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Posted by Joe Redifer (Member # 3) on 06-05-2010, 05:41 PM:
 
So the other day I was building up a brand-new print of Ragnjeeti or whatever. Many (not all) Indian prints like to number reels in a strange, third-world way. For example, they will call reel 1 "reel 1+2" and so on. Anyway, I get to reel 9+10. I see that it says 9+10/19. OK. I figured that meant out of 19 total reels. I've seen that before. But nope! Reel 19 was included on that same reel! I noticed this as I was winding the reel over and suddenly it came undone and started flapping around. Reel 19 was fairly short. It could have easily fit on reel 17+18. What the hell?

Is there no professionalism in India? I know it is on the decline here for sure , but DAAAMN!

At least the movie came on cores. I've had brand new Indian prints come sans cores. Almost all used ones come without cores. I do not understand this.
 

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Posted by Frank Angel (Member # 248) on 06-05-2010, 06:24 PM:
 
Not so much weird as just ancient; the old ways evidently don't die easily in India. That lab must be still numbering them the old fashion way -- 1000ft reels incriments. Hey, we started it in the early days of silents and 1000ft lab capacity. When we got it together and started shipping on 2000ft reels, it became the 1A & 1B thing. So if that particular Indian lab was still numbering them the 1000ft way, reel 19 would mean you had 9 and a half 2000ft reels. Pretty long movie, was it? Must have been all those musical numbers in it I'll bet. They don't know from editing over there.

If you ever play old silents or even many early 30s titles that haven't been re-edited but just printed from original elements,, you will see consecutive reals numbered 1, 3, 5, 7, etc. Of course usually by the time you get it, a brother projectionist would have numbered them 1, 2, 3, 4, etc, but you can still see the original numbers on the leaders & tails.
 

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Posted by Joe Redifer (Member # 3) on 06-05-2010, 07:00 PM:
 
I've also seen them include 3 reels on a single reel from the lab, printed as one. There was no reason for them to do what they did with reel 19. Also, Indian movies are notable for bajillions of lab splices per print. They must have an extremely low capacity on their printers over there. Time to upgrade!

I'd like to see an Indian 70mm print some day. I wonder if they can even imagine such a thing.
 

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Posted by Michael Brown (Member # 890) on 06-05-2010, 07:39 PM:
 
The 9/10 plus 19 thing didn't surprise me all that much. I've seen it done like that before.

In adition to the lab splices I also got a few reels with several tape splices (where the film has been cut for UK exhibition.)
 

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Posted by Victor Liorentas (Member # 5272) on 06-05-2010, 08:05 PM:
 
The last one i ran had tilted images all the way through like my scope lens was turned a bit but it was their camera lens!

They are not to particular about setting the anamorphic lens straight in the camera.
 

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Posted by Brad Miller (Member # 2) on 06-05-2010, 11:35 PM:
 
Joe, the solution is to stop running Indian movies.
 

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Posted by Joe Redifer (Member # 3) on 06-06-2010, 12:39 AM:
 
I like that solution.
 

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Posted by John Wilson (Member # 269) on 06-06-2010, 05:22 AM:
 
The Sound Of Music could also benefit from that theory...get to the wedding and go straight to the credits. Try programming it that way on DVD sometime...works well and saves you a good 60 minutes without all the boring war bits.
 

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Posted by Martin McCaffery (Member # 37) on 06-06-2010, 10:09 AM:
 
Joe, was Reel 19 all credits? If so, it could have been something tacked on after the body of the film was printed, or made that way so the credits could be dropped. Or, just your run of the mill half assed lab job. Maybe they print using ends
 

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Posted by Joe Redifer (Member # 3) on 06-06-2010, 10:19 AM:
 
No, there was still full motion movie action for nearly half of rel 19.
 

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Posted by Gordon McLeod (Member # 33) on 06-06-2010, 04:54 PM:
 
India used to do alot of 70mm prints
the standard is still 1000' per reel and many smaller labs still number the prints accordingly
 

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Posted by Edward Havens (Member # 4715) on 06-07-2010, 09:49 PM:
 
I recently asked one of the Bollywood distributors what I should do with my print of his movie, since Bollywood movies neither ship through Brake Water or UPS.

The response?

"Dumpster."
 

