HISTORY:
My "world" is 'the arts' and more specifically, music, artwork and hand crafted/decorated chinaware's.
I am not a film enthusiast but an associate has asked me to find new owners for THEIR large collection of photographic and film items ... this is one of those items.
Vinegar Syndrome: my nose came up NEGATIVE on these reels ...
I tend to be quite detailed in my item descriptions, please READ all the details to decide if this item may interest you.
Now, on with the description ...
SUPERMAN THE MOVIE (Christopher Reeve) PLUS LOONEY TUNES (PEPE LE PEW)
Warner Bros. - Super 8 Film
This is the 2nd print that I have discovered in the boxes of film that I am sorting through
Catalogue # Not indicated and unknown
SUPERMAN The Movie (1978)
Most folk will know the storyline but just in case you have been a cave dweller for the last 50 years ... the movie follows the origin of Superman, as an alien infant Kal-El who is sent to Earth, raised as Clark Kent in Smallville, and grows to become a hero in Metropolis, balancing his mild-mannered reporter life with his superhero duties while battling the villainous Lex Luthor.
The film has been placed across 3x 600' EUMIG reels but the owner has added a short cartoon to the "front" of Reel 1, that cartoon is from Looney Tunes, Pepe Le Pew.
White leader films are fitted to each reel but there are no film clips
I have "test viewed" around 50% of reel one, due to the cartoon and I wished to view the main feature in more detail plus around 10 minutes of reels 2 & 3
Colour
Sound
COSMETIC CONDITION:
USED
CLEAN
Film stock and the reels appear to be undamaged
Reel 1 is a Cream-White EUMIG,
Each reel is packed into a DASCO library case, with a drop down front door. The library cases are generally in reasonable condition, some useage marks, scuffs and I do see a couple of joins that have been stressed (edge cracks) but not broken except the hinge of Reel 3, it still works but has slight damage.
Vinegar Syndrome: my nose came up NEGATIVE on these reels ...
NO personal names or other writing on the reels - each reel has a small White dot with the reel number
TESTING:
Test projector is the ELMO 1200 that I have on hand at the moment.
Each film looks to be clean and in good condition, sprocket holes are not damaged.
I ran the first reel through the projector for the first 15 minutes or so, to observe the picture and sound.
"Movie Night" begins with the Looney Tunes cartoon, around 8 minutes or so
I was immediately greeted with great colours, lots of them and throughout the whole length of the cartoons - very nice!
The sound was fine, clear and at a normal level
Next, I waited with baited breath to see the main feature ... Superman. I half expected a trailer first because this first reel has a hand written note "with trailer on" although this writing is a bit faint so perhaps it had been removed in the past. In any case, there is no trailer and it was straight into the main feature ... again the colours are very good, Reds (of course) Greens and Blues although not as vibrant as the cartoon colouring. Actually it is the Greens that really save the day, the Blues seem quite reduced and overall there is that Orange-Red hue to the pictures
The sound is fine across all three reels, again it is clear and of a good level
I then played 10 minutes or so of the other two reels ...
SPECIAL NOTE:
I always include a couple of "off screen" snapshots ... now my digital camera is antiquated (it almost belongs to the world of the Kodak Box Brownie!) and it's limitations are definitely showing up in these sample photographs.
I take the screen shot in very low light levels, the camera flash is turned off (otherwise the picture is flooded with White) and the camera shutter speed is very slow.
This means I have trouble getting sharp photographs, I am trying a new method by pausing the film and then taking the picture but this is pretty cumbersome and not always a good photograph results, it's also tough on the projector (forwards-backwards-pause-forwards) I have noticed that after viewing quite a few films now, that my poor OLD digital camera is tending to emphasise the Red's in the photographs anyway (the camera has no White balance controls, it is OLD) - in real life the on-screen picture is not as Red as recorded in the photographs.
In my opinion, after this relatively brief test viewing, I am happy that the film is as stated on the reel labels and that the reel looks (and smells) to be in reasonable "technical" condition.
I have now packed each reel in a sealed clear plastic pack along with some Silica Gel and then also packed the complete set of three reels within an outer sealed clear plastic package.
