It’s hot as heck today, and there’s a pretty good chance it’s been hot as heck where you are too. Now, I know, as a Michigander, I’m not as used to the brutality of weather as so many people are, but I’m finding myself pretty exhausted just trying to get basics done when it’s 95 degrees out and the air conditioners here are struggling to keep up. I’m a wimp.
These particular weeks have been filled with working out logistics related to Thunderbean. How to get each of the new titles over to replication, how to get the covers, booklets and other things done with the discs back from replication, how to get this film or that sent here, how to get out to New York to get more things scanned, how to bring a load of Vinegar syndrome films across the country as soon as I can, how to make good on each project that’s wrapping up. In all honesty all of this stuff has been going very, very well, better than I ever could have expected, but somehow as that’s all happening I still want things to go faster, better and with less complications. Maybe that’s in the cards in the near future. I think sometimes we get so busy in life that we forget to enjoy what is happing right before us. Being present is a skill.
Earlier today I lent a 35mm IB Technicolor print Pinocchio to show for one of the large college’s film classes and got to talk about it a bit. There’s nothing quite like a beautiful print of a film projected. It’s one of my favorite films, and I’ve had a print of the film since I was in High School, but recently acquired another that I had only put on the rewinds to check before we ran it. While it was absolutely beautiful, reel one has started to curve. This affected the focus, and while the reel still ran and overall looked very good, it was a reminder to me that we are in a period where we’re watching two giant things happening at the same time; the disintegration of projectable film is increasing at an alarming rate while, at the same time, so is both the interest in seeing or preserving film in these particular ways.
This is an Eastman print – and not the Tech print I ran in class this week.
In more recent years (including the class that was watching Pinocchio) many people in the class hadn’t experienced a showing of films *actually on film*. Growing up, I was soaked in seeing film projected, in school, at the movies, at home. It makes sense that technology would eventually have cheaper ways to accomplish some things, but it’s of course understandable why us die hards lament that happening. There is something so beautiful about the physical object being projected frame by frame, a magic in both quality and tacitile-ness that is really getting lost in the slickness and accessibility of the digital age. The professor in this class commented to me that many film classes there are no longer requiring students attend the showings of the films, rather allowing them to watch them with a link on whatever device they choose. I think about all the frames they miss while looking down to eat a bite of whatever rapidly prepared food they’re eating, or browsing the internet or answering texts while ‘watching’ the film. We’ve lost our ability to focus when faced with a mountain of nearly endless media on Youtube or streaming.
It isn’t completely hopeless of course. There are champions that are trying really hard to keep these things alive. Micro Cinemas run by hipsters project 16mm across the country. New collectors show films to friends. New restorations draw crowds of folks to seeing things they would have trouble coming across on their own. Those rare teenagers online are fascinated that the world of preservation exists.
As I was watching cartoons at one of Tommy’s shows in New York, I thought back on the times I was huddled into a hotel room with a bunch of film collectors watching prints late at night, or watching cartoons in Brooklyn at Collin Kellogg’s with Milton Knight and Mary. The films have life if someone can champion them, even as time marches on for the actual physical film. There are still little gatherings where people watch old films, Sometimes still on film or even video.
Reel one of Pinocchio ends just as the Blue Fairy is leaving Geppetto’s house. Pinocchio waves and says “goodbye” as the brightness of Fairy light pulls away from him, as that physical film reel was saying a bittersweet goodbye to being shown publicly. It was a lovely last showing for that reel. Let’s hope the other surviving IB Technicolor prints of Pinocchio get the same opportunity to an audience that can enjoy the particular magic of projected Technicolor animation.
Have a good week all, and I promise to get back to part 3 of the other series next week.
Steve Stanchfield is an animator, educator and film archivist. He runs Thunderbean Animation, an animation studio in Ann Arbor, Michigan and has compiled over a dozen archival animation DVD collections devoted to such subjects at Private Snafu, The Little King and the infamous Cubby Bear. Steve is also a professor at the College for Creative Studies in Detroit.
A great reminder of a great film. The trailer looks magnificent. This post is also a good reminder for those of us old enough to remember, of the whirr of the projector in the classroom when a movie was shown. Without digital media at our fingertips, we paid attention and even got interested in a film that was shown in class. It was a welcome break from books and quizzes.
“Pinocchio” was made before the formulas had kicked in, when Walt Disney was willing to experiment and take risks. It has an edge to it. The happy ending is not automatically guaranteed from the first frame, but is rather earned after much hardship and growing up. It’s a sad and scary film, a cautionary tale gone mad, a nightmare, but also filled with exquisite beauty and joy. I can’t walk away from a showing of this film without processing through its emotional impact. Every time I see it, and I have of course seen it many times, I come away with fresh insights. There is so much detail that I always discover something I never noticed before.
