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Topic: When did you start collecting films ?
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Melvin England
Jedi Master Film Handler
Posts: 707
From: Hull, East Yorkshire, UK
Registered: Feb 2016
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posted December 18, 2016 11:21 AM
I have always has a fascination with the moving picture. I don't know where I get it from, as my parents where never interested in the mechanics of moving picture,but just enjoyed good film.
During the summer of 1972 I passed the city center shop window of Boots the Pharmacy and there... what did I see? A projector! I wanted one of those! Not bothered it was silent! It just showed moving pictures! I told mum I wanted it but was told it's too expensive and you'll get bored! (as if). (at this point, I knew there were two types of 8mm - standard 8 and super 8,but had not yet then become significant to me.)
Pretty much at the same time, a friend of mine purchased a standard 8 silent projector and had a 1x 200' black and white silent film for it.....a Collectors Club version of The Vagabond starring Charlie Chaplin (a film I have only just recently tracked down as a 400' with musical soundtrack). The thrill of seeing Charlie moving around on that white living room door was beyond compare. My friend needed more films. We popped on the bus into the city centre and to several camera shops that also stocked movie films. Alas, they were all in super 8 so we were unsuccessful that day.It did teach me a lesson,though.Super 8 was the way forward. Back to that days newspaper and....Hey!... adverts for movies for sale.... by post!... super 8 and STANDARD 8 !!!! From that day, the film collection grew a little.... still on school boy pocket money! Still I kept nattering my parents for a projector. Nope. Friend phoned one day...."I've got another film........ in colour!!!" This was another milestone. I had never seen an 8mm colour film.Straight over to his house to take up my position in front of the famous living room door..... and there it was! "The Mouse Comes To Dinner" starring Tom and Jerry..... in glorious colour! (another film I have only recently purchased...with sound...and in colour,of course). For this 10 year old, the 8mm juices were working overtime! More pleads to my parents...more deaf ears!
Then....
A Saturday morning a week or so before Christmas lying in bed still feeling drowsy, my father pops his head around the door and says "Are you getting up?" "Why?" "Thought we would go into town and get this projector you are after." Let me tell you....my personal best time between lying in bed and being dressed still stands today!
We didn't go to Boots.Many months later,when I knew more about projectors, I saw it there again and was relieved I didn't get that one.... was a glorified toy! The shop we went to was Dixons...UK members will remember the shop well. A super 8 "Prinz Magnon LV" was what was purchased.... a 6volt 50 watt bulb,I believe, and variable speed control. (still available on Ebay). That week was agonising..... simply could NOT wait for Christmas Day for my film projecting to begin.
However,it did.
As has happend with various members on this forum, the first films were 50' black and white. The very first two that,trust me, got projected probably 20 times each that Christmas Day were "Fowled Up Falcon" starring Woody Woodpecker (Once again only recently tracked down as a 200' colour sound.... and a second black and white copy on 16mm) and a Disney one called "Bear Trouble." ( I have yet to track this one down as a 200' colour sound but am on the lookout). From then on, as soon as the pocket money allowed, another 50' black and white silent film was added to the collection.Then came my birthday..... and birthday money! Remembering the thrill of "The Mouse Came to Dinner" I was determined to "go colour." Trotting off to the camera shop again, I forked out a massive £7.50 for a brand new copy of "Cruise Cat" with Tom & Jerry again... 200'this time.... and in COLOUR! Heaven!
Christmas's and birthdays came and went and so up went my collection of silent films.
Then came 1980.
I had been holding down a part time job at a local grocery store for two years whilst still at school. Thursday and Friday evenings and all day Saturday,earning the grand total of 98p an hour! Tax free! A choice...... vastly expand my film collection.... I could now afford a 200' per week..... or..... do.... I .... move...... into......sound?
Sound..... let's go for it.....
So, in the spring of that year I became the proud owner of a make of projector I still swear by,although I now do own several other makes, a Sankyo Sound 700. So, it was another pleasant trip to the camera shop to choose my first sound film...... a 200' black and white Laurel and Hardy "At The Front" which I think is an excerpt from "Pack Up Your Troubles." Just like the first time Chaplin walked across that door, just like the first time I saw that colour film, just like that Saturday morning before Christmas, I was in seventh heaven! Not only do they move.... I can HEAR them as well.... and it even sounds like them too!
The rest,they say, is history. I got a full time job elsewhere, discovered the delights of the Blackpool Film Convention soon after, and my collection of 400' digests shot up. "Close Encounters" being the very first. Then came the 4x 400' versions and,of late, the full features and cinemascope. That,of course, with the addition of several extra projectors after discovering the delights of ebay, to take me into the future as, not being mechanically minded, when a projector breaks down, I swap to the next one unless I find a decent Mr.Fixer. And,yes, I am also the proud owner of a GS1200 as of autumn 2015.
That is my story.Other bigger and better movie formats may come and go, but when you have this hobby running through your veins,nothing will stop you getting the screen out and cranking up the good ole projector and watching our heroes move across the screen the way they were meant to..... on celluloid !
-------------------- "My name is for my friends!"
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Paul Adsett
Film God
Posts: 5003
From: USA
Registered: Jun 2003
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posted December 18, 2016 01:02 PM
A wonderful story Melvin! And one, which most of us I am sure, can relate to. I remember being blown away when I saw my first black and white film on a just purchased Eumig S802 back in 1973. I was soon purchasing the Fox and MGM musical color digests, and they were all ground breaking products at the time. As you say, once you have film in your blood it's there for good, no matter how good newer technologies get.
-------------------- The best of all worlds- 8mm, super 8mm, 9.5mm, and HD Digital Projection, Elmo GS1200 f1.0 2-blade Eumig S938 Stereo f1.0 Ektar Panasonic PT-AE4000U digital pj
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