70mm Oppenheimer

[Jim Cassedy]

I'll be interested in hearing how the magnetic prints run. My experience with 70mm
mag thus far pretty much always involves it tearing after a splice goes through the
soundhead, but our prints are all ancient and worn out.

I've got some old 70mm mag-sound reels I use for testing- - I think they're on acetate film stock
from the early 1960's, and I do know that they're very prone to tearing if there's even a slight nick in
the one (or more) of the sprocket holes, or an uneven edge or splice. - - and it's done this on multiple
machines in several different states. I think, the film-stock is just old, dried out and a bit brittle.

[Henry Atkinson]

You've got something seriously wrong with your projector if that's happening. What kind of projector are you using?

Probably worth its own thread, don't want to hijack this one, but the short answer is:
We have 2 DP70s, so far as I can tell, there's nothing wrong with them or the mag heads in them. Our mag film is all old (70s/80s), and I really have no idea how many times its been run, but its more splices than film at this point, so its very much a worst-case representation of mag 70. The way it usually fails is tearing between a constant motion and the intermittent (its not a loop size issue), and it usually happens after a splice goes through the mag head. Film will pile up under the buckle switch, and usually some will get left in the gate attached to that bundle, while the final constant motion will pull what's left after the gate through and onto the takeup reel. I've got some pictures and can make a thread for this if you would like, but I think it boils down to our prints being really really sad.

[Brad Miller]

I'll be interested in hearing how the magnetic prints run. My experience with 70mm mag thus far pretty much always involves it tearing after a splice goes through the soundhead, but our prints are all ancient and worn out.

You've got something seriously wrong with your projector if that's happening. What kind of projector are you using?

[Jim Cassedy]

70MM showings of Tenet, Lifeforce, and The Last Boy Scout are on the calendar

Nobody tells me anything! Really, sometimes I"m the last guy to find stuff out.
A this point, I'm not in a position to confirm or deny anything. - -

[Henry Atkinson]

At this point, I'd rather hold off since the tix have not gone on sale yet & I don't think the titles
have been released 'publicly" yet. Also, I just discovered one or more of the titles will have
magnetic sound tracks. I've been told by several people that the mag sound here works, but
I'm won't be comfortable till I test it myself, which I'll probably do before the end of the week.
Fortunately, I have some mag-sound test loops and trailers in my personal collection, so I'll
bring those in tomorrow night & test maybe. (after I clean heads & demagnetize everything!)

I'll be interested in hearing how the magnetic prints run. My experience with 70mm mag thus far pretty much always involves it tearing after a splice goes through the soundhead, but our prints are all ancient and worn out.

[Geoff Jones]

70MM showings of Tenet, Lifeforce, and The Last Boy Scout are on the calendar at Alamo Drafthouse New Mission in SF. (Along withe Oppenheimer, of course.)

[Jim Cassedy]

Great! Are you allowed to divulge the titles?

At this point, I'd rather hold off since the tix have not gone on sale yet & I don't think the titles
have been released 'publicly" yet. Also, I just discovered one or more of the titles will have
magnetic sound tracks. I've been told by several people that the mag sound here works, but
I'm won't be comfortable till I test it myself, which I'll probably do before the end of the week.
Fortunately, I have some mag-sound test loops and trailers in my personal collection, so I'll
bring those in tomorrow night & test maybe. (after I clean heads & demagnetize everything!)

[Michael Coate]

My venue is playing several other 70mm films in the weeks leading up to OPPENHEIMER.

Great! Are you allowed to divulge the titles?

[David Ferguson]

If 15 perf IMAX film is 4.267 frames a foot, and the runtime is 3 hours, then there are 24*60*60*3=259200 frames, and therefore 259200/4.267=60745 feet, which... is indeed 11.5 miles.

However Avatar 1 was 2:42, and it was 3D, so if you add both eyes together, it comes up to over 20 miles. Nolan, please don't read this as a challenge!

[Mark Gulbrandsen]

There is a short clip of Christopherort Nolan on Instagram explaining that the Oppenheimer is 11 miles long... Tried posting the link, but it's not working from my phone. 11 miles??? I don't know about that...

[Chris Haller]

Purely FYI: On the opposite end of the spectrum, for theaters that don't have IMAX or 70mm capability,
Universal announced yesterday that they will be sending out OPPENHEIMER DCP's in both FLAT and
SCOPE versions- - to accommodate theaters stuck with either common height or common width screens
and/or maskings. (which means that there's at least a 50% chance that some theaters will get it right.)

Considering how many movies have been issued in 2.20:1 or even 2.00:1 in flat containers in the last 10 years, this is going to greatly improve the experience for many theaters that just ran their movies in pillarboxed and letterboxed 2.20. I imagine that, like with recent titles like Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3, most theaters will get issued the scope version and only will receive the flat version on request. We do a decent job of keeping scope DCPs on our scope screens, though some of that is at the end of the day out of our control.

It's too bad there's no one running it in 70mm out here in Western NY. There's allegedly was a BLS setup for Hateful Eight in Syracuse, NY at one point or plans to install one, but according to folks I know it was scrapped as soon as Disney made their absurd Star Wars demands for Force Awakens. Guess I'll have to wait and see if Kodak throws an event screening of it at their Theater on the Ridge.

[Jim Cassedy]

My venue is playing several other 70mm films in the weeks leading up to OPPENHEIMER.
They're starting to arrive. I don't know where I'm going to put them all. I've been told that
O-HEIMER will be 9 reels. I'll probably have to pull some of my 70mm reels outta storage.

To paraphrase a famous line from "JAWS":
"We're going to need a bigger booth"
70mmFilmStash.jpg

[Henry Atkinson]

I didn’t realize locations had projectors owned by WB. I assume they are from Hateful Eight? I guess it makes sense, I can’t imagine large chains like AMC wanting to own film projectors still.

As I understand it, WB left a bunch of equipment behind after the Hateful Eight run, and it has been leased/rented for subsequent film showings. I'm kind of surprised Nolan didn't get Universal to just buy them all out, I can't imagine paying WB for every release they do in order to use them is something they particularly want to do.

[Kyle Mikolajczyk]

You are correct Jim, I am SURE your're boss was very pleased! I was mainly referring to the locations with equipment owned by Warner Bros. not exhibitor owned equipment in which case if they have a qualified projectionist on staff such as yourself in some cases we are picking up the payroll. In other exhibitor owned locations we are providing the projectionist 100%

I didn’t realize locations had projectors owned by WB. I assume they are from Hateful Eight? I guess it makes sense, I can’t imagine large chains like AMC wanting to own film projectors still.

[Ian Puffenberger]

If anyone didn't see the notice this morning all IMAX 70mm locations have been published by IMAX: https://www.imax.com/news/oppenheimer-in-imax-70mm

I wasn’t aware the Udvar-Hazy Center still had their 70mm projector….