8mm Forum: CONDUCT UNBECOMING!! Super 8 optical snd.

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Posted by Osi Osgood (Member # 424) on November 20, 2009, 09:03 AM:

It surprises me that I have never gotten around to doing a review of this fine film. It has a personal spot in my heart, along with just being a great film!

It is ... CONDUCT UNBECOMING!! (1975)

It has a who's who of British cinema to start with ...

Sir Richard Attenborough (Jurrasic Park)
James Mc Donald (Great Eascape)
Trevor Howard (The Third Man)
Micheal York (Logan's Run)
Christopher Plummer (Sound of Music)
Susannah York (A Christmas Carol 1984)

as well as Persis Kombatta (Bald woman in Star Trek: Motion pic)

The story is as follows ...

During a dance party, the prominent woman in the community (widow of the regiments hero) is violently raped, by sword point, no less. A young new officer, cocky and obnoxious, is pointed out as the rapist. They then have a British army courtroom trial. Micheal York is assigned as the defense lawyer to defend the very young man he came to the post with. James Mc Donald plays the posts's doctor, and Sir Richard Attenborough, Trevor Howard and Christopher Plummer play senior officers.

Susannah York plays the victim of the violent rape, and she does an excellent job with her role. Persis Kombatta plays an earlier victim of the rapist. No one phones in they're performance and they all do a very good job. It's a pleasure to watch them.

The question is, who is truly the rapist?
The young cocky officer, (who doesn't even want to be assigned to this outfit), or someone else?

Though made in the 1970's and taking place in the early 1900's,
(I might be off on the century), this trial is as modern as you could ask for, (it could be a "CSI" episode) and has a number of twists and turns that keep your attention to the very end. In the end, it's about what honor truly is, and the lack of it. How far does honor extend and when do you lose it?

This print is a wonderful example of just how good an optical sound super 8 feature can be. This is presented in the letterbox format that it appeared in, in the movie theater.

The print is pin sharp with great grain levels and, as with all the optical features, no wash-outs or blacked out scenes.

Now, anyone who has collected this feature in the past know that it is notorious for being faded, to a greater or lesser extant. I was lucky enough to have two very good prints, (one of which is on ebay right now), and I can verify that you can find a good color print if you search diligently enough.

The sound is in-between. It's not too quiet, but not booming as well. Of course, as with all optical sound features, the less faded, the more robust the sound will be.

One caution however ...

Approximately, the first twenty minutes of this feature have a somewhat muted color scheme. I at first thought that I had run into bad faded prints, but even on a very unfaded print, this first twenty minutes has that aspect to it, so don't judge the whole film by that first twenty minutes. It's not faded, its just rather muted.

As I stated earlier, this film is one of the special films in my collection. This was the first optical feature that I bought, both times that I have collected Super 8 (in the late 80's and then again in 2003). It was what impressed me about the possible quality to be offered by optical super 8. It took me awhile to find good prints of this. In fact, one of my "archive" prints was compiled from different source prints to come up with the best color possible, but it was worth it.

It's probably one of the few times that you'll find so many great british actors all in one film, at least, on super 8.

LONG LIVE SUPER 8!!

Posted by Paul Adsett (Member # 25) on November 20, 2009, 11:24 AM:

Nice review Osi - I really must get into collecting some optical prints. One reason that optical super 8 is so much sharper than mag prints, may be due to the fact that you do not have to deal with the variable stripe thickness of mag prints, which can really affect side-to-side focus uniformity. I have some mag prints which are almost impossible to get good flat focus on. Too bad super 8 projectors( with a couple of exceptions) were not made with rear sprung gates, which would have eliminated this annoying problem.

Posted by Osi Osgood (Member # 424) on November 20, 2009, 01:10 PM:

ThanX Paul.

I have my back-up "archival" print of this, from my collection up for sale on ebay. It was a labor of love (and frustration) finding good color reels of each. It's a good example of the high points about optical Super 8. I projected the one I put up for sale on the big screen and I mean I REALLY blew it up to the full size of my 250 foot screen, (Note: from top left corner to bottom right corner) and even though letterboxed and super 8, it is a really easy on the eyes print, as it is nice and sharp! Interesting observations as well as well. You could very well be right.

Posted by Michael O'Regan (Member # 938) on November 21, 2009, 01:11 PM:

250ft screen????

Posted by Osi Osgood (Member # 424) on November 21, 2009, 02:00 PM:

I just thought of that two Micheal.

I was using the measurements of my old Sharpvision projection TV, cuz it does sound silly.

What I meant must mean that same measurement for the screen size in inches, not feet. My screen is made up of a very shiny silk full size bed sheet, connected to two wood dowels, and it merely rolls down. I just measured it. Nine feet across and usually six foot from top to bottom. There, that's better.

So, at a full nine feet across, (and it being a non scope print, but letterboxed), it still looked fabulous, being a very sharp optical print. It was projected on a "souped up" CHINON 9500.

Posted by Michael O'Regan (Member # 938) on November 21, 2009, 02:07 PM:

Yep, that would've been almost 90yds corner to corner. Three times the distance between home plate and first. One helluva screen, eh??

[Smile]

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