Film Leader Gag

In days of yore, when motion pictures were actually distributed on big reels of film, it was necessary to have a length of empty film — called a "leader" — at the start to give projectionists something to thread through the projector without skipping over the beginning of the movie proper. (There is actually a leader on both ends of the film -- the one at the beginning is called a "head leader" or "head", and the one at the end a "tail leader" or "tail".)

These leaders weren't always completely empty -- often they had handwritten annotations (such as the film's title) and text identifying them as a leader and not a projector malfunction. And because these lengths of "empty" film weren't exactly standardized, it was necessary to provide some kind of warning mechanism to indicate when the movie was actually about to start, to allow the projectionist to cue it up. There are two such leaders familiar to movie and television audiences, both dating from the 1950s:

The most common one is called the "Academy Leader" or "Society Leader", with a simple text countdown from eleven to three seconds (with NINE and SIX spelled out to prevent confusion in case the film was inserted into the projector upside-down) in black on a plain white background; at three seconds a quick beep sounds.
The "SMPTE Universal Leader" is the familiar clock-style countdown leader, running from 8 to 3 seconds with a spinning clock-hand around a target inside which the numbers appear. At the beginning, before the countdown, it features "16 SOUND START" and then "35 SOUND START" inside the target. Then "PICTURE START" appears and the countdown begins. At two, a quick beep is heard.

Naturally, once this mechanism was well-established and familiar to audiences, some filmmakers could not resist the chance to hang a lampshade on and play with its expected behavior. Strangely-behaving and outright impossible film leaders and countdowns could appear in a movie or television show, especially when there was a film within a film. Sometimes this was intended to emphasize or underline the essential unreality of the story being told, by explicitly reminding the viewer that they are, in fact, watching a movie. Sometimes it was to mock the conventions of movie-making. And sometimes, of course, it was just to be silly.

Possibly a Dead Horse Trope now as the film industry is in the process of converting to digital projection; film leaders and their countdowns are no longer necessary to cue up films. If they appear at all, it will be because of nostalgia or Post Modern humor.

See also China Girl. For another gag playing with the nature of film and reality, see Melting Film Effect.

Examples of Film Leader Gag include:

Film

The start of Bruce Conner's 1958 short film A Movie plays extensively with the conventions (and audience expectations) of the "SMPTE Universal"-style leader. He rapidly alternates all-black and all-white footage, interlacing individual words of the title between them, then restarts the leader complete with projectionists' signals, throws in a title card reading "End of Part Four", then runs a countdown, inserting footage from an old stag film between 4 and 1. This is followed by the words "The End" — more leader appears, with "Movie" written backward, more projectionists' signals, and a repeating number "1" that flickers in time to the soundtrack's quick tempo, before cutting directly to black again. Even that is not enough, as right in middle of the film he throws in even more leader gags.
The original short version of Mike Jittlov's The Wizard of Speed and Time starts with a mock countdown in the style of the Academy Leader, using a still of The Wizard as a background. The countdown appears as numerals appearing in a ball of light held in his hand, ending with the word "BEEP" instead of the numeral 2, synchronized with an audible beep.
- The feature-length version jumps to a "SMPTE Universal"-style leader after the opening credits, with a voice over that makes it clear we are watching someone watching one of Jittlov's films in a screening room. The leader is filled with subliminal jokes (just like the rest of the film), and the "clock face" countdown begins behaving very oddly.
- Jittlov's short film Fashionation starts with a countdown made from colored film reel hubs.
Travis Wilkerson's 2002 experimental documentary An Injury to One starts with a countdown with aurally manipulated tones, superimposed over stock footage of clouds. Some reviewers believe it's a deliberate shout-out to Conner's A Movie.
Ingmar Bergman's 1966 film Persona draws attention to its own cinematic nature and reminds the audience that they are watching a film by starting the film with shots of a projector's arc light igniting followed by film running through a projector before switching to a leader countdown interspersed with images and footage both odd and disturbing.
Academy Leader Variations, a short film by a group of Polish filmmakers which plays with and mutates the Academy leader.

Live-Action TV

Naturally, Monty Python's Flying Circus abused the film leader in several episodes, usually by interposing unexpected images or text into the countdown. The earliest example occurs in episode 2, when athlete Jimmy Greaves' name was inserted instead of the number "5"; another is found in episode 8 when a woman's passport photo is inserted after "4".
Mystery Science Theater 3000's "theater entry" sequence is a deliberate invocation of the leader countdown (as well as a shout-out to the opening credits of Get Smart).
The Disney Channel did their own playful take on the SMPTE leader as a bumper.

Music

During their late 2014 tour in support of their CD ...Like Clockwork, Queens of the Stone Age began their concerts with a film leader-style 60-second countdown projected on a screen behind them, apparently leading into one of the songs off the new CD, but unexpectedly launching into another.
In what is arguably a borderline case, Foreigner used a still of the 4-second indicator from the SMTPE leader as the cover image for their fourth studio album, 4"".

Web Original

The Notorious RBG, a video made by the Lincoln Project as a memorial to Ruth Bader Ginsburg shortly after her death in 2020, starts with an SMPTE Leader that leads into a montage of photos as a recording of her plays over.