Sources: Wikidata · OpenAlex. The record of the motion picture, not an assessment of this cell.
FILM NOTES
Pokémon: The First Movie arrived in November 1999 as Warner Bros. and Nintendo tested whether a television phenomenon could fill American theaters, pairing Mewtwo Strikes Back with a new short, Pikachu's Vacation. It became a genuine box office event, introducing millions of young moviegoers to franchise mythology on the big screen and cementing Pokémon as a cultural force beyond cards and cartridges. For collectors of 35mm memorabilia, it remains a touchstone of late-90s theatrical distribution and merchandising history.
This cell carries only the simple designation Pokemon, a title without further qualifier, meaning it stands as a piece of the film itself rather than a marked character or mood study. Such unadorned cells are prized precisely for their ambiguity and generality, offering a fragment of the release print divorced from any single scene description. Collectors value them as tangible remnants of the actual theatrical run, artifacts tied directly to the movie's original distribution rather than promotional ephemera.
This original motion picture film element has been examined and authenticated by Crown Grading in partnership with National Film Vault, and encapsulated for archival preservation.
Why so little survivesRelease prints were leased to theaters, not sold. When the run ended they went back to the distributor to be destroyed, and most were. What collectors hold today came from the prints that escaped that order, and no new 35mm prints of these films are being struck.
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