GREMLINS (Derann - 2x600 ft)

[Lincoln Thorn]

I received this copy from the wonderful Robert Aragon a couple weeks ago and thought I'd provide an updated look at this classic!

STORY SYNOPSIS

What happens when you take home cute little munchie monsters as a pet to your Norman Rockwell town? Well, you end up with a lot of dead character actors in this wonderful holiday comedy horror classic!

PRINT

The digest (or mini feature) for this film, in my opinion, is wonderful and edited together on one 1200 ft reel! Derann did a great job editing the story to keep the foundation of the plot while including most of the best moments of the film in its 50-minute runtime! They knew what the people wanted and gave it to us with plenty of the lovable Gizmo and devilish Gremlins causing chaos to everything thing they touch.

COLOR/CONTRAST

The pictures below don't really do it justice, but the print is very sharp, focused throughout, and the color saturation is terrific.

SOUND

This print does have Stereo sound and it plays loud, very clear, and well edited together. I can't speak to the mono version of this S8 film, but Stereo is a clear winner.

All in all, I'm so happy to own this print! It's hard not to love this Joe Dante film and screen it to all your friends/family during the holidays. So, if you're a S8 collector able to find a copy, I highly suggest you take the plunge.

Thank you for reading my thoughts on this excellent film and remember the most important rules for Gremlins (and pretty good rules to follow for your film collection too!):

1) Never expose it to bright light
2) Never get it wet
3) NEVER EVER feed it after midnight

[Rob Young]

Lincoln, this was the Derann title that, for me, being in my mid teens in the 80's really signaled that super 8 was back.

I'd never given up on super 8 as my friends all watched their Betamax and VHS, and Derann had clearly pulled the format back from the brink of extinction with Raise The Titanic, but to release a recent, big Spielberg produced movie was so exciting at the time.

Originally it was touted as a 600ft version, which sounded good as I could maybe actually afford it. Briefly, even a feature version was mentioned, but as a 35mm print became available to Derann, the 2 x 600ft version was decided upon. Legend has it that Keith Wilton did the editing. I don't know how true this is, but he certainly gave the editing a thumbs up when he reviewed it!

Part of the super 8 is hard masked to 1.85:1 ratio. This is because one of the reels used from the 35mm release print is hard masked this way, apparently at the request of Joe Dante. As the whole film should really be viewed 1.85:1 (the super 8 print is open gate), I can only imagine that something is visible in the frame that the director didn't want to risk ending up on a badly racked presentation?

Making this extra special to me is that it was my Christmas present when I was 15 (I know, I was a spoiled kid!)

I still treasure it and run it every Christmas. Actually, when I watched the Bluray, I found some of it quite slow. I actually prefer this fast moving version.

[Brian Fretwell]

If the open matte is the wrong format, next time I show my copy I'll zoom out until it is correct!

[Lee McCaffrey]

The cinema (Snow White) sequence is hard matted to hide all the puppeteers and animatronics rigging/gubbins which would have been just outside of the frame.

[Larry Arpin]

Does this have the kitchen scene where the mother kills some of the gremlins, such as pushing one into the microwave and it explodes?

[Rob Young]

It does Larry!

Yes, the movie should be really be shown 1.85:1 although it doesn't matter too much. Brian, I have black velvet masking top and bottom and do indeed zoom it out to 1.85:1. It works really well.

Lee, that's interesting as in cinemas it should have been masked off anyway with the 1.85:1 gate. Like I said, I can only guess that Joe Dante was worried about poorly racked presentations? I guess this decision was an unexpected blessing for the open gate super 8 version.

[Oliver Feld]

Yes, it’s included and almost every highlight of this fantasy classic. The perfect film for a special Christmas screening!

[Lincoln Thorn]

Thanks for all the nice comments and conversation about GREMLINS! To echo the others, this version of the film has all of the best highlights put together and quite well edited together. I'm very excited to finally have this one for my collection.