Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE: Reel of Indiana Jones in Narnia

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Posted by Donna Sylvester (Member # 726) on 05-15-2008, 12:42 AM:

I just looked at my print of Narnia and saw two reels (3&9) tails up. Reel 9 was imprinted on the film T-9 NARNIA, but the small white piece of paper adhered said INDIANA JONES! When I rewound the film I discovered it is actually reel 7 of INDIANA JONES. I saw Harrison Ford wearing his same old hat. The film head was imprinted with the correct I.J. title.

Technicolor is at a loss as to how it happened, especially since INDIANA JONES is a DFS print. The lab must have screwed up. I just hope someone doesn't get a locked up INDIANA JONES print that has a NARNIA reel in it by mistake. There wouldn't be time for the correct reel to arrive.

Check your reels carefully.

I did post this on another site, but thought it important to get the word out in case there are other similar print mixups.

Posted by Joe Redifer (Member # 3) on 05-15-2008, 01:43 AM:

This is why prints need to be inspected and screened with plenty of time to obtain replacements before the first public showing.

Posted by Mike Schulz (Member # 4297) on 05-15-2008, 01:55 AM:

I'm pretty sure this has nothing to do with preventing piracy and everything to do with pushing digital cinema. They are trying to make film prints the biggest pain in the arse that they can to help convince theatre owners to go digital to avoid the hassle.

I would also assume that the "average" theatre will crack under the pressure of time and have sloppy build-ups and lots of angry customers complaining about bad framing, scratches, etc due to not having time to screen prints. Well guess what? That would never happen if you had a digital projector!

It doesn't take a genius to know that all of the piracy is done from the inside during post production. The quality of bootlegs these days are amazing. Gone are the days of the hand-held camcorder bootlegs, they are all dvd quality now and everyone knows that every projection booth in the world has the transfer equipment necessary to produce dvd bootlegs! [Roll Eyes]

Posted by Monte L Fullmer (Member # 2797) on 05-15-2008, 03:15 AM:

I'd more call it a lab goof since both releases were processed by Technicolor labs.

Since they spin out thousands of feet of film a minute, someone in QA fell asleep at the switch.

Even DeLuxe can do the same goof from time to time...

[ 05-15-2008, 01:21 PM: Message edited by: Monte L Fullmer ]

Posted by Chris Slycord (Member # 4239) on 05-15-2008, 03:16 AM:

Methinks you chose the wrong thread. Obviously, a printing mistake giving you a reel for a different movie doesn't get rid of piracy.

Posted by Justin Hamaker (Member # 2165) on 05-15-2008, 03:18 AM:

Mike
Even if every theatre signed on to convert every screen to digital today, it would still take a good 3-4 years to get everyone installed. Between equipment and technician bottlenecks, there is no way that the conversion to digital can be done within a short amount of time.

And I disagree with your assessment of the purpose not being to stop piracy. While the locks are not going to affect the determined pirate, the bean counters and policy makers can use them as "proof" they are doing something about the problem. Besides, if it was really about creating an inconvenience, why didn't we see locks on Drillbit Taylor or The Ruins.

Posted by Mike Blakesley (Member # 26) on 05-15-2008, 10:25 AM:

quote: Donna Sylvester
Reel 9 was imprinted on the film T-9 NARNIA, but the small white piece of paper adhered said INDIANA JONES! When I rewound the film I discovered it is actually reel 7 of INDIANA JONES. I saw Harrison Ford wearing his same old hat. The film head was imprinted with the correct I.J. title.

Donna, you contradict yourself in this paragraph. First you say the reel was imprinted "T-9 NARNIA," but then later on you say the film leader was "imprinted with the correct I.J. title." Which is it?

Posted by Randy Stankey (Member # 64) on 05-15-2008, 10:45 AM:

Aha! You have exposed the bittorent of 35mm film piracy!

Somebody at the lab or depot "accidentally" scrambles the reels in certain shipments of key movies and sends them out to a series of predetermined theaters who are ALSO receiving a legitimate copy of the same movie.

The film pirates receive the target print in UNLOCKED CANS and reassemble them from various sources to get one complete print, BEFORE the official release.

Then, when the print has been telecined and uploaded to the torrent it is placed back in the cans it was originally SUPPOSED to be in and sent back. Nobody is the wiser.

Now that everybody knows that only reels 1, 3,5, etc. are sent in locked cans the job is half done. The other half is being sent in the clear. They only have to divert half the reels.

One last thing... Please be aware that this post was made with tongue planted firmly in cheek. [Wink]

Posted by Donna Sylvester (Member # 726) on 05-15-2008, 11:05 AM:

The tail is imprinted T-9 Narnia, while the head is imprinted H-7 Indiana Jones.

