8mm Forum: Movie Newsreels, Hollywood, CA

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Posted by John Skujins (Member # 1515) on August 21, 2009, 07:25 PM:

I've been wondering if any of you Super 8 enthusiasts own any of the movies from this company. Shown below are the two sides of a mailing I used to receive from this company as I ordered a few of their films in the early 1980s. They sold Super 8 films of EVERY Apollo flight, not just Apollo 11, and yet I haven't seen any of these films on ebay. I've only seen a few Apollo 11 films and some Gemini, and even these weren't made by Movie Newsreels.

The films I have are:

Flight of Apollo 17, 400 ft. Super 8 color movie
Flight of Apollo 16, 200 ft. Super 8 color movie
Flight of Apollo 15, 400 ft. Super 8 color movie, VIDEOTRONIC of highlights of TV from moon

Are these rare or what? I've always wished I ordered more of them, but they were kind of expensive at the time, especially for a high school kid such as myself.

Posted by Bill Phelps (Member # 1431) on August 21, 2009, 07:44 PM:

John,

WOW! That's awesome! I don't have any of these but I would love to find 'em. I have NASA films from Castle and Columbia and I really enjoy them but these look really nice and would fill in gaps around the more 'popular' missions.

There in color too!

Are these sound films? I noticed that 'Voyager' is. How is the color holding up on your prints?

What a cool mailing!

Bill

Posted by John Skujins (Member # 1515) on August 21, 2009, 09:04 PM:

They're silent if they don't say "sound," although my Apollo 16 film has a blank sound track on it. The original 16mm flight footage had no sound anyway on these missions, and they were taken at different speeds, so it's appropriate to be silent I think. However it would have been nice to have sound on my Apollo 15 film since it's all moonwalking TV footage.

The color is holding up well on the ones I have.

Posted by Winbert Hutahaean (Member # 58) on August 21, 2009, 10:09 PM:

If you are into space film collection, I have seen once super 8mm films about Columbia Space Shuttle mission. I posted once here, but it was hard for me to get it back. But I remember that I attached photo of the reel.

Maybe it can also be added to your library (althoug as far as I remember it was not from Movie News Reel)

cheers

Posted by Adrian Winchester (Member # 248) on August 22, 2009, 02:47 PM:

Fascinating, who would have imagined that there's even an Apollo 13 film! I wondered approximately when there were available for sale? And what does 'Videotronic' actually mean?

I have releases such as the 200' sound Apollo 17 film 'Rover On The Moon' that Universal released, so it's interesting that others were licensed to put out NASA material. It's also interesting to note the variations in length, with some Apollo missions producing 200' releases, others 400' and Apollo 11 causing a 500' release!

Posted by John Whittle (Member # 22) on August 22, 2009, 04:20 PM:

Videotronics was a company that made film from video tape called kinoscopes back in those days. The company was or became a division of Technicolor and used a system that allowed them to record 3 strips which could be used for Technicolor IB printing. The three black and white negatives gave them much more control over quality than shooting on color negative (at an increase in cost). Another early company was Image Transform which still exists today as 4MC.

John

Posted by John Skujins (Member # 1515) on September 05, 2009, 01:59 PM:

I just nabbed the Apollo 11 500-footer and the Apollo-Soyuz 400-footer off ebay! So they're not impossible to find after all. Yippee!

Posted by Joe Caruso (Member # 11) on September 05, 2009, 03:07 PM:

Nothing is really impossible nor improbable, now with EBAY, there is a better chance to see items appear that ordinarily only show up rarely - I know price gouging is the normal tendency, but it's the same with any auction setting. No one is going to sit still. Sometimes the bid may get way above what we preceive, then it depends on your definition of 'want' - This topic has its place, but just wanted to give my three-cents' worth on it - Shorty

Posted by John Skujins (Member # 1515) on September 05, 2009, 06:27 PM:

I was actually prepared to pay a lot if there was competition, because I've been wanting more of these releases since about 1982 when I got the ones I have. But I didn't have to pay much at all! Less than $20.00 total for both. I was surprised but pleased.

Posted by Bill Phelps (Member # 1431) on September 06, 2009, 02:05 PM:

John'

That is great to hear that you found some of these films!

