I had almost forgotten that 3D was a thing

There are probably plenty of funny entry points to discussing my Wednesday night viewing of Avatar: The Way of Water. Here is a couple I will note but ultimately reject:

1) Of the two other people who were supposed to go with me, one couldn't go and one couldn't get there until the movie was nearly 15 minutes old. It's not funny except that one of them is a millennial and the other is a slightly older millennial, and this is very millennial behavior.

2) There was a 1:45 a.m. showing of this 192-minute movie, meaning it would get out around 5 a.m. I've heard of that sort of thing on opening nights of new Star Wars movies that can't start until after midnight, but not when there are showings at a very reasonable 6 p.m., like the one I went to.

But here's the one I did go with:

I couldn't remember the last time I had worn 3D glasses to a movie. 

Yeah we've had the pandemic and all that, but it was way before that. In fact, I doubt I'd have any way of figuring it out for sure. I was going to 3D movies fairly often (at least three to four times a year, anyway), and had no reason to believe that activity was about ready to subside. It's like that extremely melancholy concept that states "The last time you went outside to play with your friends, nobody knew it was the last time." I did nothing to mark the anticipated demise of 3D because I didn't know it was coming.

But then I wondered, is it possible that 3D has continued to be available, only I just haven't been going?

Now granted, I do see most movies in the theater for free with my critics card, which excludes novelties like 3D, IMAX or other oversized screens. (There's a thing here called X-Treme screen and another thing called VMAX, and I believe both are excluded from free passes.) 

But if so, then I'm not seeing it advertised on the posters anymore. There used to be something like "See it in 3D!" on the poster and you would actually consider doing that, depending on the movie.

And I think the glasses have had another technological upgrade, as they did this sort of thing where they synched themselves up, plus gave me a momentary panic about going blind. The first 3D trailer (I believe it was for the next Guardians of the Galaxy movie) led directly to something that was decidedly not 3D, and at least the guy next to me and I thought we might have lost vision in our right eye. It was disconcerting to say the least, having a black square of emptiness in that eye.

But I'm glad 3D was back for Avatar, because yes, the thing looked absolutely crazy once again. 

I don't know how I would really look at them side by side to tell you what was so different. I guess I'll just say it was more. More immersive, more grandiose, more imaginative -- just more. 

Now this is not to say I am giving it my top rating or anything. It's still an Avatar movie, and I firmly believe an Avatar movie has sort of a ceiling on it. But I definitely liked it better than the first. You can read my whole review here.

As for the length? Honestly, it felt like about 2:30. That's a huge compliment. In fact, so little did I need to go to the bathroom, I didn't actually go upon leaving the theater, I didn't actually go after sharing a pitcher of beer with my one friend who did make the screening, and I only finally relieved myself at the train station -- but not the departing side, the arriving side. I was able to hold it on on the whole ride home before deciding not to wait the extra five minutes for the bike ride back to my house. 

And it does look like at least the next Guardians of the Galaxy movie is coming out in 3D, so maybe I'll be donning the glasses again at some point in the not-too-distant future.

Go 3D in style

As if you weren't already spending enough money when you go to a 3D movie, Hoyts Cinemas thinks you might want to fork out an additional $15 to $20, just because.

At Hoyts -- at least the one at the Highpoint Shopping Centre -- you can buy your own 3D glasses, right there through a handy dandy vending machine in the lobby.

Note I said "can." They'll still give you a pair, as a ticket taker confirmed for me -- I had to ask him because I was concerned this was just another upsell. But the pair they give you will be flimsy and disposable. You'll get to see the movie's 3D effects, but you won't be able to do it in style.

I greeted this vending machine with a chuckle, but then I decided, "Hey, why not?" Surely there are people who do think it's worth doing. Australian society seems to function on the idea that people are not very attached to their disposable income, and this is no less of an egregious example than some others I've seen. Especially since one of the most common complaints I hear from people about going to 3D movies is "I hate the glasses."

You can get something that's functional, designed to go over your existing glasses ...

(Though note that they tell you it's "designer," which justifies the $15 charge.)

Or you can get something that's whimsical, based on an existing movie franchise ...

Or you can get something that's adventurous, also based on a (no longer) existing movie franchise ...

Or something that's extra fancy ...

Or something that's extra cheap ...

(Though I guess, still better than the free ones -- or maybe they are just trying to fool people into buying something they'll give them for free, which is perhaps the most shameful upsell of all.)

And then, finally, there are just the ones nobody wants ...

Me, I'm content just paying the $4 surcharge for 3D and being done with it. 

Completism

The biggest chore on my 2014 to-do list was turning out to be The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies. Some of the movies I watch this time of year, I watch out of a sense of obligation, and the final Hobbit movie was seeming more like homework than most.

It's not that I'm down on this Hobbit series. Actually, 2012's An Unexpected Journey just missed my top ten, so enchanted was I by my return to Middle Earth. But I was less enchanted by The Desolation of Smaug, and then the general narrative about the Hobbit movies switched to a discussion of exhaustion. Whereas Tolkien lovers were thrilled with each new installment of the Lord of the Rings trilogy, they were now demonstrating weariness about the bloated and protracted Hobbit series. I can't help if some of that seeped into me. And then, when the reviews for Five Armies started coming in, even more of my enthusiasm was sapped. Especially when a colleague of mine at ReelGood listed the final Hobbit as one of his two worst movies of the year.

But I felt a duty to be completist on my theatrical viewing of these movies, all six of which I felt needed to be seen on a big screen. And instead of just trying to get the final one out of the way as quickly and painlessly as possible, I decided to super-size my viewing, so to speak, by returning to seeing it in 3D HFR. 

That's how I saw (and loved) An Unexpected Journey. Like most people, I thought the images looked a bit like they had been shot on video, but there was also a hyperreal quality to them that made them unique. Both as a financial decision and a means of contrast, I caught The Desolation of Smaug in 2D last year, and didn't like it as much. There was no way to know, of course, whether HFR would have made a big difference for me with the second Hobbit movie. The story should play the biggest role in determining how well a movie like this works for us, but unless you can somehow orchestrate two "first viewings" of the same movie, one in each format, you really don't know.