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Posted by Phil Blake (Member # 2012) on 06-07-2010, 09:56 PM:
 
similar experience here ran one few weeks back noticed it was not like our "normal" prints.
also the film stock was very thick and the one sheet posters were very thin.
also the attandance was terrible and I too have a feeling my return address may be the dumpster.
 

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Posted by Scott Norwood (Member # 30) on 06-07-2010, 10:02 PM:
 
There is some other (eastern Eurpoean?) country that numbers reels this way, too. They go 1,3,5,etc., but ship on 2000' reels (cores?).

Russian films (at least older ones) ship in 1000' lengths and are, of course, numbered as such.

Then there are the countries that make films intended to be shown at 25fps. I can count on one hand (with fingers left over) the number of venues in this state that can show those properly....
 

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Posted by F. Hudson Miller (Member # 5318) on 06-07-2010, 11:08 PM:
 
Until the late 1990s all films made in Hollywood were cut and mixed on 1000 reels. After the final mix the sound stems (dia, fx, mx masters) were spliced together into A/B reels or Big Reels. R-1+R-2 = R-1A/B or Big R-1. The pull ups (35mm) & pull downs (70mm) were added and 2000ft print masters were recorded. Optical tracks were made and married to 2000 ft release prints made from 2000ft cut pix negs.

In the 1990's With the advent of digital editing/mixing (Avid/Protools), 1000ft reels were abandon for "Big Reels" throughout post-production. There you have more than you ever wanted to know about the demise of the 1000ft editorial reel.
 

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Posted by Frank Angel (Member # 248) on 06-08-2010, 09:32 AM:
 
Also abandoned were editors who knew how to edit so that change-over reel ends were not made across important elements like critical dialogue and/or music crescendos. Use to be they would be careful to make reel end cuts at non-critical "sweet" points what wouldn't be marred by an imprecise change-over. Nowadays I find sometimes a real ends exactly at the breath between one sentence and another....not that I ever don't get those right on the money but the best manual change-over will be audible if foreground music is present across the switch point.

Choosing a clean end-of-reel c/o point seems to be an art that digital editors have lost.
 

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Posted by Geena Phillips (Member # 3726) on 06-08-2010, 11:57 AM:
 
Bah. Hindi films like Rajneeti are easy. It's when you get into the other languages in Indian film that the prints get... um, interesting...
 

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Posted by Danial Simmonds (Member # 4638) on 06-08-2010, 12:14 PM:
 
Very interesting...

Liquid paper ontop of 3 or 5 frames to mark the splice?
Normal selotape instead of splicing tape?

I had seen many weird things,

there was a hindi movie last year where the reel 4 repeated about 20 seconds at the end, couldnt notice it until the movie was played...
 

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Posted by Tony Bandiera Jr (Member # 2365) on 06-08-2010, 01:49 PM:
 

quote: Scott Norwood

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Then there are the countries that make films intended to be shown at 25fps. I can count on one hand (with fingers left over) the number of venues in this state that can show those properly....

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quote: Frank Angel

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Also abandoned were editors who knew how to edit so that change-over reel ends were not made across important elements like critical dialogue and/or music crescendos. Use to be they would be careful to make reel end cuts at non-critical "sweet" points what wouldn't be marred by an imprecise change-over. Nowadays I find sometimes a real ends exactly at the breath between one sentence and another....not that I ever don't get those right on the money but the best manual change-over will be audible if foreground music is present across the switch point.

Choosing a clean end-of-reel c/o point seems to be an art that digital editors have lost.

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quote: Joe Redifer

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Apparently this confused the Eastgate 10 theater in Cleveland. The whole country is talking about their predicament.

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Can you elaborate on this? I am both interested and mystified.
 

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Posted by Chris Slycord (Member # 4239) on 07-01-2010, 08:29 PM:
 
I assume he means that they ran the non-sequential reel as if the reel itself was sequential.
 

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Posted by Joe Redifer (Member # 3) on 07-02-2010, 12:03 AM:
 
No, they just looked at the cans and thought there should be another can because the end of reel #14 didn't have any credits.
 

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Posted by Joe Redifer (Member # 3) on 07-04-2010, 02:24 AM:
 
GOD DAMN IT! Look at what I received this week. A print of Ravaanan with two reels crammed inside one can:


Sorry about the quality, the only camera I had was the one on my 7 year-old cell phone.

