The Saturday briefing
KNOWLEDGE IS POWER
YOUR QUESTIONS ANSWERED
Is there anything you’re yearning to know? Send your questions, on any subject, to the contacts given below, and we will do our best to answer them...
Q
I was having a conversation about new films and wondered whether modern cinemas still use film projectors?
Les Laverack, Selby, North Yorks
AThe days when projectionists would switch out film reels during intermissions have gone.
Digital projectors have taken over from 35mm film projectors – from 2011-2013 around 90 per cent of projectionists in Britain were made redundant. Since that period, most movies have been shot and distributed digitally.
Traditionally, one film reel was 35mm wide and 1,000ft long and would run for 11 minutes, but reels could be spliced together in advance to cut changeovers. The Last Broadcast in 1998 is believed to be the first ever movie to be filmed, edited and transferred digitally. Cinema chains were won over with hard drives replacing 25kg cans of film reels. Images were cleaner and free of the “cigarette burn” cue marks that were used to change reels.
James Cameron’s 2009 film Avatar sped up the process, with many cinemas converting to digital to take advantage of its digital 3D effects.The UK Film Council also set up the Digital Screen Network to help smaller cinemas with the switch.
But old film projectors aren’t extinct. Some cinemas keep them for showings of classic films, and some directors still prefer to shoot in 70mm or 35mm. Quentin Tarantino’s 2019 movie Once Upon A Time In Hollywood was
released in film form across selected US cinemas.
Q
In the 1970s there was a huge machine that walked across fields and had a sign saying: “Excuse me, I am walking to Corby”. I lived in Grantham and my children stood in the digger bit and were in awe of it. What happened to it?
Liz Stonebridge-Foster, Lincoln
AThis was the giantW1400 dragline excavator known as Sundew, named after the 1957 Grand National winner, and it was first used for opencast iron ore mining at Exton Park quarry in the East Midlands.
At that time it was the largest excavator in the world – it could reach 175ft, weighed 1,600 tons and its drag bucket would clear nearly 30 tons with every scoop. It had two giant feet that shifted it slowly around. In 1974, after the quarry closed, it walked 13 miles to a new site near Corby in Northamptonshire, as dismantling it would
have been too expensive. Known as the Great Walk, it took 45 days, with Sundew travelling one mile every 10 hours.
The monster machine, featuring that huge sign you remember, crossed fields, rivers, roads and railway lines. Blue Peter covered the story, with John Noakes getting behind the controls.
In 1980, Sundew was retired and walked to its final resting place, an old airfield, where local children would use it as a giant climbing frame.
Its parts were finally recycled for scrap in the late 1980s. But the driving cab was saved and is now an exhibit at the Rocks by Rail Living Ironstone Museum in Rutland, serving as a reminder of the region’s mining heritage.
Q
Why do we say something won’t “make an iota of difference”? What is an iota?
Jan Harris, Port Sunlight,Wirral
A
If something doesn’t make an iota of difference, it won’t make the slightest impact.An iota is something very tiny – it is the smallest letter in the Greek alphabet, like our “i” but without the dot.The English word “jot” is derived from iota. Iota in this sense appears in the Bible
(Matthew 5:18): “For truly, I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not an iota, not a dot, will pass from the law until all is accomplished.”
Some tie it with the Arian heresy in the 4th century, when the theologist Arius argued Jesus was separate and subordinate to God. His view was outlawed, with Christianity holding they were one and the same.
Arius was arguing over the word homoousios, which in Greek means the same (homo) substance (ousios).
Some of Arius’s followers suggested “homoiousios” to explain the relationships of Father and Son, with “homoi” meaning “similar”. But it did not have any impact on the strict Christian teaching of the day – so that extra iota was pointless.
PLEASE SEND US YOUR INTRIGUING QUESTIONS ON ANY SUBJECT:
● By email: put “questions” in the subject line and send to kay.harrison@reachplc.com
● By post: to Any Questions, Daily Express, One Canada Square, Canary Wharf, London E14 5AP
● Unfortunately we cannot reply individually, but we will feature the best questions on this page.
If you can’t remember the words to a favourite verse or song from yesteryear, send us a snippet and we’ll do our best to find all the wonderful words.