So did anyone get the chance to watch the Super Bowl I rebroadcast last weekend? I would have myself but I had to work nights all weekend long.
From what I gathered about it, the word “rebroadcast” is kind of a stretch since the NFL Network people basically had to cull together footage of the plays from about a dozen different sources and then splice in an archived radio call. I don’t have any idea what kind of footage they would have used though. Was it archived TV videotape (some of which is apparently floating out there somewhere)? Was it the slo-mo NFL Films clips we’ve all seen a hundred times? Was it some grainy black-and-white 8mm film from some fan in the stands? Was it plays simulated by Madden 2016, or God forbid, Tecmo Bowl? Was it some weird combo of all of the above? And how well did it all flow together with the radio call synced up?
I’ve long considered this one of my TV “holy grails” (even if the result does end up only having a smidgen of actual TV footage at best), so what kind of experience was watching it for the fan? Was it awesome, meh, or don’t even bother?
It was brutal to watch. it was pretty well done, but the current talking heads wouldn’t shut up and let us enjoy the game footage, they yakked over most of it. Nobody who tuned in wanted to see or hear them. It made the whole thing virtually unwatchable.
For what it’s worth, they’ll show just the footage and the radio call on Friday in a 90 minute slot. No studio full of idiots and no interviews. Don’t know if they’ll do the inset box with random facts due to the old 4:3 footage.
Exactly. It was actually an interesting game. I was surprised at how similar it was to today’s game. Kick offs and extra points were the main difference. And of course players nowadays are way bigger
That was my take, as well (and as a lifelong Packer fan, who was not quite 2 when this game was played, I was eager to watch it). I’m looking forward to the non-gabby version.
I saw a bit of it; it might have been okay if they’d shrunk the talking heads to black silhouettes at the bottom of the screen.
A day or two before that was shown, I read an article about the lost broadcasts of Super Bowl I. The networks (it was shown on two) have lost the footage, and home video tape was almost unheard of at the time. But apparently someone did discover that they had a home tape of the game. He took it somewhere to be restored and authenticated, but he hasn’t been able to come to legal terms with the NFL to allow it to be shown. If I remember right, the league was only offering five figures, claiming that they already own it as intellectual property; which sounds like a total dick move to me.
One of my regrets is not asking for a guys name. I walked up to the first tee box at a golf course in minnesota and had to wait. An older gentleman and a guy my age were waiting also so we played a round together. After the 18th hole i shook both of their hands and then the old man showed me a ring and told me he used to be a green bay packer. I didn’t know what to say. And that was it. I will always wonder who he was and if it was real.
Followup: I did watch the 90-minute version at a bar last night. Unfortunately I didn’t get the audio because most of the TVs had the Bucks-Rockets game, and then the party crowd started blasting the jukebox around halftime.
As I expected, it was mostly NFL Films or similar film footage, mostly played at full speed, with some slo-mo scattered in there. (Similar to a ‘rebroadcast’ of the Ice Bowl I saw some years back.) The NFL did put a simple scoring bug in the corner, which was a nice touch I thought. They did have some videotape footage (namely, the player introductions, which consisted of them running out of the endzone to midfield, pausing before the camera for a second before running off, plus a postgame interview between Pete Rozelle and Pat Summerall) but the video was so degraded I’m actually glad that’s all they used.
They did replay what looked like the Len Dawson interview at halftime (wish I could have heard it, because for all the flak last week’s broadcast took, that was one part everyone seemed to like, but oh well).