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Topic: Your experiences running porn..

Tony Bandiera Jr
Film God

Posts: 3067
From: Moreland Idaho
Registered: Apr 2004

posted 10-25-2008 03:46 PM

Thanks to Rick Raskin for dropping the challenge...so I'll lead it off: [evil]

Back in my days in the Air Force, we had a strip club/adult store just outside the bases' main gate.

For one of my buddies Birthday party, I went out to the adult store and picked up four films on Super-8mm film (two silent, two sound) and I projected them for the party. [sex]

Let's just say the combination of a whole room of drunken straight boys, some really cheesy porn and me drinking half a bottle of Yukon Jack made for a wild night. [puke]

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Tim Reed
Better Projection Pays

Posts: 5246
From: Northampton, PA
Registered: Sep 1999

posted 10-25-2008 05:29 PM

I take it they were no longer straight when they left? [Razz]

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Monte L Fullmer
Film God

Posts: 8367
From: Nampa, Idaho, USA
Registered: Nov 2004

posted 10-25-2008 08:02 PM

My experiences in running "X" rated (not heavy porn like those grease houses in large cities do) was at a theatre where teenage kids running the booth couldn't be there do to age. Thus, I got the dubious honors that summer.

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John Stewart
Film Handler

Posts: 67
From: Austin, TX, USA
Registered: Sep 2001

posted 10-25-2008 11:54 PM

I ran XXX at the Ritz theater here in Austin in the early 70's. We were still worried about getting busted by the APD even though we were union. We ran both 16mm and 35mm. The 35mm stuff was the two perf stuff. It had a 2 soundtracks and the image was printed 2 perfs high. Never had to rewind...you just took the reel out of the bottom magazine, turned it over and put it back in the upper magazine and rethreaded. A 4 reel film was on 2. Hottest booth I ever worked.

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Jesse Skeen
Phenomenal Film Handler

Posts: 1517
From: Sacramento, CA
Registered: Aug 2000

posted 10-26-2008 05:20 AM

Whoa- were those run on a modified projector, or was the whole thing handled by the lens and aperture?

I'm still trying to find out what the very LAST porno movie distributed on 35mm was. I know some of the later ones were still shot on 35mm, but most were posted on video and no 35mm prints for theaters were ever made.

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Mark J. Marshall
Film God

Posts: 3188
From: New Castle, DE, USA
Registered: Aug 2002

posted 10-26-2008 10:05 AM

quote: John Stewart
The 35mm stuff was the two perf stuff. It had a 2 soundtracks and the image was printed 2 perfs high. Never had to rewind...you just took the reel out of the bottom magazine, turned it over and put it back in the upper magazine and rethreaded.

I've never heard of that. Is that something that was specific to the porn industry, or was it some other odd-ball thing that was tried and then abandoned?

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Tony Bandiera Jr
Film God

Posts: 3067
From: Moreland Idaho
Registered: Apr 2004

posted 10-26-2008 02:00 PM

quote: Tim Reed
I take it they were no longer straight when they left?

LOL sometimes I did wonder about a lot of those guys...with the horseplay that went on you'd think they all had a touch of the lavender. [Smile]

quote: Jesse Skeen
I'm still trying to find out what the very LAST porno movie distributed on 35mm was. I know some of the later ones were still shot on 35mm, but most were posted on video and no 35mm prints for theaters were ever made.

Don't have an answer for that one, but I do remember the biggest 35mm release in porn was a film called "Extreme". The local Pussycat theatre advertised it in huge letters on the marquee as being both "35MM and DOLBY STEREO!" How much you want to bet it may have played in 35mm but the sound was MONO?

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Rick Raskin
Phenomenal Film Handler

Posts: 1100
From: Manassas Virginia
Registered: Jan 2003

posted 10-26-2008 02:09 PM

I ran porn at the Art and Playhouse theaters in DC in the late 1960s. The Art was at 9th & F Sts. I remember the first time I worked there the manager said that if I saw the house lights come on and I hadn't done it, to beat feet outside the balcony door because they were being raided. That was in the days when the operator got busted along with the manager. Not to worry though the business agent said, they would bail me out! Right! The Art had the capability to run 35, 16 and 8mm (No Joke). An 8mm nudie film was usually part of the program lineup and was actually watchable when projected with their Fairchild projector. The 35s were XLs with Peerless carbon arcs and the 16 was an RCA 400 with expanded arms for 6000 ft. reels. I also ran some shows at the Playhouse on 15th St. which had been a first run house. It was rather subdued there and not much different than running a regular house. That booth, if I remember correctly, had Motiographs with Ashcraft lamps and an ancient TV projection system.

All in all, I didn't run porn very long before landing a job at an upscale 2nd run house.

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Monte L Fullmer
Film God

Posts: 8367
From: Nampa, Idaho, USA
Registered: Nov 2004

posted 10-26-2008 02:14 PM

quote: John Stewart
The 35mm stuff was the two perf stuff.

Yea, I've seen that stuff before - the two perf frame with that dbl soundtrack.

Odd to see two images in one frame - one right side up, and the other one upside down with soundtracks on each side so all you had to do was pull the reel out of the lower magazine and just rethread it and begin the show again.

No, you didn't need any special machines. Just a very narrow special 2.30/1 flat aperture in the trap to fit the frame and roll your framer accordingly.

Kinda like a poor man's widescreen movie..

-Monte

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Gordon McLeod
Film God

Posts: 9532
From: Toronto Ontario Canada
Registered: Jun 99

posted 10-26-2008 03:04 PM

The Pro 35 was available with a 2 perf pull down movement originally
As for Porn there was a 70mm porn flick we ran at the Eden theatre in Toronto way back when

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Mark Lensenmayer
Phenomenal Film Handler

Posts: 1605
From: Upper Arlington, OH
Registered: Sep 1999

posted 10-26-2008 03:17 PM

The 70mm porn flick was PANORAMA BLUE.

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Dick Vaughan
Phenomenal Film Handler

Posts: 1032
From: Bradford, West Yorkshire, UK
Registered: Jul 2000

posted 10-26-2008 04:27 PM

Now there's an idea for next year's Wide Screen Weekend !! [thumbsup]

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John Stewart
Film Handler

Posts: 67
From: Austin, TX, USA
Registered: Sep 2001

posted 10-26-2008 06:44 PM

Monte's discription is exactly what we had. You just need a shorter than normal focal length lens and a plate as he described.

A friend worked in Houston and said they had some of those films as well. I've never heard of this being used outside the porn industry but that doesn't mean it didn't happen.

J

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Gordon McLeod
Film God

Posts: 9532
From: Toronto Ontario Canada
Registered: Jun 99

posted 10-26-2008 07:31 PM

PANORAMA BLUE yes that was it it was advertised in UltraPornoRammaScope
We set up to JJ's for it with a Century preamp system for it that was touring with the print

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Frank Angel
Film God

Posts: 5305
From: Brooklyn NY USA
Registered: Dec 1999

posted 10-26-2008 10:35 PM

quote: Tony Bandiera Jr
Don't have an answer for that one, but I do remember the biggest 35mm release in porn was a film called "Extreme". The local Pussycat theatre advertised it in huge letters on the marquee as being both "35MM and DOLBY STEREO!" How much you want to bet it may have played in 35mm but the sound was MONO?

Don't underestimate the Pussycat chain. They had the state-of-the-art (at the time) sound -- Dolby CP50s and their theatres were usually very well appointed. When they closed in the late 70s, they gave their equipment to local schools; we got a CP50 from them. I was hoping for a few porno titles to be throw our way as well....just to use as test reels, of course. No such luck. [thumbsdown]

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