Early '70s Salomon in shop movie theater

[RickyG]

Gang:
OK, I can't be the only one on planet earth that remembers the little contained Salomon movie theaters, that had 8mm films in a large cassett that you'd snap in and it would play. Movies such as "Go For It", and the one I want to find "Between Chaos and Beauty", the one where Wayne Wong and John John Clendenin do ballet
routines. Which I studied like mad to learning every trick I could from the movie. So this is a question a two levels, any of us "oldddogger" out there remember these theaters and/or remember the movie?

 

[RickyG]

Really? No one?

 

[eok]

Really? No one?

Heh heh. I vaguely remember. Lost too many brain cells back then. I worked in a ski shop back then. We got crap pay but free ski passes at the local resort (which was really a minor perk because passes were so cheap back then).

Anyway, we had the Salomon player setup for a while. I remember the film setup not being super reliable and problems with the cartridges & projector. The thing literally wore out after a few months. I came to dread hearing "hey, does this thing work?" from customers when they saw the non-operational setup. I have almost zero memory of the films. You jogged my memory though, and I remember Wong was one of skiers.

I think in the late 70s some shops started using setups that employed VHS decks to play promotional ski videos. I think the shop I worked in started using that kind of setup in the early 80s. The player was a kind of VHS deck that could loop a tape (play to end, automatically rewind and then start playing again). The deck was specifically for in-store video display. Overall It was better than the Salomon 8mm film setup. Reliable and better viewability under store lighting. VHS tapes would last at least season of constant daily use as I recall.

 

[dan ross]

Wasn’t it a little black box kind of thing with the Salomon logo on the outside sort of like a rigid tent? I vaguely recall seeing on at the Boston ski show...

 

[eok]

Wasn’t it a little black box kind of thing with the Salomon logo on the outside sort of like a rigid tent? I vaguely recall seeing on at the Boston ski show...

Yeah, something like that. I think I remember the front of it was covered with a translucent (plastic ?) sheet of some kind. The 8mm film player thing inside the enclosure projected onto the back of the translucent sheet. God, that was so long ago.

 

[dan ross]

Yeah, something like that. I think I remember the front of it was covered with a translucent (plastic ?) sheet of some kind. The 8mm film player thing inside the enclosure projected onto the back of the translucent sheet. God, that was so long ago.

Yes, even though I might have been 10-12 years old, it doesn’t change the fact that it’s closer to half century ago than a quarter.... where does it go?

 

[eok]

Yes, even though I might have been 10-12 years old, it doesn’t change the fact that it’s closer to half century ago than a quarter.... where does it go?

I hold onto the belief that our accumulated life experience is what makes us who we are. We may not be able to resurrect vivid memories of every experience in our life - but the essence of all those experiences remains woven into the fabric of our minds.

I probably have heard that last one somewhere before... it sounds quite familiar.