Ziegfeld Theatre

Thanks. Did the Ziegfeld use the curtain before the pre-show today or not used at all?

In 2002, I saw a movie at the Toronto Uptown balcony screen. Lamb designed movie palace, but sadly demolished.

We never had that problem in the First Run houses in Hollywood and Westwood, CA.. We told them that was the way the film was mixed and the level the director wanted it tobe played at. Just think if it was a full 70MM print, who’s going to turn that down. Management needs to take a stand and say that’s the way the director mixed and wants it presented. Just turndown the trailers.

4PM showing on Friday. Good sized audience… 300 or so. Treated to a blank screen for a minute or so as the digital projector fired up. The Ziegfeld’s digital picture is quite nice – clear and bright. Unfortunately, as is often the case here, it was NOT loud enough. The volume was clearly adjusted for the peak sound FX so as not to offend anybody’s ears.
This happened during their run of Hairspray as well. One of the very nice managers told me that they got so many complaints about Hairspray being too loud on opening day that they ran it between 5.0 and 5.5 for the duration of the run – which is the way I saw it there. Much of the dialog was unintelligible.
Today, rather than complain, I just requested a pass and left about 15 minutes into the movie when I realized that I did not want to see Blade Runner at a low volume. Ah well. So it goes.

Scan of the Times ad:

View link

Remember it’s a Digital Cinema Presentation. So no 35mm print.

Scan & link the ad?
More people will buy as a result of the ad. However, in my experience only nationally advertized classics tend draw huge sold out gatherings in movie theaters as large as the Ziegfeld.
Can somebody TONIGHT report on the print, including picture & sound (and that curtain used before movie), how many attend, and whether any long line? I’m considering this for perhaps tommorrow.

I’m taking 8 people to see BLADE RUNNER tomorrow evening. Any idea when one should arrive to insure a decent seat?

Also, if anyone’s interested, this weekend the Jersey Loew’s will be showing several films I’ve always wanted to see on the big screen with an audience. http://www.loewsjersey.org/ (Take the PATH to Journal Square – just across the street from the station)

Thanks,
SwankyJohn

$2 off! Wow, that will help offset the cost of gas from DC :) Hey, every little bit helps. I’m looking forward to a screening Monday.

Thanks to Clearview, $2.00 off all “Blade Runner” tickets with this coupon:

http://www.bladezone.com/ticket.jpg

Thanks very much, BH, for posting the text of that article. Makes me miss the Ziegfeld even more, and increases the interest in interviewing Robert Endres for a feature on Showmanship.

Our D-5 and HDCam tapes are standard HD with a 1:79 output some are letterboxed, some squeezed. It does vary. I have an HDCam deck that offers “Edge Crop”, “LetterBoxed” or “Squeeze” functions. The latter actually unsqueezes the output of a squeezed tape for 1.79 (or 1.85 with slight top and bottom cropping). We also use a 2K server for file based material which arrives on USB drives from Technicolor or on Dolby drives. I can take a 1.79 tape with a letterboxed 2.35/2.40 image and format it in our NEC IS8 projector to fit the panels widthwise which squeezes the image and fills more of the chip, then use the anamorphic lens to unsqueeze it. The projector chips are 2048 x 1089 native res.

Our NTSC DigiBeta tapes are upconverted to 1080 in the HDCAm deck. Other NTSC material is upconverted by a Folsom scaler. Oddly enough, a couple of years ago all the producers wanted 2K digital cinema projectors with anamorphic lenses installed in screening rooms, which makes running standard def NTSC material a lot more difficult. We’re still discovering the best way to do so, but digital cinema projectors really are designed for that, and I know of one post house here in N.Y. that doesn’t even want to touch 30 frame NTSC stuff in their screening room anymore. Fortunately, I’m surrounded by a knowledgable tech staff who know lots more about this than I do.(Sorry to use up the space with tech stuff — but celboy did ask.)

Cellboy: You’ve got it — the files are squeezed to fit the chip, and then the anamorphic lens unsqueezes the image to 2.35/2.40. I think the squeeze is around 1.25, much less than the 2x squeeze used for anamorphic 35mm. The result, at least as far as I’m concerned, is the same as with 35mm. You’re gaining much more resolution. The height of both formats stays the same. It’s actually easier going between 1.85 and 2.40 here on the digital projector here. Most of the D-5 transfers I’ve been getting are actually 2.4 rather than 2.35, but I can just slide the anamorphnic into place and I’m set. (I do have to increase the light from about 19% to 38% to compensate for the light loss in the anamorphic, but that’s not a problem).

I don’t know how many digital projectors the Ziegfeld has had. They had a prototype Texas Instrument unit in for the premiere showings of the last “Star Wars”. They’ve had the NEC which they own in for a while. They may change with the requirements of the production company. Warners screened “Blade Runner” at the Rose Theatre in the Time-Warner Center for the NYFF over the weekend and used a Christie with an anamorphic lens. I talked to a tech who was there and said it was really impressive as the Rose has a very big screen. There was a studio post-production rep there as well, so hopefully the Ziegfeld’s presentation will match that one.