Still, I thought it made sense to stack the deck in my favor for #3, especially since I could see it on a discount Tuesday night and pay "only" $16 for the movie, including the $4 3D surcharge. I also figured this might be my last opportunity for a while to see a movie in this format. You'd have to think some other filmmaker is working on a project in HFR, but if they are, I haven't heard of it. 

And wouldn't you know it, I did like The Battle of the Five Armies a whole lot more than The Desolation of Smaug. 

HFR probably did play some role, but it would be hard to quantify it. Storywise, I felt this movie was a lot more streamlined than the previous one -- possibly even than the first one, though I like An Unexpected Journey a lot more. That's kind of the opposite of what people have been saying. The consensus seems to be that this movie is most representative of the bloat involved in expanding a 300-page book into more than seven hours of movies. However, I felt it was the most concentrated on one single goal, of any of the six Tolkien movies. Everything and everyone is focused on the thousands of tons of gold resting the belly of the Lonely Mountain, and they will fight to the death to get it.

Of course, my favorite sequence in the whole movie has nothing to do with any of that. Ingeniously, Peter Jackson tidily closes up the story of Smaug the dragon entirely in a pre-title sequence. Unleashed from his castle toward the city of Laketown at the end of the previous film, Smaug predictably lays waste to the city with just a few swooping passes and a few extended fiery exhales. This was shot thrillingly, and the HFR gave the whole thing the look of a real set, like you might see at Universal Studios. The buildings burning and the people scampering here and there made it seem like a real production, rather than a largely digital creation. And that seemed to intensify the danger significantly. Bard the Bowman (Luke Evans) perched atop a flimsy tower, using his son's shoulder to steady the final arrow he has available to shoot at Smaug, gave the movie an immediate emotional intensity that I don't think it ever fully frittered away. Like a really great James Bond pre-credits sequence, it put me in a delirious state of anticipation for the rest of the movie. 

Which proceeds to focus on Smaug's prize ... who has the right to it, and what they will do to get it.

The HFR continued to deliver for me during the politicking leading up to the titular battle -- which includes a great descent-into-madness performance by Richard Armitage as Thorin Oakenshield -- and through the final battle itself. That battle may not compare favorably with the epic battles in either The Two Towers or Return of the King, but it's the type of epic battle we have come to expect from Jackson's Middle Earth movies, and one that was absent from both of the previous Hobbit movies. On this front I welcomed it.  

The final smart decision, though, was to end the movie on the intimate scale of a one-on-one battle between Thorin and Azog, atop breaking ice no less. There's something about the quiet and setting of this battle that reminds me of the climax of Kill Bill Vol. 1. As such, the movie may actually be bookended by my two favorite scenes. 

Look, it may not be a great movie, but it is most assuredly a good movie, and I don't understand the people who think otherwise. Cumulative fatigue, I would guess, and a pre-wired inability to consider this movie on its own terms.

Looking back on all six of Jackson's Middle Earth movies, I note that the two series are kind of an inverse of each other, at least as far as I am concerned. Allow me to explain.

I got off to a rough start back in 2001 with The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring. I actively did not like it, feeling that it was overlong, that it was overly emotional and that it left off at an unsatisfying point. (Remember, this was back in the days when not a lot of movies were made with an absolute certainty that the sequels would also be made.) Since then, I have watched it again and grown to like it. Conversely, The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey was my favorite of the new series. I was immediately on board. 

The second movie in both series represented a radical change from my thoughts on the first. The Two Towers was what made me fall in love with The Lord of the Rings, establishing itself as what turned out to be both my favorite of the series, and my favorite overall of Jackson's Tolkien adaptations, I can now say for certain. The Two Towers also made me reconsider the first movie and view it in a more forgiving light. On the other hand, The Desolation of Smaug kind of made me fall out of love with the Hobbit series. I still liked the movie, but I probably give it more of a pass than it deserves because of my lingering affection for the first one.

The third movie in each series is my second favorite in that series. The big difference is how close it is to my favorite. Return of the King is a lot closer in quality to The Two Towers than The Battle of the Five Armies is to An Unexpected Journey, but even just writing about it now, I actually think I like Five Armies even more than I thought I did at the start of this piece.

Here are my rankings:

1) The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers

2) The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey

3) The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King

4) The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring

5) The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies

6) The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug

I do debate whether second viewings of An Unexpected Journey and The Return of the King would keep that order intact, or whether they would flip-flop. I think I accord An Unexpected Journey this level of respect in part because it was so, well, unexpected. The best picture winner is probably the better movie. So far, though, its daunting length has kept me from rewatching it. In fact, only the first two LOTR movies have gotten second viewings from me.

I titled this post "Completism," but part of me thinks that Jackson is not done with Middle Earth. If there are not other Tolkien stories to adapt (are there?), I wouldn't consider it beyond the realm of possibility for him to just write entirely new material himself. I guess that's kind of what he's been doing in fleshing out this latest trilogy.

But if he wants to use Gandalf, he better start on it soon. Ian McKellen can't keep playing this role forever. 

Brave new world

Pixar's Brave was going to be our first 3D movie on our "new" 3D TV.

I'm very glad it ended up being the second. But first some history.

We got our "new" 3D TV around the time we moved, which makes it seven months old and nearly ready to shed the descriptor "new." To our great shame, we went the first six-and-a-half months of its life without even tapping into the feature that gives it its name. We knew we couldn't watch a 3D BluRay until we followed up this purchase with a 3D BluRay player, but we also knew that there were some 3D features on our TV we could access directly through the TV. Still, watching programming in 3D remained for us a peripheral priority, something that seemed vaguely too hard to do.

Flash forward to Cyber Monday, when I decided to convert on my intention to buy us a 3D BluRay player for Christmas. I couldn't click the "purchase" button on Best Buy's website fast enough. The thing cost a scant $70, and with having it delivered to the store rather than to my house, there was no shipping cost either. The next Saturday, I walked my son down to the nearest Best Buy and returned home with this tiny new component, less than 2/3 the size of our current BluRay player.

