Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE: How I Saved The Day

This is topic How I Saved The Day in forum Ground Level at Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE.

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Posted by Rick Raskin (Member # 1561) on 03-20-2005, 03:43 PM:

OK, I asked for it, so here's goes:

I was stationed at Fort Benning, GA and had a part time projectionist job at Theatre #1. We were to run an advance premier of John Wayne's "The Green Berets" since it had scenes filmed at Benning. Theatre #1 had about 1500 seats and was filled to the rafters. I wasn't on duty for the show but had decided to sneak a peak from the booth. When I arrived everyone was in a panic mode because the sound system had crapped out. Apparently a main fuse had blown in the basement and according to rules had to be replaced by the Post engineers. The downside was they couldn't come out until that evening. What to do? I noticed that we had lamp and motor, just no sound. I then saw that the booth clock was running. A quick check of the amplifier rack determined that the load was less than 10 amps. So I got an extension cord, snipped off the female end and wired it to the amplifier power lugs. Plugged it into the clock outlet and the show went off without a hitch. The audience never knew anything had been wrong.

Posted by Monte L Fullmer (Member # 2797) on 03-20-2005, 08:12 PM:

Okey, I've posted this one before, yet I'm proud of this one as well:

At a megaplex running "Armegeddeon." We had 4 prints of that movie. We had 4 different sets of showtimes with this movie. Boxoffice was selling one set of shows, but unfort, the system was misprinting the house number. This set happened to be for the largest house that was being misprinted. I start that large house on time, yet noticed that the house quite empty with a smattering of people. Twenty minutes into the actual show, I got a call from the boxoffice to stop the show, for the people that bought for that time was in the wrong house. There is where my crowd was-in the wrong house. We got those people in the right house and was asked if we can restart the movie from the beginning. I looked at the amount of film on the ring: 15 minutes of trailers and 20 minutes of feature. A little bit on the big side, but decided "what the hell.." Told boxoffice that I'll be on the screen in 10 minutes on the restart. I opened up the window and hollered at the people that, "the show will be on the screen in 10 minutes." Unthreaded everything so I can wind the film back on that takeup ring, dropped that ring back into the center of the feature, relaced and was back on screen in due time. What was funny was that some of the management personnel saw me do this and was astounded that I could pull off such a feat without cutting any film. Just had to be careful not to let that ring pop out from within that small wind, or I'd be a "screwed pooch" for sure, as I was winding that film back around the ring.

Everyone was happy afterwards...and nobody knew what I was doing or what I did.

-Monte

Posted by Jeremy Fuentes (Member # 2135) on 03-21-2005, 06:10 AM:

How I Saved The Day...by Jeremy Fuentes.

This one day we were really busy and all the employees were tired, and frustrated. I bought pizza for everyone. It turned out to be a much better day after that. Good thing I was there to save the day!!!!!!!!!!!!!!