my profile | my password | search | faq & rules | forum home

» Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE   » Operations   » Film Handlers' Forum   » DUNKIRK 70MM WITH CURTAINS (Page 1)

This topic comprises 2 pages: 1  2

Author Topic: DUNKIRK 70MM WITH CURTAINS David J Hilsgen Expert Film Handler Posts: 192 From: SAUK RAPIDS,MN . USA Registered: Aug 2004 posted 07-31-2017 01:24 AM                     Just wondering how many theatres, showing Dunkirk in 70mm have curtains, we have waterfall curtains here at willow creek in plymouth ,mn.we also play the music from the movie before show start & we do not show ads, i also do a curtain call between the trailers & feature, we get a great response from our customers on our presentation.  |  IP: Logged Terry Monohan Master Film Handler Posts: 379 From: San Francisco CA USA Registered: May 2014 posted 07-31-2017 10:15 AM                     Thanks David glad you still use curtains plus to close after the trailers and open on the main feature is great. Hope you project the image on the curtains not the screen when the curtains open and close. In the SF Bay Area there are a few theatres that have showed Dunkirk in 70mm film in the last few weeks. The huge 'Grand Lake' in Oakland CA even has two sets of curtains and they go up plus a organ pre show by the organist 'Jumping Jack Robert' on the weekend. In SF we have the 'Drafthouse New Mission' with nice new red drapes that look great when they open and close. The Drafthouse gang are working on getting some blue/red led lights on them for a nice color wash. Thanks again for keeping some sort of showmanship going these days. Many cinemas leased to companies like 'Landmark', once the curtains are broke they just leave them open and you look at a old white screen when you come in. Many young new candy managers I ask, why don't you close and open your curtains they tell me they run ads before the movie starts. Big deal, show the ads then close the curtains and open on main feature. Most can be programmed into the computer to do this. They would balk at doing the curtains cues after the previews. Many of these guys are lazy, don't care and think drapes are old fashioned. The Orinda Theatre in Orinda CA also has some great curtains that the union projectionist knows how to use them.  |  IP: Logged Julian Antos Film Handler Posts: 76 From: Chicago, IL, USA Registered: Nov 2009 posted 07-31-2017 04:07 PM                     The Music Box Theatre has beautiful red waterfall curtains, but sadly we do not use them for extended 70mm engagements because we put a larger screen up in front of our native 1.85 proscenium. I wish we could have it both ways! We do have a colored screen wash which slowly fades out as the film starts, mimicking the effect ... nothing worse than a bare white screen IMO. I went to the Zigfield Theatre in NYC for the first time shortly before they closed and saw whatever the most recent Mission Impossible movie was. I stayed until the end *just* so I could see their curtains close over the MPAA blue band, but alas they did not.  |  IP: Logged Scott Norwood Film God Posts: 8146 From: Boston, MA. USA (1774.21 miles northeast of Dallas) Registered: Jun 99 posted 07-31-2017 06:36 PM                        Somerville has double curtains (a red guillotine and a gold traveler). One of the other 70mm venues in town--Coolidge Corner--has a red traveler.  |  IP: Logged Frank Angel Film God Posts: 5305 From: Brooklyn NY USA Registered: Dec 1999 posted 08-06-2017 07:54 AM                        We have a deep wine-red velour main rag that flies and a cream satin traveler on the screen. I've only used them together a few times, but didn't quite like the effect. Since we always start every show with a WB cartoon followed by the trailers, the deep red velour main curtain sapped up too much of the projected image. We always project the opening WB Merry Melodies logo on the curtain (as Terry mention - first frames on the opening curtain is the way to do it), but the WB logo plays too fast and with the velour curtain, you don't see it well enough and it's gone before the curtain is full opened. Using just the cream satin screen curtain (traveler splits) you see the movie footage very well. And yes, of COURSE you have a curtain cue between everything before the feature and the feature. The curtain before the feature imparts the feeling that an important event is about to start...it creates a mood. And yes, I know it's old school, but years ago, I was handed a Manager's Handbook at Interstate Theatres in Texas...Austin, actually -- the State Theatre there;I think it was on Main Street. Anyway, they had an entire chapter on use of the curtain and the curtain warmers; the heading was CURTAIN PROTOCOL. And there was a line in that chapter that never left me: "The mortal sin of