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This topic comprises 2 pages: 1 2
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Topic: Prints not being delivered..
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Scott Norwood
Film God
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Posts: 8146
From: Boston, MA. USA (1774.21 miles northeast of Dallas)
Registered: Jun 99
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posted 02-13-2010 05:56 PM
Although the delivery system seems to work quite well, things do get interesting at venues that aren't actual theatres. The film distribution system isn't really designed to deliver prints to colleges, hotels, offices, PO boxes, and other random places, and I have had some "interesting" experiences with those types of deliveries.
At colleges, the prints will typically be delivered somewhere on the campus (often to the campus police station), but the people responsible for the event often do not know where the print is. Sometimes, it will take up to an hour of searching and phone calls before someone finds it.
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John T. Hendrickson, Jr
Jedi Master Film Handler
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Posts: 889
From: Freehold, NJ, USA
Registered: Apr 2001
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posted 02-13-2010 06:53 PM
FWIW, we were graced with 18 inches of snow on Wednesday, closing the mall and thus our theatres. UPS had the Technicolor prints Wednesday and tried to deliver them, but Mall security would not let them in, even though we had a manager on site.
We got our DeLuxe depot prints on Thursday evening, a little later than usual, but they were swamped by the conditions in our region. Still, we had plenty of time to get them made up and ready for Friday's matinee.
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John Hawkinson
Film God
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Posts: 2273
From: Cambridge, MA, USA
Registered: Feb 2002
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posted 02-13-2010 11:26 PM
I understand DFS's Boston depot had a lot [weather-related] of delays this past week because they didn't receive their prints on time. I think this was mostly a Mon/Tuesday phenomenon so it didn't really have much impact on theatres getting Wed/Thu deliveries, other than to stress some folks out a bit more...
It takes two to tango, Joe. Yeah, they (probably *not* the depot but instead your local transport company!) should have told you, but you should also have called them at 10am to find out where your print was! The squeaky wheel gets the oil.
I dunno, Scott, the film delivery system is remarkably flexible. But I'm stunned at the people who take it all on faith. I mean, you can and should call DFS/TES to verify your bookings if there is anything special going on. Those people are there to help you. (It doesn't help that most of the venues you outline probably are inexperienced and don't know who to talk to to find out what has happened, etc.) Police stations? Wow. That sounds pretty unprofessional...
Have I ever had a print miss? Hmm. I recently had a replacement print fail to Saturday-deliver (FedEx) because of a shipper error (wrong checkbox) and by Monday the shows were over. And certainly I've had prints that were supposed to deliver 1 or 2 days later than anticipated, but still in time for the show.
And then there was the special screening where the Editorial guys in Hollywood decided to provide additional footage at the last minute (atually about 90 minutes before showtime) and they sent it via fiber, but the screening was on HDCAM SR but the fiber facility only had D5, so it ended up with the lowest common denominator...maybe that counts as a miss.
--jhawk
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Mike Blakesley
Film God
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Posts: 12767
From: Forsyth, Montana
Registered: Jun 99
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posted 02-14-2010 11:35 AM
The last missout we had was the animated film, "Surf's Up" a couple of years ago. Sony had to fly the print in from Salt Lake City, and we had one of those "it hasn't landed yet, but should be on the ground soon" phone calls from the courier service. Then at 4:00, they called and said the print was on its way from Billings to us (a 90-minute drive).
I started to get nervous when it was 6:30 and we still hadn't seen the courier, so I made a couple of phone calls and got reassured that it HAD left Billings some time ago and would be here "almost anytime." So we started selling tickets and just told people the show would be up to 30-45 minutes late starting, and we gave out free refills and all the usual show-delay tactics.
Well then at about 7:15, the print still hadn't arrived so I started calling again...and found out the stupid print still had not even landed in Billings yet! It had missed a flight out of Salt Lake City. (I guess the print was in the bathroom and didn't hear the boarding announcement?) So we sent the crowd home, and a lot of them came back the next night, but a lot didn't.
So now we have a new policy that we don't sell tickets until the print is in our hands.
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