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Are the original prints of each film still out there?

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I'm talking about the original prints shown when each film premiered.  I know the 2006 DVD's are technically considered the "original versions", but I'm sure there are some minor differences between the 06 DVD's, and the original prints when each film premiered. 

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As I understand it, there are good quality 35mm prints in the Luasfilm archives. However, the original negatives were conformed to the 1997 special edition during the restoration of the film that took place then.

A Goon in a Gaggle of 'em

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 (Edited)

adywan said:

yes there are still theatrical 35mm prints out there. a member of this site had full prints of both ANH & ESB but has since disappeared

Makes you wonder how far reaching Darth Lucas's grasp really is......or if the missing member was just spreading Sith propaganda.....

;)

 

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Jetrell Fo said:

Makes you wonder how far reaching Darth Luca's grasp really is......or if the missing member was just spreading Sith propaganda.....

;)

 

No, there was other stuff happening. Things got back on track recently but then he associated himself with a certain someone that was doing a Star Wars restoration, and was ultimately going to keep this version to himself, and then just shut me out ignoring my emails

ANH:REVISITED
ESB:REVISITED

DONATIONS TOWARDS MATERIALS FOR THE REVISITED SAGA

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Here's something interesting I read on another forum:

 

I saw STAR WARS back when it first came out in May of '77 at the Chinese Theater in Hollywood on the SECOND day after premiere. Waited three hours and had no idea what to expect but we were blown away. I learned after that only a few selected cities (like Los Angeles) got the 70mm six-channel magnetic stripe version and that most cities got the 35mm optical stereo soundtrack.

At any rate, we went back to the Chinese about 5 more times in 1977 (last time at Christmas) to see the movie and then (for old times sake) I saw it in 1997 at the Chinese for the anniversary reissue. Well, that was a disappointment. Soft picture, extra junk added to the effects, the soundtrack squashed and pulverized just like all the movies of the 1990s. A waste of time.


Last night a famous collector pulled out his 1977 70mm mag print of STAR WARS and projected it for a few selected guests. I mean, a guy rich enough to be able to project 70 in his screening room? C'mon, how eccentric is that?


At any rate, even though the print had "turned" a bit, the picture AND SOUND were just like I remembered from 1977; sharp, clean and the sound was dynamic as all heck. Watching it like this, the movie held up remarkably well. In fact, we were on the edge of our seats for the
"swiped from '30 Seconds Over Tokyo" style battle at the end. It was great.

Why can't they take this print, transfer it to high rez and just release it on a DVD? It looks (and sounds) so much better than any other laserdisc or DVD I've ever seen of STAR WARS. There had to have been at least 70 db of dynamic range on the mag soundtrack of this thing. Compare that to the 10 db of dynamics of the reissue sound mix. Urggh. And what happened to the picture quality of the reissue? You'd think the orignal camera neg had been destroyed and the soft, flabby, diffused image that they came up with in the reissue was the best they could do. I know that's not true so what was the reasoning? If you could have seen what I saw last night, crystal clear picture, sharp focus and everything. NOTHING like what you see when you watch the movie now. Somewhere down the line someone made a decision to degrade the picture, why I don't know. Did they bounce the entire movie to digital and back to film again? For what reason? Oh well. End of rant.


Sigh.

http://www.stevehoffman.tv/forums/showthread.php?t=141011


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I've read that post so many times in the past.

Collectors seem to have the only prints nowadays. It's been said that prints were shown up until the mid 90's, even 70mm ones. I'm sure those and all the SE prints are locked up in Fox's vaults.

VADER!? WHERE THE HELL IS MY MOCHA LATTE? -Palpy on a very bad day.
“George didn’t think there was any future in dead Han toys.”-Harrison Ford
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 (Edited)

 

Whatever deluxe prints that are out there:

Chances are that they have long since faded.

Judging by what this fan saw in 1982;the prints  had already started to go pink even then!