I knew I couldn't wait for Christmas to present it to my wife. I also knew it couldn't be a present specifically for her, because that's cheating -- I'd obviously get as much use out if it as she would, and probably more. So I decided to repurpose some birthday money for the purchase, and decided I would present it to her on the Saturday night before Christmas (she should still unwrap it, as a good way of revealing the surprise). That left Sunday and Monday nights as two possibilities for watching our first 3D movie. Oh, it would have still been "special" if our first 3D movie didn't come until after Christmas, but the days leading up to Christmas have this special kind of magic to them. Besides, one of my two movie choices would only make good viewing prior to Christmas.

See, another thing I'd been working on in December was borrowing the copy of Disney's A Christmas Carol I bought for my friend two Christmases ago. I bought him the version that included a 3D BluRay, even though his family didn't yet have a 3D TV (and still doesn't). But the timing of the borrow was tricky. His family planned to watch it this holiday season, but hadn't yet. About two weeks ago we realized that my needs and theirs were not incongruous. They weren't going to be watching the actual 3D BluRay, because they couldn't. So his wife secretly slipped me that disc in a padded manila envelope when she was babysitting for us two Saturdays ago.

I figured my wife would choose A Christmas Carol and that's what I was rooting for, but it seemed only fair to have another option available. And we do in fact own one 3D BluRay: Tangled. However, in my mind, that was a definite Plan B. We had both already seen Tangled twice. This would be my third Christmas Carol viewing as well, but she'd only seen it once, and had also proclaimed it "probably her favorite movie version of that story." Besides, Tangled would keep until after Christmas. A Christmas Carol would not.

As it turns out, she wanted a Plan C. And that's where Brave came into the discussion.

Both of the proposed BluRays were movies we'd seen within the past two years, and my wife was eager for another option. She mentioned that Brave had been in 3D, and neither of us had seen Pixar's latest yet. My Christmas Carol bias notwithstanding, I thought it was a great idea and went to work figuring out how to procure it.

We weren't so excited to see Brave that we thought it was worth it to actually own the movie, which would currently be priced at its all-time high. So Sunday morning I swung by Blockbuster to see if they might rent 3D BluRays. I didn't even need to get further than the front counter, where the friendly clerk told me that they didn't. I gave him an opening to refer me to one of his competitors: "So the only way to see a movie in 3D at home is to buy it?" "Pretty much," he responded.

I was satisfied with the response, because I thought it clinched my desired Christmas Carol screening. It did not. My wife chose Tangled.

And I'm so glad she did. Even if it denied us a seasonal viewing, Tangled is far and away the better movie. And watching a great movie in 3D on our own TV was as wonderful a way to usher in this new era as I could have possibly imagined.

Simply put, the 3D was astounding. I would have expected something that was very clearly a lesser version of what you get in the theater. At the very least I figured you needed to position yourself at a perfectly straight angle to the screen in order for the images to have that third dimension. But no. Tangled was as breathtaking as it had first been for me in the theater, with incomparable depth as well as images occasionally popping out of the screen. My wife, who hadn't previously caught it in 3D, claimed to like it better than she ever had before. Even a part of the third act that she had previously considered a significant narrative problem did not bother her this time. Amazing how an extra dimension, when done correctly, can just wrap you up in its spell and eradicate all your complaints.

Unfortunately, Brave could not pull off the same feat.

Last night, we did watch Brave in 3D -- without needing our new BluRay player, in fact.

It turns out that our LG 3D TV (all three of our components, including both of our BluRay players, are LG) has kind of an "app store" accessible from its home screen. It can use our wifi to deliver us a variety of movies directly from the TV, and it being a 3D TV, has a section devoted to movies we can rent in 3D. The other two 3D movies were movies we'd both already seen (The Avengers and Gnomeo & Juliet), so Brave was clearly it, especially since we'd flirted with this very idea on Sunday. Eight dollars even seemed a reasonable price to pay for such a rental -- that's probably a quarter of what it would cost if we bought the BluRay combo pack to own.

And after watching it, I can tell you that we don't want to own Brave.

Keeping in mind that I have yet to see Cars 2, Brave is the first Pixar movie that I have actually given a thumbs down. A Bug's Life might have been close, but even that lame movie would get a marginal thumbs up from me. Well, not this one. Even reasonably good 3D (though not as good as Tangled) and images that are certainly beautiful were not enough to blind us to the movie's many, many narrative flaws.

Name a few? Okay. (SPOILERS)

1. It's pretty damn hard to forgive your heroine after she has gotten a witch to cast a spell on her own mother. When was the last time you trusted a witch to do exactly what you told her to do? I didn't think so. Much like the devil, a witch's main priority is to make a nearly legalistic analysis of your request in order to figure out creative ways to follow the letter of what you asked for, though not the spirit of what you asked for. See Brave for a very good example.

2. As a result, Merida spends the entire second half of the movie trying to correct her own mistake. My wife always says that she can't stand movie characters who create their own problems. There are certainly exceptions to this, but it's hard to get behind a character who has to go to considerable trouble to undo something he/she never should have done in the first place.

3. I was led to believe one of the main plot points was that Merida competes against her suitors in a variety of feats of skill, in order to "win her own hand in marriage" rather than letting someone else win it. In this way I expected the story to resemble the tale of Atalanta from Free to Be ... You and Me (though originally a Greek myth). Turns out, she has one archery scene against the three dopes trying to marry her, none of whom can do anything with a bow and arrow. (One suitor hits the bulls-eye, but it's by accident.)

4. What the story is actually about is human beings turning into bears. Really. That's what this movie is about. The problem is that if a human being is confused for a bear -- because of, you know, being turned into a bear -- another human being might try to kill that bear. Never mind the fact that Merida could just say to her father, who has built his reputation on his desire to exact revenge on the bear who took his leg, "Dad! Don't kill this bear. It's Mom. I gave her a cake that had been cursed by a witch, and she turned into this bear." Instead, they have to hide the bear and run around like idiots.

5. When Merida and her bear mother are out in the woods, trying to find a cure to the mother's bearness, they somehow learn things about each other that make them understand each other better. However, none of this is actually dramatized in any particular moment. I guess being turned into a bear by your daughter is enough of a reason to realize that she doesn't need to get married against her will. 

