Warner Bros. released Pokémon: The First Movie in November 1999, riding the crest of the Pokémon franchise's explosive arrival in American pop culture. Adapted and expanded from the Japanese original, the film marked the series' leap from television to the multiplex, pairing the Mewtwo Strikes Back narrative with the short Pikachu's Vacation. Promotional trailers circulated widely in theaters that year, building anticipation for a phenomenon that was reshaping children's entertainment, toy aisles, and trading card culture alike. For collectors, trailer material from this release captures the exact moment Pokémon mania reached its commercial and cultural peak in the West.
This cell preserves a strip from that trailer, centered on Ash and Pikachu, the franchise's defining duo. Ash, the series protagonist, and Pikachu, its mascot and emotional core, anchor nearly every piece of Pokémon promotional art, making their pairing a natural focal point for collectors. The phrase "Falling" attached to this moment points to a scene of peril or descent within the trailer's quick-cut structure, the kind of dramatic beat trailers use to signal stakes and urgency. As a trailer cell rather than a finished-film frame, it represents the marketing apparatus built around the movie's debut.
Authentication Findings8 checks
Consistent with a 35mm theatrical release print of Pokémon: The First Movie (1999).
Gauge
Four perforations per frame on both edges, which reads as 35mm; the strip holds three consecutive frames, the first and third partly cropped by the panel.
Perforations
Four per frame along both edges, rounded-rectangle holes, evenly spaced and cleanly punched, with no torn or stretched perforations seen.
Soundtrack
A variable-area optical track of two bands runs between the picture and the lower perforations; no Dolby Digital blocks, DTS line or SDDS tracks are visible.
Edge print
Not visible in this capture
Base & colour
Clear base with a faint blue-cyan tint at the edges; the dye image looks saturated and neutral, with no obvious fading or red shift.
Projection history
None seen at this size beyond a few faint vertical streaks in the first frame; one ring spot on the middle frame is a camera reflection and is ignored.
Picture
Positive colour image; the three frames run consecutively as one shot with near-identical content, and the animation style fits Pokémon: The First Movie.
Era check
A two-band optical track on a colour positive 35mm base fits a late-1990s theatrical release print, though a digital track could sit on a part of the strip not shown.
Read from the original intake capture shown below. Observations only — film is authenticated, not graded.
This original motion picture film element has been examined and authenticated by Crown Grading, 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.
Original Film CaptureAs received
Photographed on the light panel at intake, before encapsulation — tap to open full size
Tap to enlarge
