Splice Here – A Projected Odyssey – REVIEW
Image: David Thomas - Splice Here - A projected odyssey
By MARTIN FABINYI
Rob Murphy is a passionate cinephile, and his film Splice Here – A Projected Odyssey puts you in the seat of a fascinating and dramatic return to the world of Cinerama, ToddAO, VistaVision, RKO Superscope, Super70 Technirama and the search for the lost treasure of the 70mm restoration of Quentin Tarantino’s Hateful 8.
In an extraordinary journey through the eyes of the projectionists that worked on all of the above filmic formats the film takes the viewer from the beginning of Cinerama in 1963 (with It’s A Mad, Mad, Mad, World) to the “underground projectionists subculture” that have kept the celluloid dream alive. They are the true believers who rescued projection machinery from “junking”, the cinema chains decision to rid the world of 35mm & 70mm film for the ease of digital.
Interviewees include the legendary Douglas Trumbull, filmmaker and visual effects supervisor who created scenes for 2001: A Space Odyssey and Blade Runner among many others, and the eloquent culture warrior Leonard Maltin, whose movie guide was an annual release for 40 years.
But it’s the projectionists who shine the brightest, and their tales of dealing with the fantasy machinery in a booth “surrounded by things that can kill you”, or as one interviewee says “most projectionists go nuts”.
The film is an intricate portrait of those who learned their craft early and passed it on, and a nostalgic look at Melbourne’s fabled celluloid history with footage of Henry Fonda and Chips Rafferty attending the premiere of How The West Was Won; a kinescope print of Graham Kennedy’s In Melbourne Tonight, and extraordinary scenes of the Cinema Centre in its prime.
The director, writer and editor, Rob Murphy, is also a cinematographer and projectionist.
He becomes part of the production as he plunges into the underground cult and begins the crusade to bring 70mm film back into being. His journey ends with renowned cinephile Quentin Tarantino arriving for the premiere screening of his (then) latest film The Hateful 8 at the Sun Theatre in Melbourne.
An ode to the art of celluloid and the craft of screening it, Splice Here – A Projected Odyssey, is a remarkable film that shines a projected light onto those who have kept cinema in its finest form alive.
