Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE: Dinner for Schmucks (2010)

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Topic: Dinner for Schmucks (2010)

David Stambaugh
Film God

Posts: 4021
From: Eugene, Oregon
Registered: Jan 2002

posted 08-01-2010 05:45 PM

Today at Regal 15 in Eugene, #14, 35mm. Nice presentation except for some oddness with framing noted below. Print looked pretty good.

This is the funniest movie I've seen since whatever the previous most funny movie I saw is. Steve Carell is laugh out loud funny (likewise some of the other characters). The audience seemed to thoroughly enjoy. For what it is I give it 4 out of 5 stars. [thumbsup]

Is there something weird with the 1.85 framing of this? Most of the trailers were letterboxed and the framing was way low, like almost no bottom black bar at all. Because I am so smart I reported it to the friendly ticket tearer (who was allowed to sit in a chair due to having some kind of foot or leg injury) and she said she'd report it. They did promptly reframe it more "correctly". Then when the movie started it seemed like tops of heads were cut off and about 5 minutes into it they reframed it down lower again, which to me actually looked better in terms of image composition even if it was technically "wrong". Enquiring minds want to know.

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Monte L Fullmer
Film God

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

posted 08-01-2010 06:12 PM

(aka, "Dumb and Dumber, PT 3")

Ya, it's tough when the feature is full frame flat and you got 'letterboxed' trailers with the manager/projection staff, just lace, press the green button, check focus and frame at the beginning, split to the other houses to do the same routine, then head downstairs to do their management duties...

That movie is really tough to frame to look good when doing 1.85:1 apertures. Many times, I walk by to check it and I'm on the framer more than normal so not to cut the tops of heads off.

Either the film maker should have had the camera more farther back so the image would look good cropped to 1.85:1, or theatres having 1.66:1 projection availability.

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Joe Elliott
Master Film Handler

Posts: 497
From: Port Orange, Fl USA
Registered: Oct 2006

posted 08-02-2010 12:04 PM

I noticed the same thing here. If you center on the previews, the movie is set too high. I have seen a lot of movies come through this way lately. We even had a scope print filmed too high (some chick flick, don't remember which one), and there was no fixing that one unless you wanted to show the frameline on screen. What ever happened to the one third rule for filming?

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Fred Georges
Master Film Handler

Posts: 257
From: Lombard, IL, USA
Registered: Jun 2000

posted 08-03-2010 10:34 PM

Now this is totally WEIRD. Saw this today at a Mall theater in Hot Springs Ar. Hey, 110 degrees with 100% humidity an air conditioned theater was THEE place to be. The previews were framed almost a half perf too high but NOT out of frame But, When the feature started it was framed correctly.Almost as if the feature was not printed in frame. Amusing movie, not fall down funny butAmusing.

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Ross Oba
Expert Film Handler

Posts: 181
From: Kailua Kona, HI
Registered: Oct 2005

posted 08-04-2010 11:45 PM

Having not watched it yet (will do tomorrow), I believe this was filmed as Super 35 and then printed at 1.85.

As for the framing, I set the framing to be centered at the opening logos of the movie. Everything before it seems to be framed at around half a perf higher than center. Although our Little Fockers trailer seemed to be framed perfectly.

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Frank Angel
Film God

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

posted 08-09-2010 07:18 AM

People in the labs nowadays must be smoking crack.

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Mike Blakesley
Film God

Posts: 12767
From: Forsyth, Montana
Registered: Jun 99

posted 08-27-2010 09:23 AM

I was ready for this to be "laugh out loud funny" but I found it more like "chuckle at times funny."

I'm a Steve Carell fan, but he doesn't really have a huge range of characters -- he reminds me of Michael Scott in almost everything he does. (I guess it's just because Michael is such a broad character.) In this movie he's kind of an enigma -- he's really stupid sometimes but really wise too.

After thinking about this, some of my favorite scenes with Carell (in The Office as well as in his movies) are the ones where his character gets really annoyed. In this movie, Carell's character never really gets annoyed -- he's an expert at letting everything roll off his back -- so it's not as funny.

Overall I was expecting to like it more. 2.5 out of 5.

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Joe Redifer
You need a beating today

Posts: 12859
From: Denver, Colorado
Registered: May 99

posted 08-27-2010 10:30 AM

I was going to chime in on the framing issue a few weeks back, but forgot because you all mean nothing to me. Well, I'm here now so I might as well;

My print's framing was perfect. Not too high, not too low. The trailers ran perfectly in frame, too. No adjustment between the two.

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Victor Liorentas
Jedi Master Film Handler

Posts: 800
From: london ontario canada
Registered: May 2009

posted 08-27-2010 02:18 PM

I have noticed many flat letter boxed trailers will be high or low so i don't trust them anymore but i wish they would just keep them centered!

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