6. Even while it's clear that the cake Merida has given her mother is making her physically sick, she doesn't care. All she cares about is whether her coughing and choking mother has changed her mind on whether she must marry one of the three dopes. Which, you remember, is the reason she poisoned her in the first place. All of these so far should lead naturally to #7 ...

7. I didn't like the characters. Any of them, really.

But I've saved possibly the most problematic element of the movie for last ...

8. Nothing that occurs on screen here -- I mean, nothing whatsoever -- requires an ounce of bravery. No one does something really daring. No one puts him or herself in position to make a sacrifice. No one leads an army against impossible odds. The film's only established antagonist (other than the witch with ambiguous intentions) is the king's brother, who was turned into a bear (called Mordu) after becoming evil and trying to take over sole control of the kingdom. He only appears in the story a couple times, and his motivations are so vague and generic that they almost don't even exist. He is dispatched somewhat easily. You could say that the queen engages in a bit of bravery by taking on Mordu, but since she is also a bear at the time, the risk to her is considerably less than if she had been, you know, not a bear.

So yeah, I didn't like Brave.

But that doesn't mean I can't use its poster art to symbolize our exciting new home 3D adventure. And now I'm just rubbing my hands together, figuring out which movie to rent or own that will blow our dimensional minds next.

My wife hasn't seen Wreck-It-Ralph, and I didn't see it in 3D. That seems like a probable one to own come February or March, as we get ever deeper into this brave new world.

Forty-eight reasons to see The Hobbit

It seems that nearly everyone has some angle of wariness related to The Hobbit.

A friend of mine phrased one of these angles of wariness very succinctly earlier this week on Facebook:

"Just bought our tickets for The Hobbit. I'm excited to see it (and the other movies), but I'm pretty unconvinced that you need 2 hours and 45 minutes to tell 1/3 of a 300-page novel."

I've also heard that the credits alone run for 16 minutes. So even though I usually like sitting through as many of the credits as time will allow, at least I know I can get out of there in 2:29 for this one, if need be.

However, my own greatest source of wariness about the movie has now become the biggest reason I'm interested in seeing it.

Yep, the infamous 48 frames per second projection rate.

I won't rehash the flogged-nearly-to-death discussion of the strengths (few?) and weaknesses (many?) of this gambit by Peter Jackson, but in case you don't know what I'm talking about at all: Almost every movie you've ever seen was shot at 24 frames per second. With twice as many frames per second, the image is far more crisp and there's less blurring. Most people don't notice the blurring of 24 fps, in part because it's been the standard practice throughout history. But 24 fps is part of the reason why some people don't like 3D -- they find the image darker, and it leaves them feeling queasy. The faster projection rate is supposed to fix those problems, but it has a side effect that some people hate and some people embrace: The images look hyper-real, to the extent that it sometimes makes them look cheap, like they were shot on video, or (as I have often referred to it) belong on some bad BBC show from the 1970s.

I'm wary about having my own experience of The Hobbit ruined if I find this technique distracting, as I always have in the past when my TV has been on a setting that mimics 48 fps (or actually uses 48 fps -- I don't pretend to understand all the technical details). But I've decided that I owe it to myself to see it this way, in 3D, for one simple reason:

How often do you go to the movies and see something new? I'm not talking about new in terms of plot, subject matter or narrative structure -- but something new in terms of technique?

Even if my viewing of The Hobbit is destined to be a failure, I want to expose myself to this new paradigm, which some people have said will be the future of how movies are made, and others say will go the way of the dodo bird once these three movies have come and gone. 

After all, wouldn't you have wanted to go see The Jazz Singer in the theater, if you had been there in 1927 when it came out? Wouldn't you have been so exhilarated by hearing Al Jolson's voice that you would have nearly wept? Or what about nine years before that (I'm just now learning this bit of trivia, mid-way through this paragraph, whose order I am nonetheless not going to restructure to be chronological), when a silent film called Cupid Angling was the first color feature? You could say the same thing about the first animated movie, the first 3D movie, even the first movie where you saw nudity, depending on how far you want to stretch the notion of what constitutes something truly "new." There was even a thing called Smell-O-Vision once. If I'd been around then, I would have been the first one in line. (It would have been the 1960 movie Scent of Mystery, the only film ever to use this obviously unsuccessful and impractical gimmick.)

I'm not saying The Hobbit is going to represent this kind of sea change, but I'm also not saying it isn't. And since all of the techniques listed above predate 1960, that just tells you how rare it is to get something truly "new" -- and therefore, how important it is, as serious film fans, to embrace our opportunities to experience these new things when we do get the chance.

In fact, in trying to find examples from my own life as a film fan, I'm forced to choose viewing experiences that contained far less revolutionary changes in what we experience with films. Unsurprisingly, most relate directly to visual effects. I'm thinking of the T-1000 in Terminator 2, with its unprecedented (to me) use of digital technology. I'm thinking of the first time I saw a Pixar movie, Toy Story; I was so impressed that I saw it again the next day. I'm thinking of the first movie I saw on an IMAX screen. I'm thinking of Avatar, which was clearly an evolutionary step forward in how realistic and immersive 3D can be.

What these viewings all have in common, though, is that the change I was witnessing was undoubtedly a positive thing. Even though Avatar left me a little disappointed overall, that's primarily because I couldn't separate my experience of its visuals from my experience of its story. A movie like The Hobbit threatens to make that separation all the harder to achieve, except this time it would probably the story that's good and the visuals that aren't so. 

Still, I'm not so in love with Middle Earth that I can't take this risk. Because another concern I have about The Hobbit is not just its bloated length, but the fact that it's a prequel to events that I think most people would argue are far more dramatic and have far greater stakes -- if only because there are certain characters you just know will survive. If you think Bilbo Baggins, Gandalf or Gollum might die in these movies, you obviously haven't seen the LOTR trilogy. And there are a half-dozen other characters who appear in these new films who also appear in the trilogy that comes later in Tokien's chronology. (Let's just hope they do a convincing job making the actors look younger, which is already an early problem I've noted with Ian McKellan.) When I watched the Rankin/Bass Hobbit from the 1970s, I always remember thinking it seemed pretty light and goofy -- and that wasn't just because of the animation style. Even back when I was a kid, I sensed the story's lack of dramatic weight. There's a reason Jackson started with Lord of the Rings and not this.