In a sense, “Pinocchio” and “Fantasia” represent the peak of Disney animation. If World War II had not erupted at that moment in history, and thus cut off a huge source of revenue, there’s no guessing what heights Disney might have reached with his animated features. The strike was, of course, another factor in determining future Disney product, and if that, too, could somehow have been curtailed or averted, so that pure creativity could reign without the harsh realities of economics getting in the way, the resulting output would doubtless have been astounding. As it was, with the limitations that were soon to be imposed on Disney by these and other factors, he still managed to accomplish many dazzling achievements in the decades that followed.
I don’t think it’s any accident that “When You Wish Upon a Star” became a sort of Disney anthem in the coming years. A reminder of a time when anything seemed possible.
Apart from a few scenes projected onto a screen at a Disney On Ice show that I attended in 1973, I’ve never seen “Pinocchio” on film. I’ve only seen it on the 70th Anniversary Edition DVD that I bought nearly twenty years ago. I do, however, remember seeing reissues of early Disney features like “Snow White” and “Fantasia” in the 1980s, with prints that were somewhat the worse for wear. I really enjoy having these masterpieces on digital home media, with sound and colour beautifully restored, and being able to watch them at any time of my own convenience without the constant rattle of the projector in the background.
But one thing that home video cannot replicate is the experience of being part of an audience, when your reactions to a film are magnified by those of the people around you who are experiencing it at the same time. This is especially true for cartoons, and for comedies. I once saw what I have to admit was a rather unremarkable Mike Myers comedy called “So I Married an Axe Murderer” that I nevertheless remember as one of the funniest movies I ever saw, because it was opening night, the theatre was packed, and we were all laughing our heads off. If I had watched it on TV by myself at home, I probably would have barely cracked a smile. Thus screenings like yours — which, after all, is how these films were meant to be seen in the first place — are all the more vital because of their increasing rarity. Keep up the good work!
I can definitely see it getting a 4K Ultra HD release. so Far Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs got one, Cinderella, 2 months ago Alice In Wonderland got it as well, but who knows maybe Pinocchio can be next I hope.
Actually, I read somewhere (please correct me if I’m wrong) that Walt Disney Animation recently did a 4K restoration of “The Sword and the Stone” (1963) I’m guessing to correct the botch restored version from 2013.
My beloved blue track IB 16mm print of Pinocchio, the best print in my collection, is slowly shrinking. I projected it a week or so ago, and had to ride focus a bit. It still runs, but won’t for very much longer. It isn’t sticking to itself, like the Time For Beany negatives are, but it probably won’t be long. I store the two reels of it on cores, have them in the open air as much as I can.
You know, I’ll bet the big studios are laughing up their sleeves at us collectors. They probably knew that the acetate base most of their productions were printed on was potentially unstable many years before we realized that fact. A class action lawsuit against Eastman Kodak is a long held dream of mine, that I know hasn’t got a chance. The big guys always win, don’t they?
As a projectionist back in the 1970’s — for both 16mm films in college and 35mm films at commercial theaters — I still remember where the reel breaks are in some of the films I projected the most.
For the projectionist, those are the “paragraph marks” in the story you’re presenting, even as your job is to make those moments as smooth and invisible as possible for the audience. Lord, it could get hot in those projection booths!
wait a minute is this the same print listed on eBay a year ago I sent you? did you win the auction Steve or did you pass on that Ib print? I know as a reissue but still
..
the winning bid was high giving how bright the color timing was did you really spend that much money on that listing?
or did somebody else snatch it?
Hey Paramount,
It isn’t the same print. I don’t know who got that one.
I absolutely love running 16mm cartoons for the fourth graders I teach. I was among the last generation to see a 16mm projector in the classroom when I was in school, and I was fascinated. It stuck with me and I realized (thanks to Steve) that you can actually own film, I couldn’t wait to build a collection.
Now, my students get to see actual film projected (probably for the first time ever), and they love it! I even run a longer animated feature for the entire school once a year, and even some of the parents have never seen a 16mm projector before. My hope is that maybe a few of these kids might remember this and keep the love of seeing animation on actual film alive.
Oliver and company and black cauldron full 35mm scan please?
I wouldn’t say it’s important to show films…….. on FILM, more like it’s a necessity at times. You have to, in order to explain how old technology worked….. by actually using old technology, and not making a fake 3D animation about it in a computer. Film does not last forever, and reprinting Blurays is the best method of preservation we have right now.
I guess I am just defending kids these days. Don’t blame them for not being excited about this. PROJECTORS though, are a different story. That technology still has a future. Looking at reflected light is fundamentally different than looking at a monitor, and I’d say is better for your eyes during casual viewing.
I used to run the films (16 mm) for my film class, occasionally has to splice the breaks, and between reels, the class could get a bathroom break. I used to carry a few frames of Godard’s Le Gai Savoir in my wallet.
We had a fancy Athena projector that had a filter to go over the bulb so you could run slow, backward , and do freeze-frames without burning a hole in the film!
The image of that IB Technicolor *Pinocchio* print starting to curve really hit home—it’s such a poignant reminder that even the most beautiful physical film is just borrowed time.