Warner Bros. released Pokémon: The First Movie in the United States in November 1999, riding the crest of a franchise that had exploded from handheld game cartridges into a full media phenomenon. The film's trailer campaign was instrumental in building anticipation, introducing American audiences to Mewtwo's origin story and the clash between natural Pokémon and their genetically duplicated counterparts. For a generation of young collectors, this trailer was often their first glimpse of the film's stakes, setting up a narrative about identity and conflict that distinguished it from the television series. The promotional push around this release remains a benchmark moment in the franchise's crossover into theatrical features.
This cell preserves a trailer frame built around two of the franchise's most recognizable creatures, Charizard and Blastoise, set against their cloned counterparts. The pairing speaks directly to the film's central premise: Mewtwo's artificial replicas challenging the originals. Charizard and Blastoise are perennial favorites among collectors for their starter lineage and enduring popularity, making any early theatrical material featuring them desirable. A trailer cell like this one functioned as promotional material, distributed to build hype ahead of release, and survives today as a tangible artifact of that marketing moment, tying original and clone together in a single frame of film history.
Authentication Findings8 checks
Consistent with a 35mm release print of the Pokémon: The First Movie trailer (1999).
Gauge
35mm: four perforations span each frame along both edges, and the strip holds four complete frames.
Perforations
Four per frame on both edges, evenly spaced, with rounded-rectangle holes that look cleanly punched and uniform in size.
Soundtrack
Two wavy white variable-area optical tracks run beside the picture, and the gaps between the lower perforations hold a speckled grey pattern consistent with Dolby Digital data blocks.
Edge print
Not visible in this capture
Base & colour
The base shows a pale cyan-blue tint along the edges, and the dye image looks saturated and neutral with no obvious fading.
Projection history
No lines, scratches, cue marks or splices seen at this size.
Picture
Positive image; the four frames run consecutively as one shot with only slight drift between them, and the picture is not contradicted by the film on record.
Era check
Optical tracks plus Dolby Digital blocks fit a late-1990s 35mm release print, so the strip is consistent with a 1999 trailer.
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