So I'm the perfect candidate to seek out my local 48 fps showing of The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey. I'm not some Tolkien nerd who has only one chance for this film to make its first impression on me, and can't afford to blow it at the risk of my geek soul. And besides, the most interesting outcome for me might be to hate the 48 fps but still like the movie. As much as anything, I'm curious to see if there is a definite correlation between the way the movie looks and the impression it has on me as a piece of narrative art. It would be a similar experiment to making yourself watch Avatar for the first time on an iphone. Okay, better example of a spectacle whose story is actually a success: It would be like making yourself watch Titanic for the first time on an iphone. 

In a way, the verdict is already in on The Hobbit, anyway. Regardless of its fps, it isn't wowing critics in terms of its quality as a film, as it's been conspicuously absent from the year-end awards that Peter Jackson made his bitch the first time around. Most conspicuously, yesterday's Golden Globe nominations didn't feature a single mention of The Hobbit, at least in the major categories I perused. That's ouch-worthy.

But however you choose to consume it, here's hoping that you get something out of The Hobbit that reminds you even in some small way of the original trilogy, which I consider to be one of the great achievements in film history, even though I'm not a Tolkien nerd. We should be glad there's an artist out there with the vision and ambition to give these films such a lavish big-screen realization -- whether he launches a new cinematic paradigm or not.

Pre-Thanksgiving 3D extravaganza

I've developed a very specific kind of tradition lately as it relates to my Wednesday-before-Thanksgiving trip to the theater.

In the past, I'd always try to go to a movie on the shortened last day before a long weekend -- Memorial Day, Labor Day, what have you. My boss tries to release us two hours early on days like this, and I'd taken advantage of those extra hours to grab a flick.

Since the birth of my son, my responsibilities have necessarily caused many of these opportunities to fall by the wayside. One that hasn't fallen is seeing a movie on my pre-Thanksgiving early release, and since my boss already told us yesterday that he might not be in today and that we could leave two hours early, I don't have to worry about a last-minute bout of Scrooginess causing him to renege. (Unless he reneges electronically, but that seems unlikely.)

And even though it originally looked like the times might not work out, it now appears likely that I'll be able to attend a 1:50 showing of Ang Lee's Life of Pi. Making this the third straight year that I will have gone to a 3D movie on the day before we eat turkey.

In 2010 it was Tangled. In fact, it was Tangled by default, because either there wasn't anything else opening that interested me, or the other things opening didn't have convenient start times. I dragged my ass to Tangled even though I didn't have high hopes for it, just to take advantage of the opportunity and my wife's blessing. As you may recall, I absolutely loved it -- so much so that I eventually ended up ranking it #2 for the year.

Then last year it was Hugo. I didn't love Hugo like I loved Tangled, but there were parts of the movie that delivered an equivalent level of exhilaration to me. In fact, the thing both films had in common was their exceptional use of a technology that is frequently fumbled by filmmakers: 3D.

Now Life of Pi is being billed as "The next Avatar." At least, on the billboard I see on my way in to work. I certainly hope that the story is better, but I think the comparison they're trying to make is a technological one. If this billboard is to be believed, Life of Pi is doing things with 3D and CGI that will make us ooh and ahh the way Avatar did.

Actually, I know the story of Life of Pi is better because I've actually read the book. I say "actually" because reading has been a particular weak spot for me in the past couple years. In fact, until I experienced a reading renaissance through audio books on my commute to work in the past six months, which has led to the consumption of about a dozen new books, it'd had been a couple years since I'd read a book from start to finish. Pathetic but true.

And so when an adaptation of one of the books I've read comes home to roost, it does give me a little sense of pride that I'm not a total philistine. For similar reasons I'm looking forward to the adaptation of Ender's Game, which is due out next year and will probably be a visual marvel in its own right.

But let's not look ahead to next November 1st. For now I'm excited about this November 21st, when I'm hoping to go three-for-three in pre-Thanksgiving 3D extravaganzas as part of this newly established tradition.

Now just knock on some wood for me that I don't have any work crises that nullify the possibility of my early release.

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone.

Held hostage by this menace

Do you think it might be cool to see the original Star Wars trilogy on the big screen in 3D?

Regardless of your skepticism about 3D transfers, are you tantalized enough by the prospect of the Millennium Falcon warping out of the screen directly into your lap that you'd think it was a shame if it didn't happen?

Then you better get out there this weekend and see The Phantom Menace in 3D.

Until now I'd thought it was a foregone conclusion that all six Star Wars films were returning to the big screen in three dimensions. Just yesterday in a Facebook thread, however, I learned that the fate of the remaining five films hinges on the success of this first one.

That's right, producer Rick McCallum let it slip that if Star Wars Episode I does not do enough box office on its 3D re-release, the remaining five movies will be not be re-released in 3D on the big screen. (This news is not new -- he said this mid-way through last year -- but I didn't learn about it until yesterday.)

Just an idle threat, to force us to go out and see a 3D Jar Jar Binks and a 3D baby Annakin Skywalker? Or a legitimate concern?

I'd be very surprised if George Lucas et al would pass up any chance to make a buck on any part of the Star Wars saga. Of course, the ordinary Hollywood business approach is not to greenlight sequels unless the first movie does well, and some of the same logic applies here. But would Lucas really want to take the PR hit that would come from shelving his remaining 3D transfers, simply because many fans didn't want to shell out $14.75 to see the Star Wars movie many of them considered the biggest disappointment?

And if that's the case, shouldn't we be even more disappointed that he chose to re-release them in this order, rather than the order of their theatrical release as many fans would have preferred? Surely many of us would be treating these 3D releases with more excitement if it were the 1977 Star Wars hitting theaters this weekend, right?

