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This topic comprises 4 pages: 1 2 3 4
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Author
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Topic: Movie presentation is awful in and around Denver, CO
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Joe Redifer
You need a beating today
Posts: 12859
From: Denver, Colorado
Registered: May 99
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posted 07-23-2009 04:41 PM
This is probably not news to anyone who has been in the industry for a while, but I just can't get over how mistakes continue to be made and continue to be tolerated by the companies that run these theaters. It's like they don't care about presentation at all.
I received the following information from one of my sources about the first day for Harry Potter showings:
quote:
The Regal Entertainment Group Denver West theater threw their print of Harry Potter upon their initial quality check screening and green scratched the hell out of the print. This is the same theatre that gave out tons refunds from the Transformers midnight interlock disaster!!! Their first show was bad! Apparently the guy who does trailer work wasn't working that day, so they ran their entire first day without trailers and a scratched print! AMC had scratches on their print as well. Then the Kerasotes Olde Town had a splice that apparently "came apart" and it took them a while to get the show back up. What the hell is going on around town?
And then this from a friend:
quote:
I was talked into going to the Regal Entertainment Group Continental big house on Saturday and got to see the massacre of one of Denver's destination auditoriums. WTF? How in any way is stadium seating better in this room? We sat in the front section which resembles the old style seating and that wasn't too bad other than no contrast on the screen. They started the show with 5 seconds of leader count down, sound popping through the speakers and a green band trailer scratched to hell and HUGE focus problems! It was a sold out show... They were raking in the cash but still couldn't pay a guy to do the job right? Idiots!
This combined with reports of Harry Potter prints being scratched left and right by a new theater (and one of their replacements built up backwards and shown to customers that way), scratches on prints less than a week old at other theaters around town as well as tons of other incidents, people are obviously receiving poor training everywhere. Mistakes will happen, yes. But in such a constant manner?
A lot of theaters require management to run the booth and while certain individuals may make great floor managers, that does not qualify them to be running the projection equipment in any way. That's like assuming just because a person wears a hard hat that he is qualified to operate a crane at a construction site. Granted, there are exceptions. But the companies themselves like Regal and Kerasotes (and likely AMC as well) sure seem not care about putting on a good presentation for their customers from what I am seeing and hearing about. Has any effort been made to improve the flaws? Not that I've seen. At least not in the Denver area. If you live here, you have maybe 3 theater options to see a quality presentation, otherwise just wait for the DVD.
I challenge Regal, Kerasotes and AMC (and Cinemark as well, but nobody I know ever goes there) to improve their presentations. If they can do that, I will make sure it is known by all how good they can really be. The potential is there, you just need the effort and qualified employees with proper training. Once you get a good employee, pay them to stay.
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David Stambaugh
Film God
Posts: 4021
From: Eugene, Oregon
Registered: Jan 2002
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posted 07-23-2009 05:23 PM
I count myself lucky that both Regal and Cinemark generally (and consistently) do a good job here. I'm talking presentation basics: Show starts in frame, no "oops, countdown leader", image is bright & focused, masking & lenses correct, scratch-free prints with very minimal dirt. They meet those basic presentation standards most of the time. Why can they do it here but not in other markets? As usual it probably comes down to district & local management. Someone has to care.
Somebody at Regal is paying attention to this board because the local Regal 15 staff seems to know I post here about their theater. A while back I posted something about the sound on one of their Flashback movies starting in stereo but switching to mono (Lost Boys), and the next time I was there for a Flashback show (Jaws), a Regal employee approached me out of the clear blue and said she was sorry I didn't think Lost Boys was up to par, that they had screened it in advance and decided to play it in mono because they thought it was overall better sound quality. She also spoke to the audience before the show, pointed out that the Jaws print had good color and digital sound (unlike some of the other Flashback prints they've gotten). So anyway, here in Eugene at least, someone is paying attention.
