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#openreel

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We watched "Late Night with the Devil" (2023) tonight. I posted a #5SecondMovieReview of it earlier. We enjoyed it.

However... one little thing about it is nagging at me, like a splinter in the mind's eye.

It's a period piece, set in the #1970s. The major thread of the story includes a psychologist and her sessions with a patient, which are #recorded. Part of one is played back as part of a #television show, and onscreen during that #playback is an open-reel (aka reel-to-reel) #tape #deck playing a tape.

1970s, open-reel recording - it's #retro, it's #cool, it's period-authentic, right?

I can't shake the feeling that whoever put the visual together has never actually seen an open-reel tape recorder in operation. This picture is lousy, because it's a screencap from the movie, which is supposed to be showing a television broadcast in good old analog SD - but it gets the point across.

See anything wrong?

The takeup #reel, on the right, turns clockwise, the opposite direction of the (normal) direction of the supply reel. So the tape wraps onto the inner side of the takeup reel, and ends up "inside out".

There's also no tension arm on the supply side, and an apparent #tension arm on the takeup side, but it's not actually in the tape path.

I don't think any machines were actually made like this, but I'm not an #expert. Can anyone identify the deck they butchered or digi-simmed to create this #sin against nature? 😉