This was one of many recent movies where 7+8 and 15+16 were non-sequentially combined into one reel. At least two reels were cut at random and not at the reel change. Heads and tails not reattached. Only a few cores included, but the film was not wrapped on them (is using cores so hard?) The theater that had this last is a piece of god damned shit. This is unacceptable. Mike Spaeth, is there anything you can do to admonish the unprofessional practices of the theater that had this print last? Poor quality like this needs to be stopped. I should have rejected this as unplayable as it is in seriously poor condition (that would have pissed Mohan off, getting booked with an unplayable print and all). The print for the other movie we got this week (Vedam) came in on two 6,000 foot reels surrounded in pink bubble-wrap! They broke down the movie and just cut it when it was full then filled up the next one. I could not locate the place where the intermission should be, so I had to invent my own.

Are my standards not low enough? What's going on here? Deal with this please, Mike. Make things better.
 

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Posted by Brad Miller (Member # 2) on 07-04-2010, 02:32 AM:
 
At least they were inventive. I would have NEVER thought to do such a thing.
 

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Posted by Joe Redifer (Member # 3) on 07-04-2010, 02:39 AM:
 
Oh I believe you could have thought of it. Actually doing it, though, definitely not since you aren't incompetent. Funny thing about Indian prints is that when you think you've seen it all, they surprise you with something new. Of course, just the act of assembling these reels damaged the print even more since they had to be unsquished and flopped around and "tightened" themselves as they spun.

I can't wait to see what I get next.
 

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Posted by Mike Spaeth (Member # 524) on 07-04-2010, 03:22 AM:
 
Did that print of Raavanan happen to come from Seattle? I don't remember how I shuffled the prints around this week. I'm pretty sure it didn't come from one of my theatres.

I got a print in a duffel bag once. Apparently someone accompanied the print from india, and just took the film (on cores) tossed them in a duffel bag and carried it on the flight.
 

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Posted by Joe Redifer (Member # 3) on 07-04-2010, 10:46 AM:
 
Not sure where it came from. I will try to look for some sort of source on the box today, but it didn't come direct to the theater. Mohan's second-in-command hand carried them in.
 

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Posted by Michael Brown (Member # 890) on 07-04-2010, 12:11 PM:
 
At least I get most of my prints straight from the lab, so at my place we avoid crap like that.
 

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Posted by Joe Redifer (Member # 3) on 07-04-2010, 01:17 PM:
 
Mike, it is from Seattle. I now hate Seattle.
 

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Posted by Chris Slycord (Member # 4239) on 07-04-2010, 05:18 PM:
 
Considering I used to work up there, I'm curious which theater did that to you.
 

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Posted by Frank Angel (Member # 248) on 07-06-2010, 10:56 AM:
 
Joe, I am hysterical laughing at your kiniption fit over severely challenged film-handlers from, how shall we put it kindly....not first world countries.

Well, welcome to my hell. This is the "alternative" / foreign art house plight. Those of us who hardly ever have that sweet luxury of opening up prints that have never run thru a projector until we thread them up, we get this kind of thing pretty regularly. And when I hear you first-run guys talking about immediately calling to get "replacement reels," I have to chuckly; reels stuff into shoeboxes....prints wrapped in butcher paper with no heads or tails....prints missing credits or main titles.....WHO YA GONNA CALL?! Print Busters?

Oh no....YOU are the Print Buster, my friend. You look at that can stuffed with two (only two reels? -- piece of cake, Joe), then you take a deep breath, you look yourself in the mirror and say, "OK, Booth Superhero....go to it." And you dig in and figure out what the hell order that pile of junk goes in, and you clean the three damn bottles worth of white-out or shoe polish or whatever else they effin used off the soundtrack and off the frames where it migraged and you clean off the gobs of dry, yet still stinking elephant poo that all the reel ends seemed to have been dip in and by gum, you put that baby on the screen and get it to look pretty damn good too!

And THAT, boys and girls, is how we do in the art houses! OK, maybe later we come and bitch and moan about it on FT, but in the end, we do justice to that poor film maker's art.

Replacement reels.....HA!
 

