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Post by Sue Butcher on Feb 8, 2013 11:08:48 GMT
I've just remembered that when "Evil" 2 was found, the story went round that it was originally bought from the BBC by a cinema owner who wanted a Dalek episode to show. Any truth in that?
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Post by richardwoods on Feb 8, 2013 13:52:19 GMT
Personally I really hope some more of the Web of Fear surfaces, lucky enough to remember it first time around and it would be great to see if it was as good as I thought then. Remind me, what was the story about the recovery of episode 1. It was one of the first to come back wasn't it?
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Post by Mark Vanderlinde-Abernathy on Feb 8, 2013 15:07:32 GMT
Personally I really hope some more of the Web of Fear surfaces, lucky enough to remember it first time around and it would be great to see if it was as good as I thought then. Remind me, what was the story about the recovery of episode 1. It was one of the first to come back wasn't it? Found in 1978 by Sue Malden, it was in a collection of films recently returned from Hong Kong. The other 5 weren't with it.
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Post by richardwoods on Feb 8, 2013 15:49:08 GMT
Thanks for that, presumably the other episodes were returned earlier & junked. Lets hope that more are out there one way or the other.
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Post by Jon Preddle on Feb 8, 2013 18:25:22 GMT
Found in 1978 by Sue Malden, it was in a collection of films recently returned from Hong Kong. The other 5 weren't with it. Found by Sue Malden *with* a collection of films recently returned from Hong Kong. The BBC had that print of part 1 as early as 1976... It's thought now it was being thrown away at the same time as that separate collection of Hong Kong films when Sue happened upon it, but it wasn't returned from Hong Kong with those films.
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Post by Mark Vanderlinde-Abernathy on Feb 8, 2013 18:26:55 GMT
Bless her.
Brad: In your timeline you might want to make the distinction that the film was found WITH the Hong Kong prints, but isn't necessarily FROM Hong Kong.
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Post by Brad Phipps on Feb 9, 2013 7:37:17 GMT
Bless her. Brad: In your timeline you might want to make the distinction that the film was found WITH the Hong Kong prints, but isn't necessarily FROM Hong Kong. One of many corrections I have to make when I get off my bum. (Thanks)
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Post by Sue Butcher on Feb 11, 2013 3:57:21 GMT
A skip of unspooled film is different from a skip of unspooled video in one way; you can see the images on the film, and that might make you want to dig further if you had the opportunity, or just grab a clipping of something that looked interesting. Years ago a friend's Dad gave me present of half a second of "Thunderbirds" on 16mm, salvaged from a TV station bin in all likelihood.
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Post by Michael D. Kimpton on Feb 11, 2013 9:04:11 GMT
A skip of unspooled film is different from a skip of unspooled video in one way; you can see the images on the film, and that might make you want to dig further if you had the opportunity, or just grab a clipping of something that looked interesting. Years ago a friend's Dad gave me present of half a second of "Thunderbirds" on 16mm, salvaged from a TV station bin in all likelihood. You have no idea how much I wish I was you right now!! ;D
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Post by Paul Vanezis on Feb 11, 2013 10:19:32 GMT
I've just remembered that when "Evil" 2 was found, the story went round that it was originally bought from the BBC by a cinema owner who wanted a Dalek episode to show. Any truth in that? There isn't any truth in that story, more a bastardisation of the facts. Gordon Hendry purchased both Evil 2 and Faceless Ones 3 at Buckingham Film Fair in around 1982, paying a few pounds for them. Between buying them and their return to the BBC they underwent several hazardous events which could have spelt the end for them. Firstly, Gordon was new to film collecting and damaged The Faceless Ones film on his projector. It's possible the beginning of Evil 2 was lopped off at the same time which is why it's missing the start of the opening titles. Gordon got to know Saied Marham who lived in Oxford who was in contact with the guy who owned the Duke of Yorks cinema in Brighton. This cinema owner persuaded Gordon to loan him the films; he thought he could make some money screening the episodes for fans around the country. He started at his cinema in Brighton during the weekend of the Panopticon convention in 1985. On the Friday in the late morning of the convention, I arrived at the event with Tim Porter, Steve Broster and Roger Legree (another film collector) and we met Dave Palfreymen and David Saunders. David was the DWAS chairman and told us, and specifically me, that an asian guy had arrived at the convention venue that morning and wanted to advertise to fans that these two episodes would be screened at the cinema over the weekend and fans could watch the films by purchase of a ticket. I believe the tickets were £5 each and he wanted permission to sell the tickets at the convention venue. Paul Zeus, the convention organiser and Ian Levine met with the asian guy and concluded he was making it up, trying to extort