presentation is for an audience to ever see a naked screen. The screen is a window to things wonderful, not a wall that ruins that illusion." And yes, one of the many rules in that chapter was that the curtain will be used in front of the feature regardless of what plays before it. This stuff was so sacrosanct that when the curtain motor broke, the manager assigned TWO ushers to position themselves back stage at the curtain pull and 15min before the cues. Why, I asked do we need two guys back there? He told me (then a very green, assistant manager), you assign a second one just in case the first idiot forgets, and you get them there 15min before the cue because one time or another, one or even both of them will be late. He told me that if the regional manager comes in (evidently that guy could pop in unannounced at any time) and sees the curtain not working or not working properly or, yipes, is confronted with a Naked Screen, all hell will break loose and you'll wish you weren't the AM on duty. BTW, that WB Merry Melodies logo hitting a shimmering curtain as it opens and with that great, uplifting logo music playing...it gets applause every time. Adverts, on the other hand, easily get booed (not at my thearte...we don't run adverts, just trailers...BIG difference). At DUNKIRK the other nite, we had to sit thru four effin TV commercials. Hey, Coke...you want to make me feel good about your diabetic-causing soda, give me a large Coke free when I walk in the theatre and it will make much more of an impression on me than making me sit thru your damn TV commercial...extended length no less!  |  IP: Logged Victor Liorentas Jedi Master Film Handler Posts: 800 From: london ontario canada Registered: May 2009 posted 08-06-2017 10:56 AM                     I have Beautiful Gold curtains with red stage lights on a motorized dimmer! I saved and imported the curtains from a now demolished palace downtown London Ontario. Now if I could just get a print of Dunkirk I'm all ready to go!  |  IP: Logged Jim Cassedy Phenomenal Film Handler Posts: 1661 From: San Francisco, CA Registered: Dec 2006 posted 08-06-2017 12:01 PM                     quote: Frank Angel when the curtain motor broke, the manager assigned TWO ushers to position themselves back stage at the curtain pull and 15min before the cues I too was taught the "no naked screen rule" when learning this biz. So, once, many years ago, when the curtain motor broke down on opening weekend of a big flick, and I wanted to maintain the 'presentation standards', I wanted to have one of the house staff manually handle 'curtain duty', at least for that weekend, until we could get the motor fixed. The house manager was OK with it, but "The Union" threw a fit. Opening the curtains, they said, was my "my job" and my responsibility. However, since, technically, I couldn't leave the booth to open them myself, nor could I be in two places at once, if the theater manager wanted the curtains opened/closed, we could bring in two guys @ $37.50/hr (or whatever the union minimum wage was at that time) to do so. Noooooo problem! While it was frustrating, I certainly understood The Union's position. . . . and I'm sure that had The Internet & Film-Tech been around back then, somebody attending the show that weekend would have gotten online and posted a comment noting that the presentation was flawless but whining about the curtains not opening or closing. I'm just pointing out that sometimes, things happen, or don't happen, for a reason, & those reasons often aren't always as simple as they might seem.  |  IP: Logged Jonathan M. Crist Jedi Master Film Handler Posts: 531 From: Hershey, PA, USA Registered: Apr 2000 posted 08-06-2017 12:12 PM                     The Roxy Theatre in Northampton PA uses curtains at every show.  |  IP: Logged Paul Linfesty Phenomenal Film Handler Posts: 1383 From: Bakersfield, CA, USA Registered: Nov 1999 posted 08-06-2017 01:28 PM                     quote: Frank Angel Since we always start every show with a WB cartoon followed by the trailers, the deep red velour main curtain sapped up too much of the projected image. I don't think I've ever seen this before in any theatre with two curtains. The grand drape (as some refer to it as) was always opening in combination with some lighting changes and the first image would hit the screen on the title curtain. The Fox in Bakersfield had the same curtain combination as you describe. But I have been in a number of theatres that had two 9or more) curtains, and the image never hit the screen until the final curtain was ready to open.  |  IP: Logged Frank Angel Film God Posts: 5305 From: Brooklyn NY USA Registered: Dec 1999 posted 08-06-2017 09:57 PM                        Yah, I am thinking we probably could have tried that, but I only toyed with it for a few engagements because unlike the screen curtain which is motorized, the main rag is manual and that means an extra stage hand on call and as Jim points out, adding extra crew is not something management jumps for joy about. Back then I was just a projectionist so had little say about budget matters. Our satin screen curtain looks so spectacular with purple and gold washes from the wings which catch the folds, that I was happy with just the one curtain. And sure, people like to make the argument that you don't NEED a curtain to show a movie which is true, just like you don't NEED table cloths in a restaurant to serve food, unless of course you want to maintain some modicum of class. GREAT picture, Jonathan; thanks!  |  IP: Logged Monte L Fullmer Film God Posts: 8367 From: Nampa, Idaho, USA Registered: Nov 2004 posted 08-07-2017 03:14 AM                     We had the waterfall and the scrib curtains. When the waterfall started to rise and about half way up, we opened the dowser. After a few seconds, we would open the scrib curtain. Now, since we had dual adjustable maskings, we had a cue on the last preview to close the scrib, change maskings, then changeover cue to the feature reel. At start of feature, open the scrib again. Closing, we closed the scrib about 20 sec before last image, then another cue to drop the waterfall. No one was allowed to see a bare screen. Showmanship at its best!  |  IP: Logged Frank Angel Film God Posts: 5305 From: Brooklyn NY USA Registered: Dec 1999 posted 08-07-2017 08:54 PM                        Monte -- You're giving me goosebumps; I am applauding out loud here! I just don't understand how people in effin SHOW BUSINESS no less, can't see the value in that kind of spectacular presentation. It certainly can't be the cost. It's a one-time budgetary item that goes in with the construction and the cost of the screen; thereafter you barely have to think about it. We put in our masking and curtains in 1991 and they've only needed an occasional pulley and stop adjustment, a bit of grease every so often and a small tear to be sewn. That's it: it's not rocket science. And ours is even old-OLD school technology -- motors and cables and chains. Nowadays the motors are up on the track itself; no cables or chains -- they're smaller, more reliable, set-it-and-forget-it kind of thing. How much did that block long display wall cost to install and maintain, just to show bubbly soda and popcorn kernels. Now doesn't THAT go an extra mile to enhance showmanship. And Monte, what is a scrib --never heard that term before.  |  IP: Logged Thomas Hauerslev Master Film Handler Posts: 451 From: Copenhagen, Denmark Registered: Aug 2000 posted 08-08-2017 02:00 AM                        2OO1 screening procedure by MGM http://in70mm.com/news/2014/2001_presentation/index.htm  |  IP: Logged Brad Miller Administrator Posts: 17775 From: Plano, TX (36.2 miles NW of Rockwall) Registered: May 99 posted 08-08-2017 02:10 AM                     Interesting that they are specifically asking for blank screen there.  |  IP: Logged Rick Raskin Phenomenal Film Handler Posts: 1100 From: Manassas Virginia Registered: Jan 2003 posted 08-08-2017 07:13 AM                     I remember seeing "Doctor Zhivago" in 70mm at the Warner Theater in DC. After the Entr'acte music the house lights dimmed and the theater what filled with the sound of screaming train whistles. I thought 'what the hell is going on' but then the curtains parted in perfect synch with the image of an expanding tunnel entrance. WOW! That was showmanship.  |  IP: Logged

All times are Central (GMT -6:00)

This topic comprises 2 pages: 1  2

Printer-friendly view of this topic

Hop To: Select a Forum: Category: Operations -------------------- Digital Cinema Forum Film Handlers' Forum Large Format Forum Ground Level Feature Info, Trailer Attachments & REAL Credit Offsets Category: Community -------------------- Film-Yak Film Handlers' Movie Reviews The Afterlife Bob Maar's Joke-A-Thon Category: Classified -------------------- Equipment and Supplies Wanted/For Sale Help Wanted/Seeking Employment Category: System -------------------- Software Beta Testing Forum

The Film-Tech Forums are designed for various members related to the cinema industry to express their opinions, viewpoints and testimonials on various products, services and events based upon speculation, personal knowledge and factual information through use, therefore all views represented here allow no liability upon the publishers of this web site and the owners of said views assume no liability for any ill will resulting from these postings. The posts made here are for educational as well as entertainment purposes and as such anyone viewing this portion of the website must accept these views as statements of the author of that opinion and agrees to release the authors from any and all liability.