The day the Movie Channels unscrambled

Hard Larry

Got talking today about the new Die Hard movie and someone brought back a blast from the past

Not too sure of what decade it was maybe the 80s or early 90s

but one weekend in the summer Sky Movies and the Movie Channel became unscrambled for 3 nights

The Fridays main movie was Weekend at Bernies and Die Hard was on the Saturday. Die Hard went back to scrambled just at the stroke of midnight just when it was ending :eek: I'm sure I heard a collective scream from me estate

That was a big event round my way for a chizzler at the time I'd say every Video on my block was set to record that night :cool: ...I think I still actually might have the tapes buried somewhere

Anyone have any other info on that day? What year it was or what other movies were on?

Sheridan

God, I remember that. Must have been circa 1992? I seem to remember The Commitments and The Fabulous Baker Boys being included that weekend too.

I remember this too. I think it was called the "Million Dollar Preview Weekend." Would have been 1993, but there were one or two others in years before that. Gaby Roslin was doing a few segments between the films.

I can also recall my family taping Wayne's World from Sky Movies during that time.

aidan_dunne

This only happened once where you live, you say? Because, here in Portlaoise, up until a couple of years ago even this was something that happened every now and then on Chorus and it's predecessors here. We often had times where we'd have one of the movie channels unscrambled for anything from just a couple of hours to almost a week. Usually it would happen over a weekend, though. It was probably just the result of someone in Chorus or whatever just making a mistake or pushing the wrong button or something like that and we'd have it in the clear for a while. Same thing would happen with the likes of Sky Sports from time to time as well.

When it used to happen here, if you hadn't already discovered it for yourself, friends and neighbours would usually come around to let you know and you could tune it in until it was rescrambled again.

I also remember Chorus (or whatever it was called at the time!) had Sky Sports 3 left permanently in the clear here through 1996 and most of 1997 and, when it closed down each night, you'd get to see the good old 10 minute freeview of the Playboy Channel! That was quite a nice treat as a teenager, I can tell you! The picture would then scramble after the freeview but the audio could still be heard so you could still make out all the fake moaning and groaning and cheesey music!

Don't know about Portlaoise but in Kerry it was Irish Multichannel at the time. I remember the encryption dropping on Cablelink several times though it was usually only for a few hours. One such time was August 20th, 1994, the day after the launch of Sky Sports 2. The first Soccer AM show was broadcast briefly in the clear... complete with a channel breakdown for about 5 minutes! - "We appear to be having one or two technical difficulties, we're trying our very best to sort them out, and we'll return to the programme as soon as possible."

aidan_dunne

When Sky Sports first launched in the early 90's, the cable company here (whoever it was. Think it might have been Irish Multichannel as well but not 100% sure) also had it left in the clear for a long time as well, at least 6 months I reckon. I remember this well because it was just after the Premier League started up and I remember watching the brand new 'Monday Night Football' programme to see what the hoo-haa was all about! I well remember all the hype surrounding it at the time and the way Sky Sports were building it up..... ooooh, look folks, 'Monday Night Football', cheerleaders, the big old Sky Sports blimp (remember that? )......... wow, we're just like the yanks now, eh? :rolleyes:

aidan_dunne

Well f*ck me! Just did a quick search on Google for the hell of it and look what YouTube pops up:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5yITQ7BNtmI

Now that really takes the biscuit! God, is there anything that isn't on YouTube these days? Talk about memories!

Gotta love the old 'Alive & Kicking' playing in the background there as well, haven't you? Anyone else remember the fantastic promo ad Sky used to show with that as the theme music in the build up to the launch of the Premier League in '92? At the end of the the ad there was a great shot of a player jumping high in the air and heading a football with the voiceover "A Whole New Ballgame!"

When you see how much things have changed since, they weren't wrong!

Ruu_Old

I remember when the Adult Channel went unscrambled (I'm sure it has many times since then) not that long after we got Sky installed!:eek: *covers eyes*:D

_Kaiser_

Hard Larry wrote:

Got talking today about the new Die Hard movie and someone brought back a blast from the past

Not too sure of what decade it was maybe the 80s or early 90s

but one weekend in the summer Sky Movies and the Movie Channel became unscrambled for 3 nights

The Fridays main movie was Weekend at Bernies and Die Hard was on the Saturday. Die Hard went back to scrambled just at the stroke of midnight just when it was ending :eek: I'm sure I heard a collective scream from me estate

That was a big event round my way for a chizzler at the time I'd say every Video on my block was set to record that night :cool: ...I think I still actually might have the tapes buried somewhere

Anyone have any other info on that day? What year it was or what other movies were on?

I remember that night! In fact, I was recording Die Hard as well.. but, about 2 minutes later Cablelink/Sky unscrambled it again till the end of the titles.

I remember when they first added Sky Movies to the line-up. I distinctly remember watching Red Heat in very bad black-and-white'o vision too.

As far as general presentation went too, those were definitely the days. I have that Premier League promo aidan_dunne talks about on a tape somewhere. The channel idents/logos were much better too than they are today. The 89-93 era and then the 93-95 (very cinematic) set being the best IMO...