Posted by Galen Murphy-Fahlgren (Member # 4535) on 05-15-2008, 01:18 PM:

quote: Mike Schulz
I'm pretty sure this has nothing to do with preventing piracy and everything to do with pushing digital cinema. They are trying to make film prints the biggest pain in the arse that they can to help convince theatre owners to go digital to avoid the hassle.

That would be pretty stupid, since I doubt there are many owners who handle film, and those that do probably don't have the budget for digital rollout.

Posted by Mike Spaeth (Member # 524) on 05-15-2008, 03:30 PM:

Mike Schultz...

I'm pretty sure if the idea were a push for D-Cinema, this particular release would not be available in digital ONLY if you don't have 35mm equipment. If you have dual-projection systems (35mm & Digital), you MUST play 35mm, save for extraordinary circumstances (i.e. your biggest houses are Digital only).

Posted by Dustin Mitchell (Member # 372) on 05-15-2008, 05:34 PM:

We will be playing Jones in 35mm AND digital. We have to play the 35mm screens, but we also have digital screens booked.

Posted by Ron Funderburg (Member # 4561) on 05-15-2008, 05:46 PM:

My reel 8 of Narnia has no tail on it, it has a lab splice and piece of film but no markings it also had two large circle cuts in the center of a couple of frames a few frames from the end of the printed material. I have no idea if the reel is complete or not. The Lion is talking to one of the kids or Caspain but not sure who it is cutting between lion and male actor! I guess I'm calling Technicolor now! [Frown]

Posted by Mike Blakesley (Member # 26) on 05-15-2008, 05:58 PM:

Man, this Narnia thing sounds like the world's sloppiest lab and/or exchange work. My reels are at least labeled correctly. Will watch for other problems.

Posted by Joe Redifer (Member # 3) on 05-15-2008, 06:01 PM:

I really hope the Indy prints won't be just as messed up. Kind of hard to get an acceptable replacement reel(s) when you can't unlock the cans until the same day it shows.

Posted by John Hawkinson (Member # 1135) on 05-15-2008, 06:46 PM:

DFS does allocate some number of prints as spares in major metropolitan areas and also for each local trucking company (well, at least the Boston-area folks we use, Filmtrans, get their own spare prints for some titles, so they don't need to visit the depot).

One would like to think they would increase the number of spare prints for a late-delivery like this one. Though perhaps that is fanciful.

I'm having a lot of trouble coming with with a plausible explanation for why R7 of Indy would have a tail from R9 of Caspian. After all, these leaders are printed through from the internegative. So either the internegative was fucked (in which case there may be a lot of other bad reels out there!) or perhaps they were switching the printer between Caspian and Indy and screwed up and got the wrong leader somehow?

Remember, Ron, TES has checkframes on line:
TES checkframe site
Prince Caspian checkframes

--jhawk

Posted by Ron Funderburg (Member # 4561) on 05-16-2008, 10:45 AM:

Oh I have my replacement reel already and did check it on TES it had several seconds of the end of reel missing and of course I had to remove the frames where the lab person had used a hole punch on the film and I didn't like the look of that on the screen either to hard a jump!

Posted by Ron Funderburg (Member # 4561) on 05-16-2008, 08:12 PM:

Okay from I can tell the tech that made up the reel didn't have enough film on there were 3 full minutes at the end of reel eight that just weren't there.

Posted by Brad Miller (Member # 2) on 05-21-2008, 07:15 PM:

Interesting bit of info here. I didn't realize that Disney printed anywhere but Technicolor...and I thought with Spielberg as a major player in Dreamworks (Paramount) that Indiana Jones would've been printed at the Technicolor lab, but alas it turns out BOTH Narnia and Indiana Jones were printed at the Deluxe lab. So this was Deluxe's fault.

Posted by Ron Funderburg (Member # 4561) on 05-21-2008, 08:02 PM:

Well the stuff on Caspian says it was a Technicolor print and it was Technicolor that sent out the replacement (only on a core). Other than he missing 3 minutes the print was beautiful! We haven't done land office business on it but it is steady! I have had several screw ups by labs in 30+ years of doing this but it seems the screw ups are closer together now and the print quality isn't what it use to be. That's it bitch and moan!

Posted by Mike Blakesley (Member # 26) on 05-21-2008, 08:07 PM:

quote:
with Spielberg as a major player in Dreamworks (Paramount) that Indiana Jones would've been printed at the Technicolor lab,

Spielberg may not be financially involved anymore since DW was bought by Paramount...although he has enough clout that he could probably specify where he wanted his films printed, no matter what studio he's working for.