|  IP: Logged

e-mail: info@technicolor.com

 |  IP: Logged

 |  IP: Logged

I just picked up a schedule from the Music Box in Chicago, and found the following on the inside:

quote:

---

The 50th Anniversary presentation of America's favorite Musical Comedy ``Singin' in the Rain'' starring Gene Kelly, Debbie Reynolds and Donald O'Connor Screens Christmas Day through New Years with daily matinees! New 35mm Technicolor Print specially struck for the Music Box Theatre by Warner Brothers/MGM

---

I know that WB/MGM have spent a considerable amount of money recently on Singin' -- producing a new digital projection master, but I wasn't aware that new dye transfer prints were being struck. Does anyone have any information about the new print run -- Are these prints being struck from old matrices? New matrices struck from the original copy negatives? New matrices derived from the digital projection master?

Martin Brooks wrote: "This vibrant new 35mm print (from a negative derived from the original 3-strip Technicolor separations)..."

I interpret these two statements as saying that a new duplicate negative was made using the B&W separation positives, and new incorporated coupler prints (e.g., on Kodak VISION Color Print Film) are being made by Technicolor laboratories. Since there is no mention of making new matrices, I suspect these are not dye transfer prints. We shall see...maybe there will be both kinds of prints?

 |  IP: Logged

Then there's dye transfer on a silver screen. Mmmmmmmmmmmmmm.

Jeff Joseph
SabuCat Productions

When a title releases wide, prints go directly from the lab to the theatre. Many times, when the run breaks, a good proportion of the prints coming out of the theatres will not play any other engagements but will be junked. I suppose in such a case, an exhibitor can say, loosely and probably without loosing too much sleep over truth-in-advertising ethics, that indeed "the print of SUCH AND SUCH was specially struck for the So and So Cinema by This or That Studio." From the perspective that the print only played that theatre, then it was struck "specially" for that engagement.

I would be interested in knowing what exactly that statement "specially struck for the Music Box Theatre by Warner Brothers/MGM" actually means. It certainly doesn't mean the Music Box is the one who get to use that print. So if it goes to another theatre after the Music Box, all that statement means is that this print went from the TES to the Music Box first. It wasn't struck any more "specially struck" for the Music Box than the 70mm print of 2001 was struck specially for the Astor Plaza, even though they were the first ones to play it (and damage it). Unless the Music Box actually paid for the print (then do they get to keep it?). Fat chance.

It's like when I stick the phrase "Brooklyn Center Cinema, by special arrangement with Warner Brother proudly presents...."

Well, YAH it's by special arrangement -- I pay them money....they send me a print....SPECIAL ARRANGEMENT. It's all in the eye of the beholder. Then there are the sticky banners that you past up sideways across the 1-sheets "LIMITED ENGAGEMENT" Well, YAH, it's a limited engagement....we don't play any picture for more than three days so EVERY engagement is LIMITED. This is the MOVIE business; we live by hype.

Of course all this is conjecture on my part, and you know cynical is my middle name, so if I sound skeptical of the copywriter of the Music Box, I apologize for my disbelief; but that being said, I would be the first to levitate with joy if someone can actually confirm that, yes indeed, Warners now strikes new prints for the small art house, just for the asking. If it is indeed true, I will humbly do my mea culpas.

 |  IP: Logged