|
|
This topic comprises 2 pages: 1 2
|
|
Author
|
Topic: longest Movies you've watched in a cinema
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
William Hooper
Phenomenal Film Handler
Posts: 1879
From: Mobile, AL USA
Registered: Jun 99
|
posted 12-23-2003 01:28 AM
quote:
I can't remember exactly how long the silent film "Intolerance" by D.W. Griffith ran. During my senior year of art school I watched a press screening of it at Avery Fisher Hall in Lincoln Center (complete with an orchestra no less). It was part of a film history class assignment. The movie seemed to go on forever and I recall many of the people with press badges and such were slumped asleep in their seats. That movie may not have been the longest one I've watched, but it just seemed like it.
I wonder if someone decreed that the whole movie would be run at 16 fps, & whoever assembled/composed the score decided that it must be majestic, ponderous, & important. It's hard to say how long it *should* have run, because who knows how complete the print was.
"Intolerance" shouldn't be too bad, the crowd scenes have as many arm-flailing extras as the LOTR movies, lots of battle & things blowing up, & chariot chases. Its big drawbacks are the disconnection from being engrossed at the sort of artistically pompous intercutting of the stories from different time periods; the damn Huguenots & the modern day melodrama are the worst.
On the other hand, it was a silent-era production, & intended to be projected faster than the taking speed. That gives it fun zip. Also, if the score wasn't the almost hokily manipulative chase music & other stirring stuff intedned, it could go in the direction of a sack of self-important sludge.
Two things late 20th century US symphonies have wrecked worst with pompous, turgid interpretations are Gershwin's stuff & silents.
On the other side of the coin:
I Have A Friend who was called in years ago to fix a show at a hall in an unnamed university in New Orleans. The hall is a big late 20s prosecenium theatre, with 2 Norelcos used only every now & then. The program was a bunch of early Lumiere silents & things (all 16 fps for real & by def, for a change), orchestra would be coming over from France, lotsa bigwigs like the French Ambassador, etc. in attendance for whatever this thing was. Obviously, when this thing was being set up & the specs sent to whoever at the university, their eyes just glazed at the tech sections (16fps, whatever, that's for someone else) & they let it all ride.
My friend got a call from the projectionist a few days before the show, "These things are supposed to be run at 16 fps!" Okay, no problem, he calls an Unnamed Company for a kit for the projectors, sure, we've got them, we'll send them. Stuff arrives the day before the show, he goes over to the auditorium & up to the booth. The orchestra is set up on the forestage, the projectionist has been told by the higher-ups to "just run it", the movie's going at 24 fps. The orchestra finds itself trying to play its score for a 16 fps movie at 24 fps. My friend looked down & saw "this little French guy with his arms flying everywhere, jumping up & down, looked like he was caught in a hurricane."
Reel ends, the conductor turns around & looks like he's lost his mind, & runs to chatter to somebody in the auditorium. The higher-ups come up & do the "well why are we having this problem?" routine, he says he'll fix it, he's got the stuff, it will be OK for the show tomorrow. He starts to put it together - & nothing is right. It's plain this stuff is not for these projectors. He calls the unnamed company & the guy admits it's not for those projectors, but "it's all they had". So he wracks his brains, gets an inspiration, and cobbles it together. The solution involves 2x4's jammed under some stuff hanging off the side, as these "show must go on" things sometimes do. They get it together after midnight, run a reel, it's OK, a guy from the State Department practically kisses him.
He can't stay for the show the next day, & has to go. He spends the next day worrying about how the show will go. Late the next night, he gets a call from the projectionist & asks if it went OK. "Well -- "
At the start of the show, before the movie starts, the orchestra (set up on the forestage) plays some music. They take their bow by walking off, to return to play the picture. They get up, clap, clap, clap, they go off to thunderous applause and turn around in the wings to go back on. A huge section of plaster detaches itself from above the prosc, falls straight down onto the forestage, smashes to toothpicks a hundred-year-old cello or bass & sends chairs flying everywhere. They scratch the show.
He goes back a few days later & pulls all the stuff out of the booth.
| IP: Logged
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
All times are Central (GMT -6:00)
|
This topic comprises 2 pages: 1 2
|
Powered by Infopop Corporation
UBB.classicTM
6.3.1.2
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.
|
Home
![[Eek!]](eek.gif)
, but I also fell asleep once or twice.
![[Frown]](frown.gif)
Printer-friendly view of this topic