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Posted by Randy Stankey (Member # 64) on 07-06-2010, 11:41 AM:
 
I got a copy of the movie "Rabbit-Proof Fence" where about five minutes of the film repeated itself.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rabbit-Proof_Fence_%28film%29

Somebody just cut the film at the end of the third reel, not paying attention to where the tail of the reel actually was, leaving extra film at the head of reel four attached to the end of reel three. After that, reel four got replaced, for some reason, with a brand new reel which had all the contents it should have had. Thus, an extra five minutes of film was left attached to the tail of reel three.

So, I was screening the film and, at the end of the third reel there was a cue mark and a reel change, just like normal. Then, five minutes later, there was another cue mark, another reel change then the story started to repeat itself. It took a few minutes to realize that I wasn't experiencing some strange form of Deja Vu. It took a few minutes to realize that I wasn't experiencing some strange form of Deja Vu.

So, after tearing down half the print, figuring out what was wrong and pulling out the extra film, I was able to get the print playing right. I called the distributor to ask what they wanted me to do with the extra film. They promised to call me back but I never heard from them again.

I still have that film lying around in my booth, somewhere. If anybody ever plays the movie, "Rabbit-Proof Fence" that has 5 minutes of missing footage, send me a message. I'll see if I can dig it up and send it to you.

BTW: Joe, don't apologize for the quality of the picture. It's only fitting that you take a crappy picture of the crappy way some crappy person handled such a crappy movie. Sometimes irony is better.
 

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Posted by Christian Appelt (Member # 1067) on 07-06-2010, 01:39 PM:
 
Years ago, I had to handle a lot of Indian movies. We ran them single reel changeover, and most were old titles from the 1960s and 1970s, mostly art films, not the singin' in the rain stuff.

All black&white prints were acetate and usually dripping wet with oil. I couldn't imagine why, because even numerous runs through leaky projectors would not have left that much oil.

Later I talked to an film archive guy from India, and he explained it to me. He said that in India many films were run in 2000ft. changeover operation on projectors and reels in extremely bad condition. To keep acetate prints from being ripped apart by warped reel flanges and gates with maladjusted tension, some projectionists used to spread some oil on the side of each roll of film before they wound it on reels. Even if the warped flange hit the film, the stock was so slippery and soft that it would not tear.

Of course the oil didn't stop at the edges, it spread all over and took away a lot of light in projection. I never saw darker b&w projection although we had a small screen and more than adequate lamp power!

A few times the first half of a single reel left so much oil in the gate that we had to stop and clean because the image got so jumpy. Cleaning the prints before projection was impossible because they often arrived last minute. The only good thing about the oil was that it seemed to fill the base scratches at reel ends - India''s traditional FilmGuard (Ayurveda style)?
 

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Posted by Geena Phillips (Member # 3726) on 08-10-2010, 08:02 PM:
 

quote: Mike Spaeth

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I got a print in a duffel bag once. Apparently someone accompanied the print from india, and just took the film (on cores) tossed them in a duffel bag and carried it on the flight.

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quote: Mike Spaeth

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I got a print in a duffel bag once.

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This isn't quite a duffel bag, but not far from it.
I get a lot of prints from labs in China shipped this way.
This one arrived just the other day.

The film is on cores in cans stacked inside the canvas bag.
It actually works pretty well, although I've gotten a
couple of shipments where the cans were pretty banged up.
 

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Posted by Galen Murphy-Fahlgren (Member # 4535) on 08-12-2010, 09:47 AM:
 
Jim, I had quite a few movies come that way. It is far better than many of the ways Indian prints often go.

Geena, that is nothing compared to the print that I got in a suitcase, out of the reel cans, no taped ends, missing several cores. The heads and tails were laying in the bottom of the suitcase, and the "reels" were hacked off somewhere in the middle of what were supposed to be the actual reels. Some were heads up, some were tails up. It was supposed to play three or five shows over a weekend and get sent out. I spent most of my time that weekend getting it sorted out, and finally got it built by the last show, which I think no one showed up for. I did confirm that it was built correctly and break it down to at least some kind of standard, what with reel cans, heads and tails marked with what reel it was supposed to be, and a burlap box. If anyone ever sees a south Indian print in reel cans that have the original labels covered in masking tape and the pertinent information scrawled in handwriting that resembles that of an illiterate vagrant, throw it off the roof for me. I would have myself, but I put too much effort into getting it on screen.
 

