Proof Munster, Go Home! was shot in Fullscreen

[Munsters#1]

Old films usually seem to have these burned circles on the edges. And here is one I found in Munster, Go Home! These circles only appear on the edge. This proves Munster, Go Home! was shot in Fulscreen format, and not Widescreen.

For those of you who would like to know exactly where this circle does appear, it appears exactly at 51:13 in the DVD version. The Universal VHS would be somewhere around 51 minutes.

[dirtprod]

I believe those circles are some sort of, either a cue to television stations to start running the commercial or the remnants of splicing in a commercial. I believe Universal licensed a television copy for duplication.

The search goes on...

My best,
Dirt

[A.P.]

These circles are called (info from IMDB)
"Change-Over Marks" AKA: Change-Over, Reel Change, Reel Change Marks
Most completed movies consist of more than one reel, and thus for an uninterrupted screening, at least two projectors must be used. Towards the end of a reel, one or more frames may include a small circle in one of the corners. These are signals to the projectionist that the current reel is approaching the end, and he or she should be ready to start the next projector, which should have the next reel prepared for projection."

I'm sure we all were first introduced to this if you watched and remember the Columbo episode titled,

"Make Me A Perfect Murder (2/28/78)
TV executive kills boss/lover when he refuses to promote her with him. She uses the alibi of having to change the reels on a film she is airing for studio heads. Columbo finds the gun she hid in the elevator's ceiling, and re-hides it there in plain sight, causing her to retrieve it. "

...remember when the projectonist used a coin that dropped from the reel to the ground to warn him when the approaching mark was coming.

Is there an issue of full screen/(pan and scan) vs widescreen/(todays letterboxed) for MGH? Was this a past topic of discussion? I don't think a change over mark alone proves a film was shot in full screen. A movie could have been shot widescreen and just panned and scanned ie chopped, "fitted to tv screen" using only that right edge of that scene leaving in the change-over mark and cutting out the left part of that scene. However watching that scene over again, it appears to be centered and framed properly, and does not look like the left side of the frames were chopped, so I think you are right about the fullscreen being the original format.

[Munsters#1]

Nah, I still doubt it was shot in widescreen, because there's nothing in Munster, Go Home! that looks like it was chopped. Everything looks perfectly filmed in Fulscreen.

[munstercity]

If I am not mistaken this was originally filmed for tv and ended up as a theatrical release instead. If that's the case it would have been shot as a fullscreen feature. Hopefully a DVD re-release of this and Munsters Revenge will answer the question once and for all

[Munsters#1]

I know a lot of Munsters Today fans who are waiting for there fair share of DVDs. I hope that if Season 1 and Season 2 of the original Munsters are selling well, Universal might release MGH, TMR, and The Munsters Today. Plus those two movies in the 90's won't be bad to see on DVD.

[tv star collector]

Originally Posted by munstercity

If I am not mistaken this was originally filmed for tv and ended up as a theatrical release instead. If that's the case it would have been shot as a fullscreen feature. Hopefully a DVD re-release of this and Munsters Revenge will answer the question once and for all

According to Stephen Cox's book, THE MUNSTERS (1989): producers Joe
Connelly and Bob Mosher "exhausted quite a bit of money on the original show. The cost of doing the show had escalated, so the producers decided a feature release to the theaters might retrieve substantial funds to offset the deficit." This occurred in 1966, directly after the series' cancellation. "MUNSTER, GO HOME!" received moderate reviews. But it was interesting to see the cast in color, and (in my opinion) the film still holds up well today.

[tv star collector]

Re "THE MUNSTERS' REVENGE": In 1981, Universal gathered the cast together again for a TV-movie
to be aired during February sweeps and hoped the ratings would possibly lead to another prime-time
series. Fred Gwynne was not thrilled about getting back into harness again as Herman Munster and
told his agent the astronomically high figure he would ask for. His agent told him they'd never stand
for that. Gwynne said, "That's the beautiful part. I don't care." But they got it!

By the way, the reason Gwynne decided to "stick it to the studio" was because his original agreement on the series left a lot to be desired. There were no residuals, despite what the general public might think. " ... over the years," said Gwynne, "I've paid a lot to plumbers who thought I was still getting money every time the show ran."

Although it had been 15 years since they had worked together, the TV reunion seemed (in Yvonne
DeCarlo's words) "like we hadn't left the studio ..."

[Harry T Stone]

The image you posted has been extracted from the original 35MM negative, and cropped for a 4:3 screen. If you could see the whole negative of the image, there would be more on the sides and top. The reel change marks on the film are circular, proving it was made using what is called in the industry as the 'open matte' process (with 'flat' or 'spherical' lenses) where the whole film negative is exposed, then for theatrical projection, an aperture plate in the projector masks off the top and bottom of the frame to get the 1.85:1 aspect ratio. If a film was filmed with anamorphic lenses, the reel-change marks are oval shaped. Anamorphic films usually have a 2.35:1 or 2.40:1 aspect ratio.