Zen Peckinpah

Now THAT is a freakin' blast from the past.

My parents had Raiders taped with that intro from about '84 or so. They also had Gandhi taped from HBO around the same time, and there's actually an intermission not even an hour in.

IIRC they also taped the Saturday premiere of Dragnet (1987) way back when. Not as good as something like, say, Die Hard or Rambo or Batman, but way cool.

Here's something way awesome: HBO promos from around June '87. About two minutes in a groovy vintage promo for the premiere of Aliens:

jeffkjoe

Thread bump for newly-discovered gems:



"JAWS.......will continue in a moment"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vqrR9N-LTl0

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N5MgG3PNO5g

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D_ERO8I28pk

Numanoid

Missed this thread the first time. Those were great days. The scarcity of availability really made watching those movies an event. You got psyched up for a week, and when that first intro started, goosebumps. It really was a bit of magic that is gone now. Today I have thousands of movies available to me, and sometimes sit there complaining that there's nothing to watch. Paralysis by analysis. When there were only limited options, they all took on much more significance.

Cardsfan111

I have memories of watching these movies as a kid. The commercial breaks seemed to last forever.

Jaymole

Yes...I was always so excited when the Fall preview of TV Guide came out as it always had a section listing what films are going to premiere on TV that season.

Nice memories

Ash Ketchum

And in the pre-cable, pre-VCR era, everybody would watch these movies. I remember seeing ONCE UPON A TIME IN THE WEST in its premiere TV showing on ABC's Sunday Night movie in either late 1972 or early 1973 and the next day everybody was talking about it both at school (college) and work.

rennervision

I remember taping Superman with no way to edit or fast forward through the commercials. With each commercial break you had to get real adept at leaping off the couch, hitting STOP, then FF, (cue sound of spinning gears increasing in volume as you count to 3), STOP, PLAY, then leaping back onto the couch as it takes a few seconds to start up while hoping you timed it right.

Alan Smithee

I never liked movies on network TV since they'd always be cut. I remember "The Karate Kid" having the word "sucks" edited out. One exception though was "On Golden Pond" where the foul language was left in. "The Sound of Music" had no objectionable content but would be cut to make room for more commercials, and every year they'd cut another minute or so.

The independent stations, before Fox, UPN and WB killed them off, were more daring. Stations here used to run R-rated content uncensored, but stopped because of too many complaints.

Eddie W

That was part of the mystique though. Especially back when the only way to see R-rated movies as a youngster was to go with your parents (if they'd let you) or sneak in. You could at least see the movie once it hit TV.

mcnabb

I got real good at it taping movies in the mid 80's. You had to have your hand on the pause button, and as soon as it looked like a commercial was coming you hit it real quick. What was great about it was if you were wrong, you could hit pause real quick again and it was unpause it within seconds so you didn't notice the split second you paused it.

After the movie was done you would try to label the side of your VHS tape like the real tapes, and you would end up writing crooked and it would look terrible!

Alan Smithee

And recordings with the commercials cut out are now worthless, as they are they only reason for hanging onto them.

CharlieK

At one time I had the first 8 seasons of The Simpsons recorded on VHS, commercials and all. A-level advertisers would always put their best spots during the show and it was always fun to go back and see a lot of that stuff, especially all the Nike spots during their heydey.

Jason

And here's the intro CBS ran before the movie.

<iframe width="420" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/fN3aDEpSRZU" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

emachine

Question: When "Star Wars" played on T.V. in the 80's, was it the 1981 version with the "A New Hope" title crawl, or the 1977 version with the original title crawl?

jeffkjoe

I know this answer b/c I taped Star Wars off CBS, and later HBO:

It said: "Episode IV - A New Hope"


After ESB read as Episode V in 1980, all home video media adopted the Episode IV title crawl. I hadn't seen the 1977 original crawl until the DVD had it 30 years later.

brayzie

I don't remember those films but I remember watching Alien and Ghostbusters for the first time on TV in the early 80s on a small black and white television. I didn't know what a treat it was though, since I never saw either of the films in theaters. But it was awesome since nothing like that was regularly shown on tv.

For me though nothing tops the HBO intro for movies in the early 80s. The one where it goes off into space. In some ways it was sometimes more exciting than watching it in the theaters.

stingermck

I was born in 78, but I do remember Superman shown on network TV was a big deal, and then Jedi showing on HBO. Good times.

wm lopez

I remember waiting for 1983's SCARFACE for network t.v.and it was bumped by the World Series.

Dr. DVD

I remember NBC splitting King Kong over two nights in 84. I didn't know Raiders debuted on network before cable. Wasn't it late '84 before it hit cable?

The first time I ever saw Jaws was through network. My parents knew it would have some of the scary stuff edited out at the time.

Even though these had been shown on cable several times without commercials, the way they promoted these things made them seem like a can't miss event. They really knew when to air them as well. Sunday night had not yet become a major night in TV programming at the time (mainly because cable was still in its infancy stage and the now trademark series of each company were not around) aside from 60 Minutes, and it aired early in the evening. I also recollect the Wednesday before Thanksgiving airing Star Wars and it was the first time I had seen the original in several years. I kind of miss those days, and feel certain movies could become more well known if they brought it back (and didn't have so much competition from cable).

The Bus

This explains why I can never manage to see anything new on Netflix Instant.