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Posted by Joe Redifer (Member # 3) on 08-12-2010, 01:26 PM:
 
I doubt anyone will see that print again. Once they have played for a few days they are pretty much worthless and end up getting junked by whoever is in possession of them. There are a few rare exceptions to that rule, but the key word there is "rare".
 

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Posted by James Westbrook (Member # 3690) on 08-12-2010, 02:33 PM:
 
I tore down our print of Kites on the rewind bench, putting the reels back on cores, putting the reels back into their individual cans, back into that burlap container.
We contact our film booker as to whom to contact regarding shipping the print back.
"Just chunk it into the dumpster."

 

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Posted by Galen Murphy-Fahlgren (Member # 4535) on 08-13-2010, 09:12 AM:
 
Joe, this was one of those super tiny releases with one or two prints circulating for a bit. That theater generally got new prints for anything sizable.

James, that is surprisingly refreshing.
 

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Posted by Jason Metcalfe (Member # 5739) on 08-13-2010, 01:49 PM:
 

quote: Randy Stankey

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It took a few minutes to realize that I wasn't experiencing some strange form of Deja Vu. It took a few minutes to realize that I wasn't experiencing some strange form of Deja Vu.

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quote: F. Hudson Miller

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Until the late 1990s all films made in Hollywood were cut and mixed on 1000 reels. After the final mix the sound stems (dia, fx, mx masters) were spliced together into A/B reels or Big Reels.

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Several years ago, I was running a brand new direct-from-the-lab print of "Birdman Of Alcatraz". Since this was a new print, which arrived at the last minute, I didn't pay much attention when spooling it from the lab cores onto house reels, other than to make sure I had cue marks, since I was running change-overs.

Midway through the first reel, as I had my back to the screen inspecting another print, I thought I saw flashes of light reflecting off the port-hole onto the booth wall. But I turned around and everything was OK.

During the 2nd reel, I saw this again, and I turned around just in time to realize that the print I had was printed up from 1000ft 'editorial' reels, and for some reason the lab had not removed all the "TAIL:PART 1A - CUT HERE - HEAD:PART 1B- {COUNTDOWN}" leadercrap between the "A" & "B" sections.

I already had reel 3 threaded up, but I pulled it off the projector and found it was the same way. After making the necessary cuts just in time to re-thread & do the change-over, I went checked and found ALL the reels have been printed this way.

When I later informed the distributer of this, they were pretty pissed since they had paid the lab an extra fee to remove all the inter-reel heads & tails, which they apparantly had not done.
 

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Posted by Stephen Furley (Member # 1277) on 08-25-2010, 12:05 PM:
 
I ran an Indian film a few years ago which came on 1000 foot reels; it was a recent film, not an old one. All of the reels, except the last, were just about the same length, so the changeovers came just about every 1000 feet, even if that was in the middle of a scene.
 

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Posted by Jim Cassedy (Member # 4115) on 08-28-2010, 10:26 AM:
 
The biggest problem I've been having lately with prints
from foreign (excluding Canada & Hong Kong)labs is a lack
of consistant frame line position between reels of the
same print that are printed on different printers.

This causes one or more of the reels to be slightly "out
of frame" when the assembled print is shown.

(WARNING: MY USUAL ANTI-PLATTER RANT AHEAD! )
Of course this is no problem when I run changeovers,
since I can mark the frame knob with tape so that
I can frame each reel as required, but on platters,
it often results in having to find a 'compromise'
framing position which often cuts off tops of heads
or else still leaves a visible frame line on some
reels if no universal compromise framing position can
be found. (Of course, as far as I'm concerned, EVERY
platter show I run is a compromise, but I'll save
that for another rant!)

I recently had a print of an excellent German film
with one reel printed slightly out of frame. It really
bothered me. Due to running multiple screens, it would
be impossible for me to run to the booth to re-frame
twice during each show so that the frame line wouldn't
be visibile on screen. The picture was SCOPE, so there
was no 'wiggle room" with the framing as there might
be on a flat print. We couldn't get a replacement reel
or print.

Since it was only one reel that was bad, I cut an
extremely thin strip of aluminium I found in my junk
drawer to make a "mask" for the (Century)aperture plate.


This actually worked without cutting off either subtitles
or tops of heads on the 'good' reels and perfectly hid the
annoying visible frame line on the 'bad' reel.