You will have to tell me how they look. According to the mailing the Apollo-Soyuz is the best mission photograghy yet.

Maybe some time I will run across some of these.

Bill

Posted by John Skujins (Member # 1515) on September 06, 2009, 02:19 PM:

I'll let you know how they look. They're shipping out on tuesday from Oklahoma to North Carolina so maybe I'll have them by the weekend. They appear to be in great condition based on the pictures. The original boxes are just like the ones I have. The postings are still up:

http://cgi.ebay.com/Super-8mm-MOVIE-Apollo-11-NASA-Films_W0QQitemZ350246244373QQcmdZViewItemQQptZUS_Film?

hash=item518c4d9015&_trksid=p3286.c0.m14

http://cgi.ebay.com/Super-8mm-MOVIE-Apollo-Soyuz-NASA-Films_W0QQitemZ350246243721QQcmdZViewItemQQptZUS_Film?

hash=item518c4d8d89&_trksid=p3911.c0.m14

Posted by Bill Phelps (Member # 1431) on September 06, 2009, 02:38 PM:

John,

Thanks for the links....man what a deal!

I'm gonna have to keep my eyes open.

Isn't it great when you've been looking for something for a long time and then you finally find it. The hunt is a fun part of collecting.

Bill

Posted by John Skujins (Member # 1515) on September 14, 2009, 10:04 PM:

Bill, I just screened my newly-acquired films and here are my first impressions.

All reels have full leaders and are in great shape, no splices. The leaders include head-shots of women, and classic clock-style countdowns. There's lots of little tiny scratches on these films, but no vertical lines. I'll break them down here:

Apollo 11, Super 8 500 ft color silent, from Movie Newsreels

I'm no color expert, but my wife told me this one is very red. Even I could see that. According to the flyer, this one was also available in B & W at the time. I bet that version looks better now. Anyway, the selection of film sequences is great. Very little TV broadcast, just the setting up of the flag. The rest is all from 16mm flight footage, plus some cuts to mission control, launch and recovery. The lunar orbital footage is awesome and there's lots of it, and of course there is the landing, and nice film footage from the surface too including some pans from inside the LM. The first steps of Armstrong are from the 16mm camera. Overall: Nice edit, but red.

Apollo Soyuz, Super 8 400 ft color silent, from Movie Newsreels

This one has okay color and is not red, according to my wife. Content is mostly onboard footage taken at 24fps, so it plays back at actual speed. Nice shots of the Soyuz maneuvering. Some shots of Earth. Onboard ceremonial signings and exchanges, eating, experiments, and playing with zero-G. Landing of Soyuz as seen from US mission control (in a poof of dust), and the US splashdown. Overall: Color is fine, clips are great if you're interested in this mission, but of course there's no moon.

Posted by Bill Phelps (Member # 1431) on September 16, 2009, 05:40 PM:

John,

Thanks for the info. Too bad about the color on the Apollo 11 film. You still got a great deal as far as I'm concerned. I just wonder if the color has faded on most of those prints that they offered.

I would love to go into space and be able to look back at the earth and see the WHOLE thing...right in front of me...that would be incredible! Of course I love other aspects of space too and projecting my NASA films on the big screen is the closest thing I have to being there.

I am glad that these films from Movie Newsreels exist cause now I have some more films to look out for.

Here's the films I have: all 200' silent

ATLAS
Man On The Moon/Epic Journey of Apollo 11

COLUMBIA
Apollo 8 Moon Orbit
Apollo 11 Man on the Moon
Apollo 14 Moon Voyage of Kitty Hawk
Apollo 15 The Ride Of The Rover (color)
Apollo 16 Mission to the Mountain

CASTLE
The American In Orbit
Amazing Adventure of Gemini 4
America on the Moon (color)

Bill

Posted by John Skujins (Member # 1515) on September 17, 2009, 08:39 PM:

Nice list! I haven't seen those Apollo 14, 15, and 16 films for sale. How's the color on the 2 that have it?

Posted by Bill Phelps (Member # 1431) on September 18, 2009, 07:43 PM:

Unfortunately, the color is completely gone on the Columbia short, Apollo 15. The Castle short has some but not much.