Then again, there's a good chance that The Phantom Menace will in fact make decent money this weekend, and for one or two weekends after that, which would make the whole thing moot. See, Lucas is not catering these 3D releases to the fans of the original movies -- he's catering them to the audience that grew up knowing The Phantom Menace as their first exposure to Star Wars. These are also the same fans who have to some degree grown up with 3D. Sure, 3D has only really taken off in the last couple years. But it stands to reason that the people who love The Phantom Menace are also younger and less jaded about 3D in general, meaning they are less likely to poo-poo these plans than us crotchety old thirtysomethings, who take every opportunity we can to shit on both Lucas and 3D.

But what if that group doesn't turn out either? It doesn't help that The Phantom Menace is hitting theaters on the most crowded release date of the new year. Movies like The Vow and Safe House don't figure to siphon off much of the core Star Wars demographic, but you can't say the same for the family adventure Journey 2: The Mysterious Island. Which is also in 3D.

I'm sure some of you reading this are rooting for the box office failure of The Phantom Menace, and don't give a shit what effect it has on other potential Star Wars re-releases. In fact, seeing Lucas eat crow might satisfy you more than anything else that has happened in the movie business for years.

Me? Well, I'm just tantalized enough by that Millennium Falcon jumping out of the screen at me that I have very mixed emotions.

But will I be supporting The Phantom Menace with a $14.75 ticket this weekend?

Nah.

At least the decision has been taken out of my hands. My father and stepmother are in town until next Monday, so I can't exactly sneak off to the movies by myself. Their presence does give my wife and me the opportunity to see a movie together while they babysit our son, but she's having none of The Phantom Menace, and rightly so. Really, I'm having none of it either ... but that doesn't mean I don't feel some ambiguity about it. So I guess I'm having "almost none" of it.

We'll probably be giving Chronicle our money instead, and that will feel right for my soul.

Besides, if we give The Phantom Menace a big box office, it won't create the necessary conditions for us to call McCallum's bluff.

Let's see how committed they really are to scrapping the other 3D transfers, or if they really were just trying to hold us hostage.

Remove the obstruction!

My wife is vetting movies for a horror film festival here in Los Angeles called Shriekfest. Her own short film appeared in Shriekfest in 2006, and she's volunteered one other year (2008 I think) as a person who reviews submissions and weighs in on what should make the final cut. I watched three features with her in that context, two of which were terrible and one of which was not half bad.

We're off to a slightly better start this time. Each of the past two nights we watched movies that looked like they could be terrible, and both ended up either pretty good (Amphibious 3D) or very good (Wilderness).

However, something bothered me about the experience of watching Amphibious, and I wanted to address it today.

Those of you who have received/watched a screener copy of a movie -- which is most of you I'm sure -- know that the studio/production company needs to stamp the movie with some kind of text that will keep it from becoming pirated. Sometimes this is the occasional scrolling of text along the bottom, explaining that this is for awards consideration and not for public display, or sometimes, as in Wilderness, it's the occasional appearance of a claim to ownership ("Property of Wildreness, LLC " is what the text read).

Amphibious took a different approach, an approach that nearly killed the viewing experience for me.

Amphibious was produced/financed/purchased/whatever by a company called Celsius Entertainment. I know this because their logo was on screen for every single moment of the movie, in two-inch-high, translucent letters, smack dab in the middle of the screen.

Here's how it looked:


Except the letters weren't green. As discussed, they were translucent.

So you could see the action behind. Except you couldn't see it as much as you wanted to see it. Each time your eyes had to fight past this unwanted graphic element that had been introduced into the middle of the action. "In an effects movie, too," my wife commented. Good point -- when there are special effects on the screen, it's even more important not to have your view obstructed by a watermark intended to prevent illegal copying.

And the effects in Amphibious were indeed somewhat special. I'll do the people at Celsius Entertainment a favor by not revealing what this movie's monster is, but it's a fairly original type of monster for this type of movie, created using fairly credible means. Given my previous experience with Shriekfest entries, I was conditioned to expect something absolutely terrible from a movie called Amphibious 3D, whose one "famous" actor is Michael Pare, star of such 80s movies as Eddie and the Cruisers and Streets of Fire. (Though shit, the guy hasn't stopped working -- he's been in a steady stream of straight-to-video schlock throughout his career, with occasional diversions into films you've heard of, such as The Virgin Suicides, Bloodrayne and The Lincoln Lawyer.) But hey, it was entertaining, if you get past the post-dubbing of all the dialogue, some of which was not particularly convincing.

Yet it works against your stated goal of getting into a film festival if you protect the movie so much that the people vetting it have their experience affected. There's a weird kind of contradiction going on here -- on the one hand, you are asking someone to admit you to a festival where genre fans will see your movie and potentially hype it by word-of-mouth. This is, by definition, a position in which you lack strength, in which you lack the confidence that you really have what it takes. Then on the other hand, you think you've got such a hot product on your hands that you have to go to extreme lengths to protect it from a black market eager to churn it out by the dozen to salivating customers on the street. If you've already got that level of demand for it, why do you need the film festival in the first place?

The other thing I wondered about Amphibious 3D, beyond the curious decision to burden us with the Celsius logo throughout, was how a film intended to be viewed in 3D (we of course did not view it that way) was marginal enough that it was struggling to make it into this film festival. (As of this typing, my wife has not decided if she's going to recommend it.)

My standard way of thinking about film festivals is that the production company is trying to use the festivals as a means of exposing their film to distributors. A movie with a done distribution deal does not need a film festival -- it just needs to sit back and let the distributor do its work.

Therefore, it seems like 3D movies should have already gotten to that point. Yes, 3D TVs are becoming more prevalent, but the majority of prospective viewers of a 3D movie are still going to need to go to the theater to see it. Therefore, it seems like a losing financial bet to make a movie in 3D if you don't already know that it will go to theaters. In fact, having watched Amphibious 3D, it seems there's a better than average chance that it will not ever show in theaters -- it may not be half bad, but that's with our standards adjusted downward. It's certainly a B movie, and not an intentional B movie like Piranha 3D -- it's a B movie because it stars B actors and essentially has very meager prospects of reaching a large audience.

In this country anyway. Who knows if it has the potential to play in 3D in the Netherlands, from whence came the financing, or Indonesia, where it was filmed.