 

The 1982 reissue had a trailer for the next film, which was initially titled Revenge of the Jedi. Now that was cool. I still remember the 18 frame segment of the never- used sandstorm scene. I saw this at the Bellevue Theater, in Upper Montclair. I also saw it at the old Jerry Lewis Cinema in Union. It was here that I noted that the print was pink. I couldn't believe a film of this recent vintage had already started to fade. This gave me my first hint at just how bad DeLuxe labs were. By the way, the Bellevue has been cut into a multi screen and the Jerry Lewis Cinema has been wiped off the face of the earth. Is there no respect left for the movie palaces of our youth?

http://www.cinemaretro.com/index.php?/archives/83-Star-Wars-at-30-Years-Old-A-Lifes-Journey.html.

 

It is backed up by this other fan:

The worst was Deluxe Color. They turn pink the quickest. I ran a three year old Deluxe print of "Star Wars" in 1980. There was very little color other than pink.

ttp://cinematreasures.org/polls/167_0_6_0_C/

 On edit:

Just realized that this may be an explantion for why the original 1982 VHS rental tape(which I have) is faded(and the tape always looked that way).

Maybe the the 1982 VHS rental tape transfer was from an already faded deluxe print!?

back in  1983 I recorded  a british broadcast(ITV) of SW and the colours were much more vibrant than the 1982 20th century fox rental tape.

Maybe ITV used one of those technicolour prints for their transfer.

 

 

 

I saw Star Wars in 1977. Many, many, many times. For 3 years it was just Star Wars...period. I saw it in good theaters, cheap theaters and drive-ins with those clunky metal speakers you hang on your window. The screen and sound quality never subtracted from the excitement. I can watch the original cut right now, over 30 years later, on some beat up VHS tape and enjoy it. It's the story that makes this movie. Nothing? else.

kurtb8474 1 week ago

http://www.youtube.com/all_comments?v=SkAZxd-5Hp8


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 (Edited)

I have the same 1982 VHS tape, and I always thought it was from a print that came out in 1981 since it says "Episodes IV: A New Hope" on it.  BTW, the Senator theater in Baltimore screened an original 35mm Technicolor print of Star Wars, though it was the 1981 version, not the 1977 version.

 

http://www.abc2news.com/dpp/news/region/baltimore_city/curtain-closes-on-kiefaber%27s-run-at-the-senator-theater

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OEctWVF4J_w

http://petergaultney.smugmug.com/Movies/historic/Star-Wars-at-The-Senator/13089279_nXePV#948693565_GrcLK

 

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All VHS and laserdisc releases use the 1981 crawl, if I'm not mistaken.

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@Markdav

I think Zombie speculated that they spliced that new scroll onto an already existing 1977 print.

I  would hazard a guess that the "senator" print was done only for the UK re-release -which I saw in 1981(SW was shown back to back with ESB in the early summer of that  year-my personal introduction to SW!)

For the 81' and 82' releases in the states they probably created new IN's and then spiced that scroll in.

Having said that-there is that fan who said  that the print he saw in 82' was already pink and faded-so maybe that was a print from 77' with the new 81' scroll spliced in!

 

 

 

 

 

 

I saw Star Wars in 1977. Many, many, many times. For 3 years it was just Star Wars...period. I saw it in good theaters, cheap theaters and drive-ins with those clunky metal speakers you hang on your window. The screen and sound quality never subtracted from the excitement. I can watch the original cut right now, over 30 years later, on some beat up VHS tape and enjoy it. It's the story that makes this movie. Nothing? else.

kurtb8474 1 week ago

http://www.youtube.com/all_comments?v=SkAZxd-5Hp8


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captainsolo said:

I've read that post so many times in the past.

Collectors seem to have the only prints nowadays. It's been said that prints were shown up until the mid 90's, even 70mm ones. I'm sure those and all the SE prints are locked up in Fox's vaults.

Somewhere...fairly well protected, I have filmstrips that were cut and being sold as separate pieces for collectors....it is from a theater print for one of the SE Trilogy trailers......I got them all for probably about $40.00 total. 

