8mm Forum: Sudden Impact Super 8 optical feature!

This is topic Sudden Impact Super 8 optical feature! in forum 8mm Print Reviews at 8mm Forum.

To visit this topic, use this URL:
https://8mmforum.film-tech.com/cgi-bin/ubb/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic;f=4;t=000696

Posted by Osi Osgood (Member # 424) on May 23, 2018, 11:13 AM:

There’s nothing like a great “Squinty Clint” flick and this was one of his better films from the 1980’s and we collectors are fortunate that the airlines didn’t catch up in they’re thinking and embrace VHS as they’re “in-flight movies” at an earlier time, otherwise we wouldn’t have this film on Super 8.

“Sudden Impact” in my opinion, was the best of his “Dirty Harry” series of films, with the exception of the first film entitled, not so ironically, “Dirty Harry”, but there are some neat differences in this films structure as well as it’s appearance on super 8 optical.

At the beginning of this story, a woman (Sondra Locke, Eastwood’s real life wife at the time), kills a man in his car during a “romantic” situation. She throws the gun into the sea. Harry is called to inspect the situation, already on the trail of the killer but before this, we get some classic “Harry” with his ruffing up a criminal who’s just gotten off on a technicality, with his “Dogshit” speech. We also immediately get, right after this, Harry’s visit to his favorite coffee shop (first introduced in the first film of the series), and he gets to deliver the number one line from the whole series as he confronts another punk …

“ Go ahead … make my day! “

But Harry has ruffled a few too many feathers and a number of people want him dead, (including the punk and his friends who quickly learn just how bad of an idea THAT
was) …

So his police chief decides to send him out of town for his own protection. However, those killings of fellas with they’re heads and they’re “unmentionables” blown off are turning up in the very town he’s vacationing in so, whether he’s wanted on the case locally or not, Harry is on the job. The woman doing the killings, however, slowly takes a liking to Harry and they become close, even though Harry is close to figuring out that it’s her.

When she’s within two people left that need to be killed, (all this is happening because her and her sister were brutally raped and her sister never mentally recovered) they start to suspect and they once again try to kill her, (and almost manage to kill Harry in the process) …

But Harry, in pure “Dirty” fashion, catches up with them and takes care of business. In the conclusion, Hary has the opportunity to turn the woman in, but agrees with her reasoning that these people needed to die and lets her walk free, as they walk off together.

This “Harry” film was the most “sympathetic” of the Harry series as, the “killer” is a person who got no justice from the system and while we, as a culture do our best not to think that “vigilante justice” is ever appropriate, we can’t help but agree with her methods. In the first Harry film, the villain “Scorpio” has no redeemable qualities and is just a sick sereal killer, and that fact alone makes this film stand a little taller comparing the two together.

This film also has a certain neat sense of humor with the unwanted “present” of a bull-dog for Harry, and the slight twist that, not only is one of the bad guys to be killed the son of the local police chief, this son has also been scarred by being involved with they’re rape and is a mental vegetable.

All in all, a very enjoyable Eastwood romp!

This is an airline print and so in this case, we are privileged with the title card before the studio logo, “edited for airline presentation”, but the editing is surprisingly minimal, with all the very colorful language intact, including every “s**t” and “f**k” in the film. It appears that just about the only part that was edited was the more graphic rape shots.

It also appears that, while this film does have a slight color shift, it’s my personal opinion that this was more due to bad pre-print processes as …

1. Right after the “presentation” card, we go from near perfect blacks to brown/red blacks for the actual feature.
2. There are some sections of the film where the color is absolutely spot on, perfect facial colors and pretty much the only colors that are affected are the blacks. All the other colors are intact.

So, I'd personally state that this specific print is either an 8 or 9 out of 10 and there may well be an even better print than the one that i personally have, but I'm satisfied with my print and I'm betting that you will find a decent one out there as well.

So I’m pretty sure that this print is fairly near what the color looked like when it was originally screened for the airlines. As usual with these 80’s optical sound features, the optical track is very loud and sharp, near the quality of a good magnetic track and the sharpness of the print is very good as well.

Thank you for reading ...

… and, as always …

Long Live Super 8!!!

Posted by Tom Photiou (Member # 130) on June 18, 2018, 02:47 PM:

I have to say this is one Clint Eastwood film i have never watched. Now ive read your review Osi, i will. Very good review. [Wink]

Posted by Adrian Winchester (Member # 248) on June 18, 2018, 05:50 PM:

I'm interested to read that Osi's print has an 'Edited for airline presentation' caption, as I bought one from Derann when their deal at the time caused them to have a whole batch, but I'm almost certain my print didn't have this, although it was in excellent condition. Perhaps they removed these captions, and Osi's wasn't one sold by Derann?

Posted by Tom Photiou (Member # 130) on June 19, 2018, 06:37 AM:

Adrian, i had an print of Crocodile Dundee, when i viewed it and saw it was edited for such ridiculous words that ended me collecting any further optical prints. I enquired about it at the time and was told of the cuts/edits in Lethal weapon and A fish called Wanda, in my view, this made collecting these films totally pointless. [Wink]

Posted by Osi Osgood (Member # 424) on June 19, 2018, 11:23 AM:

I didn't buy my print from Derann. I'm betting that Derann took this off the beginning of the film and put they're own leader on it, as I'm sure that this MUST have had it on there to begin with ...

or, perhaps, UK prints of this title didn't have that at the beginning? Interesting question, but I was stunned that there was litterally NO cussing left out, including the "F" bomb.

It's also intersting as to the fade properties. The blacks are brownish, but there ARE scenes, epscially daylight scenes, here and there where it appears that there is literally no fade and there are numerous times with other optical sound features where, quite frankly, they were in such a rush to get these out on the airlines that they probably didn't bother to do really good color grading or check out the original negative properties before printing.

after all, they were just going to be on the airlines for what? A month or two? Perhaps even less time?

I've noticed this very irritating quality on a notorious 80's print for pinkish fade, "Gorky Park" an excellent feature film that is truly a pin sharp print that would make Derann envious, but that pinkish fade really effect at least the frist half of the film, but the color gets better until it's almost normal by the end of the film, and this is a film that takes place in winter, which is mostly a brown to white color scheme to begin with!

UBB.classic^TM 6.3.1.2