At least the people in those countries will only have to see the word Celsius twice -- at the beginning and at the end.

3D hits January

There may be no greater sign of both the ubiquity of 3D, and the improving profile of January as a release month, than that there is now a high-profile 3D movie being released in January.

The Green Hornet is not the first movie in the recent 3D craze to be released in January. That honor goes to the execrable My Bloody Valentine 3D, which was released on January 16, 2009. But that film doesn't really exemplify the "new 3D" -- it's more of a throwback to the old days, when schlocky horror movies, such as Friday the 13th Part 3 and Jaws 3, were the most likely home for 3D.

The "new 3D" is superhero movies with big stars. Such as The Green Hornet. (Incidentally, I find it funny that the film's biggest star -- or at least best-known name -- is Cameron Diaz, and she's barely seen in the ads.)

In the past, a movie like The Green Hornet would have come out sometime between April and August, maybe not quite blockbuster enough to hold down a key summer release date, but certainly enough to come out during summer's early or late fringes. Nowadays, the calendar has gotten so packed, the studios have gotten so savvy about how to capture the available dollars, and 3D has become so prevalent, that this 3D superhero movie hits theaters on the second available release date of the new year.

The rehabilitation of the month of January may have truly begun in 2008, when, to my surprise, one of the most buzzed about films of the previous six months was released on January 18th. Yep, that's when Cloverfield dropped, and a week later, with a lot less fanfare but plenty of name recognition, came Rambo. The year 2009 reverted more or less to the status quo, with the third Underworld movie not really having the same sizzle as a Cloverfield. But that January produced two really big hits, Paul Blart: Mall Cop and Taken, reminding studio execs why January is not a month just to be sloughed off.

You really saw the difference in 2010, when three rather large-scale post apocalyptic effects movies were released on consecutive Fridays: Daybreakers, The Book of Eli and Legion. (For a longer discussion of that, see here.) None of them fared particularly well.

But The Green Hornet seems like a different kind of step forward. Not only is it 3D, but it's a superhero movie. And not even a superhero movie like Kick-Ass, which had little previous name recognition. No, most of us had at least heard of The Green Hornet, if only because we'd confused it with The Green Lantern. Just wait for that character's upcoming 3D incarnation this summer, arriving on a more traditional release date for such a film: June 17th.

I don't have a lot more to say about The Green Hornet, except that my initial disinterest has now evolved into moderate anticipation. I'm not likely to see it for a couple weeks, since I'm still focused on catching a couple more 2010 films in the theater before they leave. But I'm a lot likelier to prioritize a theatrical screening than I was a few months ago. Of course, the reviews could certainly dampen my enthusiasm if they're negative.

One thing I do want to comment on is this poster I chose above. It's pretty abstract, but with a clear view of it you can certainly tell what's going on.

A clear view of this image is not what's provided on the south face of a building on the 405 freeway, which I see as I'm driving north on my way home from work. (I thought I had a picture of it, but I see that the picture I tried to take on my phone was obstructed by one of those structures that holds the signs out over the highway). For a month now, I've been trying to puzzle out what the image was -- it just looked like a bunch of murky shapes, especially since the exterior of the building has an uneven surface, with raised edges running vertically down the side, which only serve to further obscure and distort the image. In fact, you would scarcely know it was even a Green Hornet poster if the east face of the same building didn't have the clearer ad featuring their car busting through a wall.

Maybe they chose that wall with the ridges because of its third dimension.

Number of sequels vs. number of dimensions

Saw VII is coming out today. Marking the seventh straight year -- and last, they tell us -- a Saw movie has been released the weekend before Halloween.

Except it's not called Saw VII. It's called Saw 3D.

I take issue in general with using the word "3D" in the title of a movie, in large part because it will only actually be experienced in the correct number of dimensions by a minority of the people who see it. Some will see it in a theater that isn't equipped for 3D, like the drive-in theater that sends me weekly emails, which had to specify it wasn't in 3D. Many more will see it later on video, where they probably either won't have the glasses or won't have the correct type of TV. Including the word "3D" in the actual title, then -- rather than saying [Title] in 3D!, a marketing campaign that would be limited to the period of time in which the theatrical release was being advertised -- is a kind of permanent deception of the viewing public.

But it looks like we're going to have to get used to seeing "3D" in the titles for movies, so let's not push that particular argument too far.

When it becomes really problematic is when the 3 in 3D is out of sync with the sequel number of the franchise in question. Like the Saw series.

Some series have gotten lucky. Some series -- like Jackass and Step Up -- were timed just perfectly so that the third movie in the series would be the one to take advantage of the current craze. Hence, this year's Jackass 3D and Step Up 3D. Hearkens back to the last major 3D trend, when the third Friday the 13th was in 3D, as was the third Jaws. (We should probably pause here to honor Pixar's restraint in resisting the urge to call their 2010 release Toy Story 3D.)

Or it can be the first movie in a series, like this year's Piranha 3D. I'm okay with that too. (Okay, you caught me -- this year's Piranha is actually sort of a third Piranha movie, as there were exactly two previously. However, Piranha II: The Spawning came out 29 years ago, so I hardly think this year's Piranha counts as a third movie to most viewers.)

But the Saw example is really problematic. Seeing the 3 on the poster may time warp some people back to 2006, when Saw III was coming out. (Though to be fair, they used roman numerals on those posters -- or actually, three uprooted teeth dangling from ropes.) For those expecting Saw VII to follow last year's Saw VI, there's a definite disconnect.

Which brings us back to the argument made at various times previously on this blog, about how studios think their franchises can get a boost if the latest release appears as some kind of a reboot. By destroying the sequel numbering system in the Saw series, they're trying to tell you that this movie could be something new and freshly worthy of your attention -- not just the seventh movie in a series. A roman numeral VII behind any movie title tends to cause snickers, even among its most devoted fans -- it's that point at which continuing on in a series strikes everyone as ridiculous. You might say that point should have logically been reached after a half-dozen, or even five, but the seventh movie really pushes it over the top.

Not so, now. Instead of this being the seventh Saw, it's the Saw that's in 3D. And also, the last Saw.

