Lang Thompson writes:

>Are changeover cues still used on many prints in the US?

Thinking about it, possibly not.  A few months ago I had to show a print of
'Mousehunt'.  After checking it on the bench, I saw that the dots were
there, but that the print was otherwise NFG because of a deep lateral
emulsion scratch on reel 3 and no DTS timecode on reels 5 and 6.  The print
was no. USA something or other.  I rejected it, sent it back and got a
replacement print which was a print UK something or other.  There was no
time to check it before the first show, and so I had to take reel 1
straight out of the tin and onto the screen.  Because I had checked the
previous copy for dots, I assumed they would be on the replacement one.
They weren't and I missed the first changeover as a result.

After enquiring with UIP, I was told that print no. USAXXX means that the
print has been imported from the US, ultrasonically cleaned, rewashed and
polished and then put into distribution here in the UK.  Print no. UKXXX
means that it was actually made by a UK lab (this usually happens when the
version released in the UK is significantly different, possibly thanks to
the British Board of Film Censors or whatever, and it is cheaper to make
new prints than to faff about cutting up the imported ones, inserting new
sections and so on).  Since that incident I have found that, without
exception, USA prints have no cue dots (except where a previous
projectionist has put them on using an engraver) whereas UK ones invariably do.

Actually it is very rarely that I show a film on single reels: but this was
a one-show-only Saturday matinee and I prefer to do those that way than
have to spend an hour or so stripping the print off the platter afterwards.

Leo

Leo Enticknap
email: [log in to unmask]

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