A different post this one. With all the hype around a certain director's latest 'epic' film (on a reported $250m budget) and it's already been touted through the usual marketing fluff that this stuff brings along. It's all about the 'IMAX' take. But, is that really genuine?
Lets be frank. I haven't got an IMAX theatre near me. Save for a plane trip to the mainland. In fact, there's only around 50 places on the planet that have an IMAX theatre. And then there's the 'it was all shot on an IMAX camera' narrative as well.
So? No, really, so what? What's the point? What's your real marketing take here? For something I can't see in any case? What do you expect me to think of this?
I'm not going to be seeing it at an IMAX theatre, because I don't have one anywhere near me. And even if/when I do see it, it's going to be cropped to buggery, so the marketing fluff means absolutely nothing.
Some movies are costing a couple of hundred million dollars to make. Hundreds of millions. Is it any wonder people make noise about the rediculous amounts of money being used to make this kind of entertainment. I mean, just think about it. Just... why??
I don't at all mind the idea of seeing something in IMAX. But, when you're left with only a handful of places around the world that you can see it from, when it's probably only going to be a double-2K digital IMAX anyway, it's of no value to the vast bulk of your cinema going audience. Most are only going to see it at a standard theatre.
The rest I think I'll leave to the following from John Soares, off Linkedin, which explains better some of what I've mentioned:
Since some of you are getting ready to go out and see THE ODYSSEY this weekend in IMAX (the way Old Man Nolan insists that you do), I thought I would share some disappointing facts with you about this format.
While true IMAX 70mm film presentations are actually shockingly impressive, as a lifelong student of motion picture arts and sciences, I have only ever seen two in my entire life. There are only 52 auditoriums on the entire planet capable of running this format. Although Nolan insists that this is the way his film is intended to be seen, almost no one will ever come near a facility capable of showing it to them.
What most of you know as IMAX is actually Digital IMAX, which uses a kind of perceptual illusion to trick the mind. Most of them still use two 2K projectors that project the same image simultaneously, slightly offset from itself. This increases the brightness and creates a false impression of an increase in resolution. In reality, your 4K television at home has twice the resolution capacity of your local IMAX auditorium. There is a newer 4k system (still only the same as your home theater) but it is still vastly outnumbered by facilities that still use the older one.
During my years in the studio system, I also heard rumors of more than one study that showed that almost no human being could distinguish between a 2K projection and a 4K projection beyond the fourth row and that, from the back row, a standard-definition image (like an old DVD) was passable.
Have fun at the movies.
