IMAX: The Downfall of a (once) great format

It’s ironic that Cinemark is now suing IMAX over claims by IMAX that Cinemark stole stealing trade secrets the firm openly reveals in it’s rapid retrofit expansion. IMAX once meant “giant ass screen”, the firm now says they want to be known for providing an “immersive viewing experience”. Okay, okay, sure - IMAX is just that but the new retrofits? Unless it’s in 3-D, which IMAX does better than anyone else (although I haven’t seen a digital IMAX 3-D flick yet, perhaps Aviator), but a 2-D feature? I felt ripped off when I saw Robots at Showcase Cinemas Buckland Hills (Manchester, CT), an early retrofit. Buckland Hills, while a great theater never had giant screens, they took one of their large theaters, shoved in a wall to wall screen, removed two rows of seats, and upgrade the sound - bam, they’re hanging a banner for the grand opening of a new IMAX screen.

AMC and Regal jumped on the retrofit bandwagon and its spawned some outrage online amongst bloggers and twitters, most famously Parks and Recreation star Aziz Ansari. To be fair - IMAX should have done some research into what people commonly think of as the IMAX experience. Moving a screen closer to an audience doesn’t seem to qualify to me - first and foremost, the IMAX frame has a distinctive shape: the new retrofits, don’t.

As for traditional films “blow up” to IMAX: a letter box effect occurs - shouldn’t film loyalists insist on masking for IMAX? Maybe that negates its intent, but it was fun seeing Batman: The Dark Knight open up to a full IMAX frame, I don’t know if the new digital systems and screen configurations do it.

Further cheapening the IMAX experience, which has been hit over the head, again and again: I thought like 3-D, there could be a new language surrounding IMAX. Thinking of the works of indigenous national cinema that appears from the Middle East, former Soviet nations, Africa, and other far flung corners of the world - you have a lot of new space and no rules. How does one compose a shot for IMAX verses traditional 16:9? Filmmakers were answering these questions, but IMAX like all good things, like film, actually, is now being taken over by Hollywood storytellers.

IMAX’s beginnings mirror that of early cinema. Once upon a time Auguste and Louis Lumiere used the moving image as a spectacle: it was special, photographing mundane activities such as a train arriving at a platform or works leaving a factory. IMAX started with nature documentaries, using it’s large screens as a spectacle, often at museums, amusement parks, World’s Fairs, and other special tourist events. It wasn’t till Sony Theaters opened their Lincoln Square Theatre in 1995 that IMAX started looking towards Hollywood. Lincoln Square opened with 12 screens of Hollywood and indie-wood flicks, and an IMAX that was showing 3-D features, one about fish, and the other was the stunning ethnographic and lyrical documentary The Last Buffalo.

There were filmmakers exploring IMAX, including Greg MacGillivray (a nature and sometimes ethnographical documentarian), Jean-Jacques Annaud (director of Wings of Courage, per IMDB the first “dramatic IMAX feature”), and Steven Low (Low has created commissioned art pieces in the format, as well as directed an early dramatic IMAX narrative, Across the Sea of Time). Stan Brackhage even hand painted an IMAX film, Night Music (although never shown in IMAX sadly, I learn). It’s no wonder Brackhage would have been attracted to IMAX, it was a powerful new medium of cinematic expression.

This is not to say Hollywood ruins everything. IMAX is a public traded company, they have shareholders and they grew their brand while ruining their quality - in fact that’s the key - they are a brand. I heard they wanted to be thought of as a brand worth paying extra for, like Starbucks. Sure you can grab a 75 cent cup of coffee or a sweet-ass $4 latte. But IMAX unlike Starbucks doesn’t insure you’re experience will be identical from Manchester, CT to Manchester, England - and here is lies my objectives to what it’s become - often made clear by other smarter people: it used to mean a giant ass screen, now it means an immersive experience. The films used to be “special” and “educational”, now when you get to your local theater that has an IMAX screen you have the option to see the film projected in a traditional theater or IMAX.

What is worse I think is that new constructions are being retrofitted, IMAX should be a star attraction, it should be a giant theater, larger than the rest of the complex - you should be able to see it from the outside and say “hey - that’s the IMAX screen.” For those reading this in the Buffalo area the Regal Cinemas on Transit Road in Williamsville is just that: it’s a real big screen IMAX.

Because this is a premium brand IMAX gives rights to certain territories to operators. That is AMC, Regal and a few one-off operators have IMAX screens. Apparently Cinemark, pissed that their competitors locked up key markets rebelled and copied the idea, creating XD: Extreme Digital.