More memories here: http://www.thetvroom.com/sky/

mike65

NTL Waterford did this a few times in 94/95, sadly the flicks were hardly worth taping. They also had Disney FTV once but best of all someone accidently let Liverpool - Mna Utd on SS1 be viewable to the masses. I wonder how many flicked trough the channels to discover the fact though.

Mike.

aidan_dunne

Kaiser2000 wrote:

I have that Premier League promo aidan_dunne talks about on a tape somewhere.

Man, you have simply got to find some way of transferring that promo to computer and then putting it up onto YouTube or something! I've been trying to track down an MPEG or AVI or whatever of that old promo for years now. I'm surprised there isn't a copy of it up on YouTube already seeing as there are so much old promos and idents and things on there these days but, alas, I've done a lot of searching for it and there doesn't seem to be a copy of it online anywhere. I'm sure there's loads of other people out there like myself who'd love to see it again so if there's any way at all you could manage to put it up online, Kaiser, it would be much appreciated by a lot of people, I'm sure.

Kaiser2000 wrote:

The channel idents/logos were much better too than they are today. The 89-93 era and then the 93-95 (very cinematic) set being the best IMO...

I have to agree with you there. Some of my favourite idents of the early Sky era are these:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ozAufi7juJM

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mCPhZvWumWw

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UiKXcyWoHHU

Ah, back in the days when Sky One was still called Sky One and not Sky Onc! And 'The Simpsons' was still new and fresh and was something to look forward to of a Sunday evening!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BZ13gVPReOU

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M-Ejze5JTGA

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MD7lwxte2iA

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QXb5dJlpIYM

I remember the late, great Tommy Vance also did some of the "This is Sky One / Sky Sports. A part of the British Sky Broadcasting Network" voiceover bits on those very early idents. What a fantastic voice that guy had. Sadly missed.

_Kaiser_

aidan_dunne wrote:

Man, you have simply got to find some way of transferring that promo to computer and then putting it up onto YouTube or something! I've been trying to track down an MPEG or AVI or whatever of that old promo for years now. I'm surprised there isn't a copy of it up on YouTube already seeing as there are so much old promos and idents and things on there these days but, alas, I've done a lot of searching for it and there doesn't seem to be a copy of it online anywhere. I'm sure there's loads of other people out there like myself who'd love to see it again so if there's any way at all you could manage to put it up online, Kaiser, it would be much appreciated by a lot of people, I'm sure.

Leave it with me so - think the tapes are still at home. Will have a look at the weekend if Im over that way

ciaran76

I remember getting to see Tremors when the Movie channel unscrambled.

Still love that film. At the time I had no idea what it was about and really enjoyed it esp. when you thought you were getting it for free.

Corruptedmorals

I remember 3 days of Digital TV...don't remember what we watched. If it was 1993 must've been 5 so?

8k2q1gfcz9s5d4

Ruu wrote:

I remember when the Adult Channel went unscrambled (I'm sure it has many times since then) not that long after we got Sky installed!:eek: *covers eyes*:D

i thought there would never be an opportunity to use this father ted quote

"he got his lad out"

bullets

Way back when things were all analogue we used to get a card
with a chip on it that would de-scramble Sky every so often.

The Very first thing I ever say on Satellite was the face of Hulk Hogan
while my father was on the roof or our house madly twisting the dish
and me shouting up to him when the picture got better or worse.
(I hated the WWF stuff as all the Americans in the audience looked
as though they though it was all real)

I remember several times in the early years around Christmas time
the Sky would become un-scrambled without any announcements.
It happened with both cable and satellite dish. I always thought it
was some sound dude working with the company that turned it off
when it was Christmas. later I thought it was a clever ploy to try and
reel people into buying the movie channels.

~B

carrotcake

I remember for a while it would also be unscrambled in the mornings. Not that there were any films on at that hour, just a countdown of the top ten films at cinemas. Sometimes it would become scrambled again in the middle of the program, and other times it wouldn't scramble again for a couple of hours. I also thought it was just that some guy forgot to hit the scramble button again

Ah yes, it did unencrypt for the Showcase, I remember now that you said it.

demanufactured

I remember this happenening in the summer i think of 94 or 95 may have been earlier , there was a loada channels unsrambled like disney, nickolodean , trouble , uk living, the adult channel , and sky 2!

we all thought it was great tuning in all these channels till towards the end of the summer they all got scrambled again , i remember trying to wartch WWF ppvs through a warped picture lol

aidan_dunne

aidan_dunne wrote:

Gotta love the old 'Alive & Kicking' playing in the background there as well, haven't you? Anyone else remember the fantastic promo ad Sky used to show with that as the theme music in the build up to the launch of the Premier League in '92? At the end of the the ad there was a great shot of a player jumping high in the air and heading a football with the voiceover "A Whole New Ballgame!"

Well, well, well, look at what we have here (requires RealPlayer):

http://hub.tv-ark.org.uk/dsplus/m.php?p=skysports_newballgame_92.rm

Haven't seen that ad in, what is it now, 15 years or so! Christ, I feel old!

Have to admit, it doesn't seem as good as I remember it. Bits of it look quite, well, gay, to be honest!

_Kaiser_

Actually as it happens I just found (I think) some of the old Sky promo tapes I had. Will go through them and see whats there

faceman

wow i remember this well. As far as i remember die hard went temporarilty scrambled at the bit where powell shoots karl at the end.