money from the fans. He was sent on his way. David told us in a very matter of fact way as if it was an obvious hoax, but it didn't make any sense to me at all. Firstly, if you were trying to extort money from fans you wouldn't have picked those two episodes. You would pick an entire story. Secondly, the name of the cinema had been given. Thirdly, any fans turning up at the cinema and not getting satisfaction would have torn the place up. I didn't just suspect the films existed, I bloody well knew it. Myself, Roger and Dave Palfreyman called the cinema. No reply. So we got directions and walked there, checking every door trying to find a way in. It was all closed up, but I was certain that the films were in that building on that day. It turned out that the asian guy was Saied Marham. He was a fan who was keen to get the films a public airing, but the cinema owner having been rebuffed was reticent to return the films to Gordon Hendry. Saied wrote to Steve Bryant not long after the convention fiasco, insisting the films did exist and would be returned at some point in the future. But Steve Bryant couldn't really do anything to help. A contact who worked at the film library had seen the letter and made a note of Saied's address and telephone number in Oxford. This was passed to me; the thinking was that as I had already found three Doctor Who films I must know how to deal with film collectors; I didn't see the logic myself but was flattered. I called Saied and spun a bizarre yarn about how I'd got his details. He denied point blank having the films, but I knew he had a connection to them because I knew the content of the letter he had written. I decided to play the long game. Over the next 15 months or so, I kept in regular contact with Saied. I would copy for him pretty much anything he wanted and he did very well out of it, getting some pretty good quality rare episodes for the time. By February 1987, we both trusted each other enough for me to send him one of my original tapes and for him to call me to say that both Faceless Ones 3 and Evil 2 would be returned to the BBC archive later in the year. Obviously I was very happy, but I hadn't seen the episodes. Then sadly, Patrick Troughton died. I called Saied and asked him if he would consider allowing me to screen the episodes as a tribute to Patrick Troughton at a charity fundraising convention I was organising, TellyCon. It was to be held on April 18th. Saied said he would find out if it could be done and sure enough, just a week later he agreed, but only for 'The Faceless Ones'. Saied said he would bring a tape with him on the day, but I told him that wasn't acceptable. I needed to ensure that whatever recording he provided was actually watchable. I couldn't afford to have blank screens at the event. Weeks went by and I gently pestered him for the tape. By the Monday before the convention I realised we wouldn't have the tape and called him. He promised he would be able to get it in the post the following day First Class. On Wednesday morning it still hadn't arrived. Dave Palfreyman was staying with me at the time helping me prepare the video presentations for the convention. Wednesday was a late night. We would be working all through Thursday collecting equipment for the convention and had a lot to do, so I almost missed hearing the postman early on Thursday morning. But I didn't. I collected the package from the doormat. It had Saied's writing and return address on it. I took it upstairs to Dave's room which was also where all the video equipment was. I almost couldn't bring myself to open the package, but after I'd found some scissors, we got the tape out, wound it forward and pressed play. Yes, it was real after all! What happened after that was a real web of intrigue... Paul
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Post by Sue Butcher on Feb 11, 2013 10:36:07 GMT
Thanks for that, Paul. I had no idea that the truth was so complicated, or that much effort was required to gain the trust of a collector. Mike - I lost the Thunderbirds clip years ago when we moved to Australia, so there's no need to be jealous!
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Post by steveb on Feb 11, 2013 11:19:36 GMT
I called Saied and asked him if he would consider allowing me to screen the episodes as a tribute to Patrick Troughton at a charity fundraising convention I was organising, TellyCon. It was to be held on April 18th. I was there! I had no idea it had been such a close-run thing... We had been told to expect a surprise but it was still a great feeling when Faceless Ones 3 showed on the screen :-)
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Post by Michael D. Kimpton on Feb 11, 2013 12:47:00 GMT
Thanks for that, Paul. I had no idea that the truth was so complicated, or that much effort was required to gain the trust of a collector. Mike - I lost the Thunderbirds clip years ago when we moved to Australia, so there's no need to be jealous! Who's jealous? It was more of a sense of humorous envy, that someone had a clip of Thunderbirds on film. If you took what I said in a bad way, you shouldn't have done, because that wasn't my intention at all.
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Post by Brad Phipps on Feb 11, 2013 20:16:34 GMT
Great story Paul, thanks for sharing.
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Post by senkowski on Feb 11, 2013 21:02:20 GMT
Paul, that's time well spent in my book.
Keep these things on the go.
m
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