8mm Forum: Sunset Films (Super 8 company) History?

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Posted by Osi Osgood (Member # 424) on August 17, 2013, 12:58 PM:

Does anybody have any of the history of this Super 8 film company/distributor?

I ask as I have found that they're quality is definitely a notch higher than some of the competitors back in super 8's heyday.

They seemed to specialize in the Black and White Looney Tunes, as I haven't personally seen any other releases but these cartoons. They are known by having a title card saying there name with images from early Lonney Tunes on them.

I have noted that they also used better negatives of the titles they released then other companies. I have recently acquired a print of "Porky Pig's Feat" (1943, classic Frank Tashlin cartoon)
and I remember a lot of splices in the negative on the one I had years ago, but this one is much better, with much better gray tones as well.

Posted by Panayotis A. Carayannis (Member # 1220) on August 23, 2013, 12:29 PM:

They were another 16 mm company distributing,or re-distributing WB cartoons to television ,beside or after AAP,and,perhaps,to the home market. Super 8 copies were struck by the public domain 8mm distributors in the "golden age" of the seventies- eighties. I also have this exellent Frank Tashlin cartoon but I can't remember from what company I bought it back then.

Posted by Jeff Missinne (Member # 3373) on August 25, 2013, 04:24 PM:

Sunset Productions may have been the name of a "front" company Warner Bros. used to sell their old black and white cartoons to TV; they were on TV as early as 1952, some 5-6 years before WB sold their pre-1948 features, color cartoons and shorts to AAP. The TV syndicator of these cartoons was Guild Films, whose biggest success was "The Liberace Show;" Guild also leased Walter Lantz's b/w cartoons and distributed them as "Oswald Rabbit Presents..." In the 60's Guild was apparently acquired by Seven Arts, Ltd., a Canadian-owned TV film company. Seven Arts later merged with Warner Bros. (those with long memories may recall their "W7" logo,) and WB got the cartoons back. It was then that the "colorized" remakes of the b/w Porky Pigs were made. Public domain releasers copied Guild/Sunset prints and, with them, their title cards.

Posted by Osi Osgood (Member # 424) on August 25, 2013, 06:00 PM:

ThanX 4 the additional info. They did seem to care more for they're releases than other super 8 companies did. It should be noted that I have never seen a color WB cartoon or any other cartoon released under the sunset banner in color. They have only been B/W Warners cartoons.

Posted by Maurice Leakey (Member # 916) on August 27, 2013, 02:42 PM:

I have a 16mm Liberace TV show released by Guild. I never fail to laugh watching Lee wearing a Davy Crocket hat and singing/playing the famous song.

Posted by Hugh Thompson Scott (Member # 2922) on August 27, 2013, 05:36 PM:

Coming in on that Osi, Walton Films were known for their consistency of quality regarding prints. I have some early releases
"Stingray" & " Fireball XL5" that would give 16mm a run for it's
money, they were that good.

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