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Hateful Eight


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I grew up and lived in San Jose for nearly 40 years. Did Cinemark buy up the Century dome theaters, or are those new builds? Out of all those Century domes (which I think were first built with TODD-AO in mind), I think only the standalong Century 21, had the full curved screen, which was actually problematic for a lot of flat movies. I remember seeing BLACK SUNDAY there first run and only two slivers of the screen being in focus (mid-left and mid-right), with the center and corners both just headache-inducingly soft.

 

The two theaters that I recall as being superb in the area are long long gone: the Santa Clara Cinema 150, where I saw debut of CLOSE ENCOUNTERS and reissues of 2001, and Palo Alto Square, which always got the aspect ratio right and used really bright projectors so you could see what was actually filmed. I remember taste-testing, seeing the same TREK movie at a SJ Century and then at the Square, and it was literally like night & day.

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The Ultra Panavision process (2.7 : 1) was originally designed as a way of shooting for release in multiple formats including 3-projector Cinerama (2.66 : 1). But back in the late 1950's, Cinerama screens were deeply curved and made up of a series of vertical ribbons that looked like a solid surface from the seats but prevented light from bouncing around the curved surface and washing out the image in brighter scenes.

 

But the ribbon screens were expensive to maintain, so in the mid 1960's they were all replaced by a solid curved screen made for the Dimension-150 process (the cameras for D-150 were basically a reboot of Todd-AO 65mm cameras with new lenses.)

 

So at the Cinerama Dome in Hollywood, you have this solid curved screen where the image gets washed out in day scenes. Also, the mild angle of the projector means that a horizontal landscape line has a slight upwards curve like a smile.

 

Also, keep in mind that with original 3-projector Cinerama, each projector only had to hold focus on 1/3 of the 2.66 screen, so there was a lot of sharpness from edge to edge, compared to trying to project 35mm anamorphic across that screen. It's not a problem though for regular spherical 70mm since it is slightly less wide at 2.20 : 1.

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Back to the list I posted of 70mm-capable theaters, it would appear that the Ziegfeld here in NYC no longer projects 70mm prints. According to the Bow-Tie Cinemas website - the company that now operates it - it is all 4K digital. Very sad. The last film I saw there was The Master.

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The Ziegfeld appears to still have 70mm as of last year.

 

http://www.in70mm.com/news/2014/ziegfeld/index.htm

 

That page is a year old. This is what makes me believe the Ziegfeld is no longer projecting 70mm, but I intend to call next week. You can trust only so much on the internet.

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Well, they wouldn't have thrown those projectors away. Next time you go just look up at the projection booth, I'm sure it's still there. Heck only AMC theaters out here in LA threw their 35mm projectors away, most of the other theaters still have them.

 

Here is some bad news about the Ziegfeld though:

 

"Yes no hateful eight at the Ziegfeld. I confirmed this with management. The only reason you can’t buy tickets past the 24th is Just something technical. They will fix it for ticket sales closer to the 22nd . Yes all theaters have to keep Star Wars for one month."

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"Yes no hateful eight at the Ziegfeld. I confirmed this with management. The only reason you can’t buy tickets past the 24th is Just something technical. They will fix it for ticket sales closer to the 22nd . Yes all theaters have to keep Star Wars for one month."

 

Yup...read that last night. I'm not sure if the AMC Loews IMAX theater around 68th Street has the ability to project 70mm. And the City Cinemas theaters supposedly project 70mm in 3 theaters - 1 holding 500 people with a large screen, but I've never been there (David - one of those theaters may be where you saw The Master.) I sent them an e-mail to see if they still project 70mm.

 

This is why I loved L.A. when I was there. As much New York wants to boast that it is filled with film snobs like myself, it is no match for L.A. Simply put, I found that there are far more venues for cinephiles out there.

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I saw "The Master" in 70mm in NYC at some East Village art house theater.

Village East cinema! I saw it there opening night.

 

The Museum of the Moving Image has a 70mm setup, but they don't do many first-runs besides special engagements. I wouldn't be surprised if they had something for this run.

 

I know someone who saw a preview of Hateful Eight at the Village East last week. Not confirmed if it was the 70mm print though

Edited by Kenny N Suleimanagich
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Lots of the 70mm locations are going to be installing 70mm just for the film and removing afterwards. Some cinemas that have 70mm kit already in place and skills to use them are being passed over in favour of the fresh install locations.

 

Boston refurb gear stock pile ready for the roll out.: https://www.facebook.com/94736998476/videos/10153379438368477/

 

 

I'm not sure how good its going to look projected in a multiplex with no in house 35mm projection experience let alone 70mm on in many cases a screen thats not masked to 2.76:1. I think a lot of these locations are going to trash the prints as 70mm is more difficult to project well. In the UK at Odeon's flagship venues they managed to scratch both new prints of the Master and Interstellar. The locations with 70mm experience should be fine - but with such a wide release many locations that will get 70mm prints won't even have projection staff that have ever worked with 35mm let alone 70mm.

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I live near Howard Hughes Parkway in Culver City -- the 18-plex there had one of the few 15-perf 70mm IMAX theaters in town, but unfortunately a few years ago they replaced it all with digital, even though it was a traditional IMAX room, huge 50' tall screen, steep raked theater seats, etc.