If you try this, the metal strip needs to be extremely
thin, or you'll have trouble getting your ap plate in.
One end is bent around the edge of the aperture plate,
and the rest held in place by friction once it's shoved
into the projector.
 

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Posted by Peter Das (Member # 4690) on 08-28-2010, 10:38 AM:
 
Does anybody wants to get rid of these Indian films let me know and I am glad to pay shipping costs to send to me. you can ship them to our buffalo, NY office. Thank you
 

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Posted by Steve Guttag (Member # 268) on 08-28-2010, 07:19 PM:
 
I am curious...if you run 35PA and pull your masking away...can you see the .690 line? How about any thing beyond that? I too often see plates over cut...the MAXIMUM projectable image is .690 x .825 (for scope)..that means anything beyond that (including what might fall on the masking) is over cut. Many folks mask to the lines perfectly, then cut their plates to eliminate the fringe of the aperture...which, by definition, overcuts the plate.
 

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Posted by Joseph Pandolfi (Member # 223) on 09-13-2010, 08:16 PM:
 
Before you go and chuck that Bollywood print in the dumpster. You might want to contact the Film Librarian at Yale University I have to not mention his name on this site, but he is always on the lookout for used Bollywood movies. He is the master projection at the Whitney Humanities center and is well known in the preservation of classic 35mm archival prints that Yale owns.
 

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Posted by Joe Redifer (Member # 3) on 09-13-2010, 10:24 PM:
 
The problem is that preparing them for shipping and all of that is a huge bother, much easier to trash 'em.
 

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Posted by Michael Brown (Member # 890) on 01-19-2011, 09:04 PM:
 
Just had the new release 'Dhobi Ghat' on the bench tonight.

I'll bet we're going to get customer complaints over this one. The film is a 1.85:1 image printed in the scope frame. (so it runs with a scope lense but the image won't fill the full width of the screen).

In for a week of complains over the "picture being too small" and such like.
 

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Posted by Tony Bandiera Jr (Member # 2365) on 01-19-2011, 09:48 PM:
 
Ummmm, so you simply can't set your masking to 1.85?

Think outside the box man!!

And before you say anything, as for trailers, two options:

1: Screw 'em and run without trailers...on an India film who cares anyways? (I'm only part joking on this.)
2: Run your trailers in full scope and close the masking down when the feature starts. (Which may engender more complaints, which is why I said screw the trailers.)

Better yet, take the time to do a brief intro before each show and explain to your audience that the film is presented in a non-standard format, but you are presenting the full image available on the film.
 

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Posted by Frank Angel (Member # 248) on 01-19-2011, 10:14 PM:
 
I am with Tony with this one. Ditch the trailes completely OR just run only scope trailers and prgram a masking change to close for the feature. How do you deal with mixed scope and flat trailers anyway?
 

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Posted by Joe Redifer (Member # 3) on 01-19-2011, 11:44 PM:
 
Thanks for the heads-up, Michael. We are showing that one this weekend as well. It's supposed to be huge. Expect a lot of screaming and yelling whenever the actor (or their name) appears on the screen for the first time. Lots of confetti, too. What is it with these guys? As for trailers, I never show them on Indian movies unless the Indian guys that rent our auditorium have one they want to run. If they want to run one on this one, I'll just tell 'em it's the wrong format, please STFU.

Any other oddities with this print like reel 1 being combined with 7 or other standard BS that they love to pull?

EDIT: Nevermind, saw your other thread about this.
 

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Posted by Chris Slycord (Member # 4239) on 01-20-2011, 10:49 AM:
 
If possible, I'd try to run flat trailers in front of the movie.

That way, you can just leave the masking alone and have it switch the lens and aperture during a few seconds of black slug leader between the trailer and feature.
 

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Posted by Jim Henk (Member # 3628) on 01-21-2011, 12:29 AM:
 
When I worked relief at the Rialto in South Pasadena, the company booked in two "Zatoichi" movies. (a really popular samaurai franchise) The one English speaker at the distributor was on vacation. They sent us three prints. One of which we did book, and the other two were completely wrong. (but still Zatoichi films) So I got to go down, plug in the mike, explain what had happened to the audience, (about 200 people) and had them vote for which movies they wanted to see. They thought it was hilarious, and had a great time debating, voting, and cheering for their "favorites", site unseen.

Built up their choices, and away they went.
 

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