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Michael McGovern
Film Handler
Posts: 57
From: New Britain, CT, USA
Registered: May 2008
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posted 07-23-2009 10:34 PM
It seems to me that before Regal consolidated nearly every chain in the country, just about every building would have at least 2 or 3 full time employees whose job was exclusively to run the projection booth. They were the ones building and tearing down prints, preforming maintenance, and doing trailer work. Once everybody everywhere came under the Regal banner however, that all changed. Regal does not have the term "Projectionist" anywhere in their corporate lingo. They have "Managers" who have a variety of different job functions, one of which includes "Booth operation". When this happened, many very skilled projectionists were essentially forced out because they didn't have the skills or the desire to preform management functions outside of the booth.
In their place Regal trains all newly hired or promoted management in the bare necessities on how to operate the projection booth, which includes threading, and splicing. I've seen buildings with scratched prints, where the person running the projection booth isn't even able to recognize the fact that the print is scratched. Regal does have a program designed to train projectionists on how to preform just about every essential projection task including threading, build ups, bulb changes, and belt changes, but from my experience working there, and still from what I hear from people working there today, the program is poorly implemented and not really enforced all that well.
The reason you will see all these scratched prints, and sound problems at Regal, AMC, Carmike, etc. is that for the most part the people operating the booths at these places are ignorant of them, and even if they are aware of them, all three companies pay so poorly that they cannot get skilled people to work there, and those that are skilled and dedicated don't stick around for long. Here in Connecticut for example, when I last worked for Regal, the average hourly wage for management was somewhere around 9.50 an hour, circus peanuts really, and certainly not enough money for anyone to seriously live on, so that's why you end up with booth monkeys operating projection, because only a college kid looking for spending cash could afford to work at these places.
Another problem is that all the companies depend on their Technical crew to take care of routine maintenance, and major repairs. Unfortunately the technicians are almost always overworked, and spread far too thin, as one technician could have anywhere from 20-40 theaters they are responsible for, so in most cases, unless you are off screen, most problems just end up lingering. Rollers don't get changed until the plastic literally erodes, speakers remain damaged until the movie can no longer be heard properly, and broken equipment remains that way until someone finally gives up and tries to figure out how to repair it themselves.
Now don't get me wrong, there are still a lot of good, hard working, skilled projectionists out there working for Regal, and the rest, but for the most part, those days are long gone.
The ultimate goal of Regal, AMC, Carmike, etc., within the next 2 years, is to completely eliminate anyone from even having to be in the projection booth at all. All digital locations are only a few years off, and once that happens, a lot of us will be changing careers.
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Joe Redifer
You need a beating today
Posts: 12859
From: Denver, Colorado
Registered: May 99
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posted 07-24-2009 01:37 AM
quote: James Westbrook
Is the Harkins location one of the 3 better places to see a movie in the Denver MSA?
I've only been there once and I seem to recall them having issues. However that was so long ago that I can't hold it against them now. So it is "unknown" for now.
quote: Mike Blakesley
Joe - is there any one company that stands out as being generally better than the rest?
That's really hard to say. I generally like Regal better than Kerasotes on average as far as presentation (with the exception of the Kerasotes Bowles Crossing 12 which far exceeds any local Regal), although the actual physical Kerasotes buildings/auditoriums blow away those that Regal owns/builds. They are close to a tie, I think. I don't know much about Cinemark, but a projectionist that is currently bothering Regal was trained at the Cinemark Bel Mar and all he does is scratch prints and cause havoc. AMC is good... if you go to their all-digital complex. Otherwise they are simply mediocre.
That's mainly all we have here. Harkins only has one theater. Landmark is dogshit on a stick, but I'd never watch the types of movies that they show. But the prints we sometimes get from them aren't very pretty. Regency has one theater in the Denver area (mine) that is about as good as that location can get, considering when it was built (it is a 70's mall theater). Nobody in town has cleaner prints than we do and that is a guarantee unless we get a used one that is crazy-dirty like we did once from Kerasotes (I rejected it). There are a couple of dinner theaters that I don't really know too much about as well.
quote: Michael McGovern
Here in Connecticut for example, when I last worked for Regal, the average hourly wage for management was somewhere around 9.50 an hour, circus peanuts really
That's what it seems to be around here as well, though 9.50 is the high end. We pay more than any Regal (even for floorstaff), and our ticket prices are a bit lower as well.
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