That is why I wondered about the color of those Movie Newsreels films. Depending on how they were stored all these years and what film stock they are on I'm hoping that there are some prints out there with some decent color. If not that's OK, I would still like to find them anyway just for the content.

Bill

Posted by John Skujins (Member # 1515) on September 18, 2009, 10:53 PM:

I just watched the Apollo 11 again tonight. It's a really great film document of the mission in terms of movie film footage. The red didn't even distract me this time around.

None of the others I have are red, so maybe it's different storage conditions, film stock, age, who knows.

I hope you find some of these. There's got to be a lot more out there.

Posted by Bill Phelps (Member # 1431) on June 06, 2010, 03:13 PM:

I just recently got a copy of Flight of Apollo 16 (200' standard 8/color/silent)

The print is beautiful, color is great (for space anyway...) I love the footage...looks like its right from the astronauts camera. Awesome!! [Smile]

It was part of a 'lot' of space films I picked up and I thought it was the Columbia 200' and I was very pleased that it was from Movie Newsreels!

Bill [Cool]

Posted by John Skujins (Member # 1515) on June 06, 2010, 05:16 PM:

Yes that is a good one. The footage of the rover doing two laps is great! Most documentaries only show one lap from this sequence, or less. Mine is the Super 8 color version, with a blank soundtrack.

This entire film is taken from 16mm flight footage, no kinescopes. The clarity is great, isn't it?

Posted by John W. Black (Member # 1082) on June 06, 2010, 08:35 PM:

Speaking of odd ones,I have a 200ft JFK memorial film by a company called Solumn Historic Films.

Posted by David Kilderry (Member # 549) on June 07, 2010, 03:54 AM:

I seem to recall seeing an ad once that stated that Bolex had been into space and was used to shoot 16mm film by the astronauts. Anyone recall or know any more about this?

Posted by Bill Phelps (Member # 1431) on June 08, 2010, 08:43 PM:

Yes the clarity is indeed awesome! I know on the Columbia Apollo 16 film I have (which is a good film) the on-board rover footage lasts for about ten seconds...and I wanted more. Well...I got it! [Smile]

So I got to drive around on the moon for what seemed to be 5 min! This might seem boring to some but I loved it!! [Razz]

I'm looking forward to finding more of these films.

Bill

Posted by Barrie Didham (Member # 1741) on July 08, 2010, 05:04 AM:

I wonder how many other places released these,anyway i though i would add this picture since its related to the topic.

Posted by Bill Phelps (Member # 1431) on July 08, 2010, 06:02 PM:

Thanks Barrie...also in that lot of films was a color print titled 'Apollo 11 Man on the Moon'. I watched it and there was no indication who released it. It wasn't Columbia, Castle or Atlas (all of which I have) so I wasn't sure who put it out...

I just wonder if your pic is it? I'm going to have a closer look at my print.

Thanks for posting!

Bill [Smile]

Posted by Barrie Didham (Member # 1741) on July 09, 2010, 01:16 AM:

No problem Bill,im glad i can help with alittle info.

I have no idea who printed the film,but if its as red as this then im sure they must be the same.

You might want to get a plain white box and copy the slip on the box of the first picture and Photoshop it to tidy it up a bit

Posted by Bill Phelps (Member # 1431) on July 09, 2010, 04:28 PM:

Barrie...there is nothing on the leader except the title and it is the same shade of red! The opening image is of the moon with the title over it...is that on yours?

I would love to copy your image but I don't think I'm allowed...I've tried that before and I get called a bad name by a angry picture so I don't do that anymore.

Bill [Smile]

Posted by Maurice Leakey (Member # 916) on May 07, 2014, 02:56 AM:

I have two 16mm black & white sound films joined together, each is about 100', and each start with "Joe Bonica presents" and below the title is "Distributed by Movie Newsreels, Hollywood, California." The Kodak date code for each is 1947, although as the prints look quite new it could refer to 1967.

Film # 1. John Beekman in "Delilah".
Film # 2. "At Your Service".

Can anybody shed any more light on these two items?

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