Search - The Projectionist on DVD

MPAA Rating: PG Content Advisory: Questionable for Children Movie Release: 1970 DVD Release: 04/09/2002 Format: DVD - Enhanced Wide Screen Letterbox for 16x9 TV SwapaDVD Credits: 1 Number of Discs: 1 Run Time: 1 hrs 25 mins Studio: Image Entertainment Members Wishing: 3 Genres: Comedy, Fantasy Comedy

This offbeat comedy finds a rotund, daydreaming projectionist (Chuck McCann) who fantasizes that he is the super hero Captain Flash. He imagines his nemesis to be Renaldi (Rodney Dangerfield), whom the projectionist refers to as "the Bat." Renaldi demands the lobby floor to be so clean he can eat off it. The film uses superimposition of older films, the first to employ such techniques. The projectionist imagines Rinaldi to be in league with the forces of evil like Hitler, Mussolini and space aliens. He is under the delusion that he must save a female co-worker (Ina Balin) from the clutches of the evil Bat. The projectionist summons such heroes as Errol Flynn, Gary Cooper and the US Marine Corp to save her from imagined danger. This is the first feature length film for director Harry Hurwitz, who also appears as an usher. This also marks the film debut for Rodney Dangerfield, who had recently changed his name from his given name of Jack Roy and opened a nightclub. The film premiered at the Rochester Film Festival in 1969. It has earned cult status over the years and is in the archives of the Museum Of Modern Art in New York. ~ Dan Pavlides, All Movie Guide

Chuck McCann - Projectionist/Captain Flash
Ina Balin - The Girl
Rodney Dangerfield - Renaldi/The Bat
Jara Kohout - Candy Man-Old Scientist
Harry Hurwitz - Usher

Harry Hurwitz's clever and often poignant and funny 1970 character study The Projectionist, starring Chuck McCann, Rodney Dangerfield, and Ina Balin, comes to DVD courtesy of Image Entertainment and the Museum of Modern Art, which restored the film -- a cult favorite and an underground hit -- in the 1990's. Letterboxed with an aspect ratio of 1.78-to-1, with enhancement for 16:9 screens, the movie looks extraordinarily good, with crisp, sharp detail in the black-and-white fantasy sequences and realistic tones in the more naturalistic color scenes that comprise most of the movie. The audio quality is also extremely high as the film shifts between the realistic and fantasy scenes -- actually, two kinds of fantasy scenes in the mind of its subject, a lonely movie theater projectionist (McCann). This the best presentation this feature has ever had for home viewers. The cleverly constructed heroic fantasy and the expressions of stress in McCann's mind, made up of clips from old horror and science fiction films, serials (especially Universal's Flash Gordon and its sequels), and dramas (especially from Warner Bros., and Citizen Kane -- which, at times, have McCann "interacting" with Humphrey Bogart et al, a la Steve Martin in Dead Men Don't Wear Plaid -- look as good as or better than some of that same material in the proper DVD editions of those same movies. The only deficiency in what is here is the presence of a mere 10 chapters, which hardly seems adequate in the 85 minute film, and the lack of a trailer, at least; it would be interesting to see how The Projectionist was presented to the public at the time of its release. Additionally, there could easily have been an audio commentary track; not only is Chuck McCann still with us, but assistant director Roy Frumkes -- who has done commentary tracks for Image before -- is very much around and would have been happy to talk. ~ Bruce Eder, All Movie Guide