How I miss those days of hiring super 8 films, way back in 1978 week ending 22 October we had on hire from Columbia/Warner Magnum Force feature. Not sure of the cost would be £10 to £12 I would think. Officially for only one showing, don't tell them but got a few more than that. Used to go to the retired peoples home and show them films every couple of weeks.

ITS EVEN MORE SAD TO THINK OF SUCH TITLES ON 8MM NOW ALL DESTROYED. WHAT A WASTE.

sorry about the caps

what did derann do with all their rental prints?

Anybody's guess Clyde, but mine would be that they were probably sold off very very cheaply as the rental service came to an abrupt end very very quickly indeed shortly after launching it again second time around.

It really didn't last long at all, probably less than a couple of years as I recall and somewhere I still have the rental catalogue from this later time period.

There were plenty on offer as I remember, but nothing to rival the masses of choice from catalogues such as the Mermaid one.

Can you imagine the state of some of those rental prints,I've had a couple over the years and all were scratched to bits, the black and white prints seemed to get off lighter though as many lines were improved with a clean,I guess someone renting would never have bothered cleaning them,Mark

For many years I was with the Bristol Film Unit giving shows to Old Peoples Homes using an Elf Slimline with prints on long-time hire from Filmbank.
Then, Filmbank changed to DVDs, rather cheekily with the same hire charge as 16mm. The Unit then invested in a Sony video projector. With no further use for the Elf they sold it to me. I still have it.

#5

Mark, I believe that was the very reason why Derann ditched the whole idea almost immediately.
It's no surprise really that even within just a few screenings most of the prints would have become damaged, especially when you consider most probably were not given the respect they ought to have had and most no doubt, would have been projected on sub standard poorly maintained machines.

No wonder they gave up on the idea very very quickly, it was probably costing Derann a small fortune to even begin to try to provide such a service!

Yes not surprising they stopped hiring as not really cost effective when the films get damaged,Mark

I know its sad that prints were destroyed but some copies must survive with some collectors - I know I have Robin and Marion with Sean Connery and that I believe was rental as I believe was French Connection 2 and Legend of the Werewolf - so I believe that somewhere out there on somebody's shelves are certain ex rental elusive titles !!!!

I will pop up the article of this subject later.
Derek Simmons was invited to a company who looked after all the airline feature. While a few made it onto the super 8 sales lists most had to be destroyed by the film company.

It was a question i asked Derek about personally and he said in his reply that as i asked it bought about very harsh memories, (harsh because he couldn't believe they had to be destroyed with an auditor present) and the result was an answer in a two page item in FFTC.

Will find it and put it up, its a great read, (but sooooo annoying that all these films had to be destroyed as the rights didn't allow them to be sold.

I think it was Grahame Newnham who told me about Pathescope having to destroy the left over copies of their 9.5mm sound feature "The Glass Mountain".
It was a new release (9 reels) that Pathescope considered would sell well (£31.5.0 in 1954) so they printed a lot of copies. But, it didn't sell as predicted, and at the end of the licence period a representative of the licencing company attended to watch all the remaining copies being destroyed.
In 1954 I was in the Royal Air Force and my weekly pay was £1.5.0. !!!!!

I have only one ex rental print to the best of my knowledge and even then, I am unsure whether or not it is a Derann ex rental print.
The one I have is the full feature of The Way We Were starring Streisand and Redford.

It's a print I don't believe otherwise ever made it for actual sale release on Super 8mm so as a very big Streisand fan, despite some fade and a little wear and tear, it's one I'm still pleased to have now on Super 8mm.

What Tom speaks of above was merely the specific restraints by the film companies in allowing companies such as Derann to distribute such films and as a result, collectors to own ex airline optical sound prints which is something completely separate but linked by the actual outcome being something of the same due to copyright protection in these instances.

Most (if not all) of what i read in Derann's second period of film hiring catalogues, were films they already had the rights by the film companies to distribute as they were all titles they also actually sold similar prints of to their customers.

When I find myself a little spare time I will photograph the later hire catalogue and all of its contents and post them here.

It was very much an abbreviated version of their actual sales catalogue in many respects, except in one or two cases it also featured titles that at that time, were by then obsolete as they had found themselves "out of print" as the rights Derann had obtained for some from the film companies had expired previously some time ago.

Andrew 'The one I have is the full feature of The Way We Were starring Streisand and Redford'. This was a hire only print from Columbia/Warner. I think they had 30 maybe more for hire in the late 70s. I hire quite a few from them along with FDA and Rank.

When I first started in super 8 I had a block booking with Derann and had films every two weeks. Once bought a ex library film Naked and the Dead what this had been show on was likely made by fellowes shredder inc.