8mm Forum: Cinema in Miniature

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Topic: Cinema in Miniature

Lee Mannering
Film God

Posts: 3216
From: The Projection Box
Registered: Nov 2006

posted March 03, 2007 10:52 AM

The Cinema in Miniature
200ft Colour Sound (Stereo optional)

I could not resist doing a review of the film I myself produced in the 80’s, and which later found its way onto super 8mm for collectors.

This was a 200ft Super 8mm Stereo documentary I produced with the intention of promoting Super 8mm and multi gauge film collecting, and was included at that time in talks I was giving about film collecting. You need to transport yourself back to a time when VHS & Betamax were going strong, and if you were lucky you had Laserdisc to fully enjoy the content of the film.

I scripted this film shortly after the documentary I made titled Cinema of Our Time which was a record of the first Warner Multiplex cinema in the UK at Bury. This first effort was released by Perrys Movies, but I am jumping the gun a bit.

I filmed Cinema in Miniature using a Nizo super 8mm cine camera and over a four week period. I got a small crew together to help with lighting and we were then underway with what turned out to be a fun project although I soon found myself making the film on my own as my helpers had other things to do. I wanted to get the real feel of home cinema, but not detach it from reality as newcomers to the hobby would not have a purpose built Cinema in the home as many these days do.

I filmed the lab at Perrys Movies, Local Cinema projection rooms, and Derek Simmonds at Derann doing a demo of his high quality stereo striping and re recording at the premises. The film was also jammed packed as you would expect with cine projectors, tips on use and even a section on 9.5mm film collecting. I think it would be OK to say it pretty much covered the hobby pretty well within 200ft demonstrating 8mm, 9.5mm and 16mm equipment.

Also featured were some rare film clips and the whole content came together quite well in the melting pot. So much so that Perrys having seen just the edited film with no soundtrack scooped it up for 8mm release. I can remember going to Ian’s shop film in hand and giving him a live voiceover how it would all sound as he ran the edited master on his Fumeo.

Perry’s soon produced a double run 8 negative from the film which is 16mm width and looks like two Super 8 lengths side by side with the main stripe side by side in the middle. Considering the film was shot on super 8 Perry’s did a superb job with the printing I thought and I would say this was largely due to one very knowledgeable guy known to us as Arthur. Sadly he passed away a few years ago, but he was a lovely man and highly respected. Both Ian and Arthur made a good team at Perry’s and I was assured of a first class job with my filming efforts.

The completed film was made available on super 8mm by Perry’s with a mono soundtrack, but I soon found myself being inundated with requests for rerecording them into Stereo which I did around 30 prints I guess. Even today I get the odd request to rerecord these films, and its nice to know people want to see and hear the film as it was made.

Considering the film was made by a group of amateur film makers it certainly gained popularity through Perry’s. Today used prints do come up for sale, but Ian tells me they are not on the shelf for very long. Fond memories of my best years film making & collecting indeed.

Update. It was with sadness my friend who loaned me his camera to make the film way back then passed away and amazingly I was able to purchase it, so it would seem the cameras return to me was meant to be and I continue to use it.

[ December 12, 2013, 07:17 AM: Message edited by: Lee Mannering ]