 

Other 5-perf 70mm venues over the years in West LA have been torn down -- the Picwood, where I saw "E.T." in 70mm, and the Plitt Century Plaza, where I saw the restored "Lawrence of Arabia", plus "2001" in 70mm several times, were both torn down years ago. In my area, that leaves two old Mann theaters in Westwood (the Village and the Bruin) that are still standing that used to have 70mm projectors.

 

These days, the only times you can see a 70mm print now and then during the year are at the Academy's Goldwyn Theater and the Aero and Egyptian Theaters of the American Cinematheque, but that's something.

 

And of course, the main Mann Chinese screen got converted to show 15/70 IMAX, but it's an odd experience there... instead of a steep rake, there is a very long shallow slope to the seats with the screen very far away, and it's a silver screen for 3D to boot.

 

Back in the 90's when 70mm was more common, often they would play at the Laemmle Royal in West L.A., which was an old theater with a screen very far from the booth, a very gradual slope that at the bottom, about 1/3 from the screen, would then slightly slope back up again! Very weird, everyone sort of grabbed the last row of seats before the slope started going up again and the screen was reasonably large to your eyes, but the projector was so far back. The 70mm "Hamlet" screened there. But a few years ago, the theater was gutted and converted into a three or four plex, oddly chopped up, with digital projection (which in truth has been an improvement, the old 35mm print projection in the Laemmle art house theaters was always mediocre.)

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Village East cinema! I saw it there opening night.

 

The Museum of the Moving Image has a 70mm setup, but they don't do many first-runs besides special engagements. I wouldn't be surprised if they had something for this run.

 

I know someone who saw a preview of Hateful Eight at the Village East last week. Not confirmed if it was the 70mm print though

 

If the Ziegfeld & City Cinemas no longer project 70mm (which is entirely possible -The Master came out in 2012 and a lot has happened in 3 years,) that would leave Avery Fisher Hall at Lincoln Center. But that's another place that usually only shows revivals and restorations...

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The Grand Rex in Paris (where I've seen The Amazing Spider-Man 2 premiere, great room, way too small of a screen considering the capacity) was supposed to have a premiere on December 11th, or 12th, which was obviously cancelled, it's now private. However, since it comes out here (in France) on January 6th, I'm not sure if they'd be showing the premiere only in 70 mm. The french distributor said there should be a "few" (whatever that means) 70 mm equipped theaters which makes me wonder if those equipped will have upgraded their screens. I can't imagine that every single theater showing it in 70 mm will have switched their screens for the aspect ratio.

 

Anyway, this is probably a once in a lifetime opportunity, I'm making the trip to see it in 70 mm if need be.

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There's a note on the 12/15 issue of AC stating that, over the past year, 100 theaters nationwide have been retrofitted with 70mm projectors. In a nutshell, the projectors have all been refurbished, have new lenses and lamphouses, splicers were brought in, platters, everything. The show will be projected @ f2.8 to 3.2 for increased dof.

 

The rest of the article is impressive, as it becomes clear what a monumental task it was to do this movie in UP70: cameras, lenses, editing tables were rebuilt, DI workflows developed, etc. What a wonderful story itself, worthy of a Docu!

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I've been working with Thomas from in70mm.com on updating his site with pertinent info and images. Here are some other interesting facts about distribution:

 

http://in70mm.com/news/2016/hateful_8/index.htm

 

 

• all 70mm prints (for platter houses) will be shipped out entirely assembled, none will be assembled in the venues. The prints are being built up by a selected crew working near Magic Mountain (Santa Clarita), CA.

 

• the prints will be in one single transport case, custom made for the show. A large, flat case, similar to those sometimes used to transport Imax 70mm prints, back in the day.

 

• even though the show will have an intermission, there will be only ONE ROLL of film. In other words, the intermission is built into the movie, with 12 minutes of black film (and DTS [Datasat] timecode printed in it) in the middle of the built-up platter print. There is no audio during the intermission, but there is a 45-second "entr'acte" music bit at the beginning of the second half of the show.

 

• the film print itself weighs about 220 pounds.

 

• with the shipping box, the total shipping weight is 350 pounds.

 

• the total running time is a little over 3 hours, including the intermission.

 

• BLSI tracked down about 120 projectors, including 20 from Cinemeccanica and some Simplex XL 70’s. About 90 of the machines are Century JJ’s.

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• even though the show will have an intermission, there will be only ONE ROLL of film. In other words, the intermission is built into the movie, with 12 minutes of black film

 

This must be where all of David's black leader went! That's 1300 feet of black. Cool.

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Word has it 4 cities in Canada are supposed to show this on the 25th. Montreal and Toronto have now been listed. No word on which theater in Vancouver yet. I'm waiting to see what theater. Not sure which theater in Vancouver would even be acceptable for a film like this, as all 5 perf 70mm theaters have been closed and torn down. I have 3 weeks to find out who ends up doing this.

 

Its great to see the excitement on here and elsewhere for 70mm from this film. Goes to show there is life still left in the format, and in the right hands, can help revive it. Its a shame that most theaters putting in the 70mm projectors won't be keeping them there. Its the only way to make sure any future films have a chance to be seen in 70mm.

Edited by Scott Pickering
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