Or so they say.

I'll believe that when I don't see the next one in 2011. Or 2015. Or whenever they decide it's the perfect time to release Saw VIII.

Or, by that point, perhaps Saw 4D.

About face

Just over three weeks ago in this space, I was issuing dire predictions about the quality of Disney's A Christmas Carol.

Yesterday afternoon, I felt disappointed not to be seeing it a second time.

Amazing how actually seeing a movie can change your impression of it.

I caught A Christmas Carol a week before Thanksgiving, when a friend of mine was in the neighborhood and had some time to kill between an afternoon engagement and an evening engagement. This was earlier than I planned to see it, being one of those old-fashioned guys who doesn't acknowledge the beginning of the Christmas season until after Thanksgiving. I also thought I'd be seeing it with my wife, since she'd expressed some interest, and Dickens' tale plays a history in the formation of our relationship.

Yet I convinced myself of my own logic, that A Christmas Carol looked like a garish abomination, and that the only thing we could expect to get out of it was the hollow sensory enjoyment of some good 3-D on the IMAX screen. (Plus, it was the only thing playing at a convenient time that both my friend and I wanted to see, but hadn't already seen.) On these grounds I decided I'd probably be saving my wife the trouble of having to witness it herself -- keeping in the back of my mind the possibility that if it were really good, maybe I'd go with her a second time.

Well, it was really good. And yesterday was supposed to be that second time.

Yet on our walk home from brunch, my wife confessed that she didn't really want to see it -- even with my glowing review. I was glad she asserted her opinion in no uncertain terms, rather than letting me steamroll her into going against her will. You see, I had just steamrolled her into changing tables at brunch, mistakenly believing that we would both consider the new table an upgrade, when in fact it removed us from the direct sunlight that would have helped make sitting outside more palatable for her. I get that way sometimes, and a person who just wants to be agreeable can pay the price for my inadvertent headstrong behavior.

Still, I felt a sinking feeling inside me when she told me this. I accepted her decision, but thought it would be worth mentioning that the experience of A Christmas Carol would not be the same at home on DVD, without the astounding 3-D. She then took it one step further and said she might not ever want to see it. And to that there was no retort.

Realizing we were not going to A Christmas Carol made me realize that I had no excuse for a second chance to absorb that 3-D experience, and also made me recognize just how much value that experience itself has. I rarely see movies twice in the theater, yet with A Christmas Carol, I realized I was worried I wouldn't be seeing it twice. The last time I saw a movie twice in the theater was There Will Be Blood, when I arrived at the theater too late for the start of Semi-Pro. And though I love There Will Be Blood -- more than A Christmas Carol, to be sure -- I ended up feeling somewhat disappointed by the decision to revisit it on the big screen. Not that it wasn't still a great movie, just that if you're going to spend theater prices on something, might as well make it something new.

But that's where the 3-D is a real game changer. It's not just the same to wait and see it at home on DVD. Once you miss that 3-D experience, you won't ever get it again, barring some kind of extremely unusual theatrical re-release, which hasn't really been fashionable since before the days of video stores.

I've been split on 3-D in the past. I've complained that it affected my enjoyment of Up; since the 3-D was done somewhat indifferently in that movie, I found myself clawing at the glasses with no clear benefit. Yet I found it riveting in Monsters vs. Aliens and Beowulf, the latter of which was Robert Zemeckis' most recent use of the same kind of motion capture technology used in A Christmas Carol. I might have felt the same desire to see Beowulf again if there was a reasonable excuse to go again, but my wife saw it with me the first time. My second experience of Beowulf was at home on DVD, where I still liked it, but didn't feel that same sense of being engulfed by the action that IMAX 3-D had given me. While we're on the topic of 3-D, I'll also mention that the 3-D component was a factor for me in prioritizing seeing Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs in the theater, rather than waiting for DVD.

A Christmas Carol left little doubt of just how wonderful 3-D can be, if done correctly. As interpreted by Zemeckis and Jim Carrey, A Christmas Carol didn't move me, per se -- the familiar story hit the usual beats, but didn't really warm the cockles of my holiday heart. And so I'd have to say that the visuals themselves -- starting with the animation and expanding outward, literally, with the 3-D -- were what put A Christmas Carol over the top. As I suggested earlier, I felt surrounded by 19th century London in all its splendid detail, swooping through the city with the camera, and wondering if this landscape was really, truly sharing the same theater with me. Not to mention the fact that there are some wonderfully scary, trippy details in that movie.

But that kind of sensory experience doesn't hold the same currency with my wife, who really does need the cockles of her holiday heart to be warmed. That's something I just have to accept. In fact, I also have to accept that urging someone to see a movie isn't always going to yield positive results. As critics, we probably believe that our recommendation, made strongly enough, will hold enough weight to push someone off the fence, to be the crucial endorsement necessary to make even a skeptic see the film in question. But there are just some movies that some people are never going to want to see. Not only is my wife never going to want to see A Christmas Carol, but neither is another of my friends with whom I discussed the film, who also rejected my endorsement of Beowulf. It is what it is.

But I'm not really sad for them. They're adults, and they've made up their minds. I can only put so much heft into my guarantee of enjoyment, and then I just have to let it be. After all, they really may not enjoy it. Movies are extremely subjective experiences, and it's a mistake to assume someone will love something just because you did.

No, the person I'm really sad for is me. I realized yesterday afternoon how much I really wanted to see A Christmas Carol again, but how much I also needed a legitimate excuse to pony up another $16 for the ticket. On Thanksgiving I learned that my friend had gone a second time, having taken his wife the night before. That only whetted my appetite more.

Well, I'm an adult too. If I want to see A Christmas Carol a second time, then dammit, maybe I should just go. It seems absurd to consider such a thing during what is sure to become a very busy viewing season, very soon. Especially with my upcoming trip to Australia, which will knock out two weeks of prime year-end viewing.

But most of those other movies will probably be just as good on DVD.

If I'm ever going to see A Christmas Carol again, now is the time. They're going to need that IMAX screen for something else soon enough.

Stay tuned, dear readers, stay tuned ...