I have no way of knowing how exactly to put them to good use....I don't have the equipment or the knowledge to do so.  

:)

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danny_boy said:

@Markdav

I think Zombie speculated that they spliced that new scroll onto an already existing 1977 print.

I  would hazard a guess that the "senator" print was done only for the UK re-release -which I saw in 1981(SW was shown back to back with ESB in the early summer of that  year-my personal introduction to SW!)

For the 81' and 82' releases in the states they probably created new IN's and then spiced that scroll in.

Having said that-there is that fan who said  that the print he saw in 82' was already pink and faded-so maybe that was a print from 77' with the new 81' scroll spliced in!

 

 

 

 

 

I'm curious as to why they would splice the "A New Hope" crawl onto the print, if it really was the 1977 print.  I still think it was the 1981 print, but perhaps Zombie is correct.

BTW, the quality looked excellent.

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 (Edited)

I think the idea is that Lucasfilm/Fox just took prints they still had from 1977, and spliced in the new crawl, then sent them out in 1981 for the re-release.

*Not saying that some 1981 re-release prints weren't completely new prints, I'm sure some were, but I can't see them not using prints they already had.

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Here is a nice clip of a super 8mm 1977 9 minute reel of star wars:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GbUDUT3T_EA

 

Its cool to see,but you can see how badly the film has faded.

I saw Star Wars in 1977. Many, many, many times. For 3 years it was just Star Wars...period. I saw it in good theaters, cheap theaters and drive-ins with those clunky metal speakers you hang on your window. The screen and sound quality never subtracted from the excitement. I can watch the original cut right now, over 30 years later, on some beat up VHS tape and enjoy it. It's the story that makes this movie. Nothing? else.

kurtb8474 1 week ago

http://www.youtube.com/all_comments?v=SkAZxd-5Hp8


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 I vividly remember differences I've not seen on any version since seeing it in the theatre. The biggest one is Luke being badly bloodied during the duel with Vader.

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Does anybody know what the sources for the complete Super8-Versions (Derann) were? (I am not referring to the Super-8-Cut-Down-Versions, but the complete Super8-Versions)

 

Could Super8 be a suitable source for a HD-Scan?

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I wonder what kind of negative Lucasfilm sent derann.

They only had star wars and Return of the jedi and never Empire strikes back.

Earlier prints run off were incredibly sharp but the last ones rolled out were not as good.

These were the same as the 35mm versions of the film, not sure if star wars was just star wars or it had the episode IV,

Jedi was identical to the 35mm engagements of 1983 and 1985, only the stereo dolby audio was folded into monaural.  And it was super8mm scope.

Of course magnetic sound and not optical.

“Always loved Vader’s wordless self sacrifice. Another shitty, clueless, revision like Greedo and young Anakin’s ghost. What a fucking shame.” -Simon Pegg.

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I have seen EBS Super8 Prints offered on ebay and in a local super8 collectors magazine in Germany. However it was an english languaged print.

Do you now something of EBS on Super8, as well?

 

Would a super8 copy of a 35mm print a good hd source?

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A 35mm print of the original version of Star Wars was shown in Baltimore last summer. It was a free screening for a single screen theater that was closing... they had two showings, one at 4 and one at 8. The print was said to be pristine and generously lent by a collector. I wish I could have been there.

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There's a thread somewhere on here about it, but the most relevant stuff can be seen on this page

As someone who was there in Baltimore and saw it, I can say that the print was not pristine, but it was pretty darned amazing. There was definitely dirt on it, but not a whole lot. It was beautiful.

I'd say that the two things I learned about Star Wars at that showing were that the colors should be pretty vivid (although the photos of the screen overdo the contrast a bit), and it should definitely look like it was made in the 70s.

ROTJ Storyboard Reconstruction Project

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I think I also remember seeing a complete Super 8mm ESB offered by Derann.

He's out of business now, though, correct?

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There are a lot more original prints out there, than when we first looked into it.

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