the four channels into one, FOX saw that a loophole existed in their contract and promptly drew up one for future films to ban this practice. However, due to overwhelming exhibitor complaints ("we cant afford both a new screen AND speakers") Fox and others relented around the middle of 1954, at first offering dual inventory prints (and, in Fox's case seom mag mono prints)and then eventualy mag-optic prints with foxholes and optic prints with standard perfs.

quote:
Does anyone remember some B+W western pictures filmed anamorphic, and called RegalScope ? Unless I’m badly mistaken made by Fox.

Not just westerns, but horror movies, too. In fact, these were CinemaScope productions, but Fox had made a marketing push that color was an integal part of CinemaScope and would be on all CinemaScope films. So, to get around this, they came up with the name Regalscope. It didn't last long, however, when black and white started creeping in again at some influential studio "A" directors. So CinemaScope became more "flexible."

Posted by John Pytlak (Member # 331) on 05-14-2003, 06:09 AM:

Original specifications were for 4-track magnetic sound only. Scope devolved to mag-optical, then optical only.

http://www.widescreenmuseum.com/widescreen/cinemascope.htm

http://www.widescreenmuseum.com/widescreen/cinemascoperef.htm

Posted by Ray Derrick (Member # 1001) on 05-14-2003, 09:37 AM:

You know, there was a time when cinema sound was leading-edge technology, then it "devolved" (as John so eloquently puts it) because of cheap-minded cinema exhibitors. Shame, shame. No wonder television took over.

Posted by David Stambaugh (Member # 1102) on 05-14-2003, 11:45 AM:

Showing off the "goods" may not attract new customers. But at least it reminds and reinforces for the hardcore movie regulars that there's no substitute for the cinema experience of "Film Done Right".