Issue 47 of Film for the Collector magazine, published in February 2001, carried Barry Littlechild’s report on the first convention of the new millennium.
The 24th Blackpool Northern Collectors Convention must go down in film collector journals as one of the best ever held. Just when I thought conventions must be coming to an end, Derek and Anne Simmonds pulled out all the stops to give us just what we wanted – a great dinner, film show and convention come movie jumble!
Despite the fact that master MC. David Erskin (sadly missed) couldn’t make this year’s Saturday dinner, El Supremo Simmonds took on the lot – MC, Quiz master
(once again our table host), projectionist, host raffle king – he even found time to entertain our friends from Germany and Czechoslovakia – far beyond the call.
Lots of collectors had made their first visit to Blackpool and couldn’t wait to tell me just how fantastic they found it all.
The highlight of the dinner was an amazing hour-long film show looking back at the many films Derann have distributed over the last twenty five years. ‘Distributed’ is a very light word considering the fact that they find the owners, negotiate a price, print a negative and copies, stripe and re-record the sound, cut the prints to make 8mm, make boxes and spool up, and then get on their soap box and sell the things to us punters! Features, shorts, cartoons, newsreels – Derek must have felt very proud in seeing all his work flash up on the giant screen for us all to enjoy. For the first time in Blackpool’s history, Barry Attwood didn’t win a thing in the raffle – this cheered everyone up no end! Bob Nicholls went around all of the tables interviewing people on video for next year’s 25th dinner – should be a riot!
Up early the next day for the convention/movie jumble, and despite the fact that many regular dealers were missing, we were treated to many more newer faces having vast amounts of bargains. I spent most of the day on the floor of Michael Bentley’s stall. He had piles of 35mm and 16mm material, including spare parts for Philips projectors, with 16mm IB Technicolor features starting at £25.00. He got a great deal of cash from yours truly!
Eric Lennox, representing our Irish buddies, was seen with a professional video camera interviewing dealers and punters for a special tape, available from next year – put me down for a couple, Eric. The Bring & Buy (run by the beautiful Marlene; I think she thinks I’m some sort of pervert. Believe me Marlene, I’m quite harmless!) had copies of ‘Hawaii 5-O’ 2200ft 16mm colour at the incredible price of £9.00 each!!! Derann did a roaring trade, with Ged and Gary run off their feet all day long trying to keep up with impatient collectors.
Steve, on Derann’s 16mm stall, had material to kill for. One, ‘The Worst of Hollywood’, which I had been after for years, was just too much of a temptation – I managed to get it down in price by waving cash in his face. Iron man Steve couldn’t resist, and I got my prize at a bargain price – thanks Steve.
Time went so fast that I couldn’t believe the auction had actually started. Derek and Ged (see photo on opposite page) spent over two hours keeping us in fits of laughter, with endless banter on the state of the material they were selling off. Best bargain had to be a complete Derann print of “The Jungle Book’ for £20.00 and a new 600ft “Once Upon A Mouse’ for £15.00!! None of the Italian Disney features at £45.00 went, neither did 400ft cutdowns at £4.00.
It’s very interesting seeing what people will bid for. The funniest moment was when collector Adrian Winchester (see photo top centre) pulled off 200ft of film to see if it had a scratch, during the actual bidding! Ending with a Standing ovation, it was back to the hall to see Bob Nicholls and ? (Duncan’s mate at Derann) trying to strike up a deal over the new Sony Video Projector – what an incredible picture this puts out – I left them to it.
Movieland and Classic Home Cinema were at last demonstrating the Davis Video projector – not as bright as the others, but it gave a very good picture, without any pixels showing. I managed to get into the cinema for just two demonstrations. This time I went right up to the screen. Firstly for the 8mm scope show, then for the DVD demo. I can tell you that there is nothing in it. If anything, the DVD was clearer and, of course, with 5 stereo tracks, my money was on the electronic system.
Marjorie and Joe Ashby (see photo bottom centre), celebrating 50 years of marriage and film collecting, plus sixteen years of Blackpool, informed me that this was the best year yet! As I’m always saying: if you only go to one convention a year, try and make it Blackpool.
Barry Littlechild
In the same issue of the magazine, Derann’s Derek Simmonds wrote about the 2000 event from the organiser’s perspective.
Still recovering from the Blackpool Bash and an open day, I suddenly realised that I had not done my bit of writing for Film For The Collector, despite being reminded by our editor a couple or so weeks ago (have you NO sympathy for the elderly Dave?)…
Not having seen Barry Littlechild’s column yet – I do not see this until the mag is printed – can you imagine the risks we are taking? I am pretty sure he will be giving a full report on the November Northern Film Collectors Convention at Blackpool.
This year seemed more work than ever. When we arrive at around mid-day on the Saturday, the Derby room where we have our Saturday evening Dinner, is usually well on the way to being set up – not this year – there was a business conference in full swing, which meant that we could not set up the projection and sound equipment, and worst of all, we could not get the cars and vans on the small car park at the side of the hotel! All this wasn’t helped by one collector deciding he wanted to attend the dinner, and more or less demanding that he be sat on a particular table, expecting us to move people around to accommodate him, despite the fact that people had had their tickets with the places named, so they knew exactly where they were sitting. We do try, but we cannot work miracles!! So, it was a snack and a cuppa, before we could finally get everything in place.
At the very last minute our usual M.C., David Erskin, was unable to attend, so yours truly had the job. Now I know what it is like to eat a cold meal and get violent indigestion, David! Seriously, I enjoved having some fun with the guests, and everyone I spoke to said they had a great night. The biggest surprise of the evening was Barry Attwood NOT WINNING THE RAFFLE. This must surely be the first time this has happened – possibly that is why he looked “down in the dumps” for most of the evening! However it was nice to see other people win some very nice prizes.
Naturally, the colour T.V. was snapped up by the first ticket out of the bag! At this point I would like to say thank you to the many collectors who have phoned, faxed, written and emailed me thanking us for a wonderful weekend – many thanked Anne (my wife) for organising a lovely dinner. To round off the evening we had the obligatory film show – this year I had spent some three weeks taking clips out of shorts, features etc to try and cover 30+ years of Derann releases. This went down so well, I had many collectors come and ask me if they could purchase a copy. Sorry, it is impossible; all the bits have to ‘be put back in the respective films they came from. I have not yet started that mammoth job!
Everyone seemed thriiled at the news that, despite what you may have heard and read, Derann IS CONTINUING TO RELEASE FEATURES. In fact, only a couple of days before Blackpool, I finalised a deal with Disney to release FANTASIA 2000 and DINOSAUR. The negative to Fantasia 2000 is being made at this very moment, by the labs in Hollywood – it is expected to be ready for early New Year release.
We got the doors opened on the Sunday at 9.45am, and the collectors poured in. We were slightly up on last year, and everyone I asked said they had a good day – and we didn’t have one single complaint.
Derek Simmonds
Blackpool Film Collectors' Convention 