Extreme Digital from the photos I’ve seen is a similar format and good for them. IMAX uses two digital projects, a slightly larger screen and better sound. IMAX can only show films that studios make available to them, meanwhile XD, virtually the same thing can show Real D 3-D films and any digital film out there: virtually anything. IMAX at this point looks like a middleman.

They’ve sold out alright, the differences are so subtle I’m not sure untrained audience members will notice the difference (but they’ll shell out an additional $4-5 for the experience). There have always been IMAX imitations out there, iWerks built “extreme screens”, other theater chains have big screen theaters they play up: Harkins Theaters Cine Capri, Marcus Theaters Ultra Screen (in some markets larger than IMAX retrofits), and Crown Theaters Odyssey Screen (one still open at Bow Tie Palace in Hartford, which is larger than the Buckland Hills IMAX 10 miles east).

AMC, IMAX’s number one customer, the first to commit to 100+ new digital IMAX screens even created their own screen. When they couldn’t put an IMAX in their brand new Younge & Dundas 24 in Toronto they created EXT: Enhanced Theatre Experience. I was in this auditorium for the Toronto Film Festival and the experience was unremarkable, especially in digital (might have been the film I saw, a lower budget indie named Passenger Side). The sight lines weren’t great, neither as the sound (then again, this wasn’t an action flick), and the picture didn’t “take up” the whole screen, it seemed picture size equaled that of a non-EXT auditorium.

What Cinemark is doing is pretty brilliant: they’re exposing IMAX as a scam, if they and AMC can do it, then every theater operator can. At this point IMAX ceases to be a premium, and like various wide screen branded formats they will get lost in the fray.

When I first heard about digital IMAX I had to check to see it was April 1. I think the museum IMAX locations will always exist, but retrofitting existing auditoriums and digital 3-D isn’t the answer to get people back out to the movies. “Alternative content” maybe be one route, as the Opera seem to do well, but what about the basics. Creating excitement is something that needs to happen more often, event films are exciting, getting there, lining up - it’s like going to a rock show, they are far and few between.

Status of Stuff: Hollow Spaces/Post Production

Once in a while a blog is a place not to analyze films you’ve seen recently but to chat about what the hell you’ve been up to. This is one such “update”. Over the summer I stopped updating a blog for fear I had nothing interesting to say out of fear that I was just an aggregator and not an actual content provider, I still don’t know, but this at least will be somewhat original.

What have I been up to lately, then? Glad you asked.

I’ve been working through post-production on Hollow Spaces and found I accidently made a longer film than I intended, it’s still the movie I intended to make, but it’s hard to put it in a box: is a long short or a short feature. I was depressed but it’s for all purposes the film I intended and hoped to make, not 100% of coarse, nothing ever is, but I’m stuck with a challenge. There’s not much to cut, but there’s more that could be fleshed out, there’s also the question of the ending - which I think could be enhanced - without saying much.

There’s the basic technical elements that need correction (sound, fine edits, music score, ect.) so I’m going to finish those over the next month. There’s nothing that needs to be reshot from what I see so far, but there’s a lot of work in melding what’s already shot into a film that has the emotional impact I hoped for when scripting and shooting it. Obviously along the way compromises are made, we shot it quickly, cheaply, but I think what we lacked in money and time is there in passion - there are some scenes that give me goosebumps to watch, they are that raw and well acted.

I suppose it’s important to be proud of what you do - I just want this to be a masterpiece in terms of tone, mood and performance. Technically it’s not 100% because for a good period in the shoot it was me and my HDV camera and the actors, a few lights but a very light crew, I like to think that worked to our advantage in terms of getting natural performances, of coarse I could always use a person or two to keep me in check - but maybe I’m being overly critical.

Of coarse post production is in full swing and I haven’t gotten it to the point where I’m anxious to show it off and run test screenings (I will most likely do that perhaps both in my apartment complex and with UB’s Media Study department). DMS is full of generous and smart people who hopefully tell it like it is.

As for other things going on Mary May’s Suicide Letter is screening in two film festivals: it’s playing before the opening night feature at the Big Apple Film Festival (tomorrow at 6:30PM) and again on Saturday night at the Hartford International Film Festival at 11:30PM. Hopefully this time next year Hollow Spaces will be having it’s film festival life - although I’m not sure what category it’ll be slotted into (short or feature).

I am encouraged to learn that while I’ve always said content should dictate running time and a film should be only as long as it has to be (advice I wish Michael Bay would follow) - some of my favorite filmmakers have been in the same boat (making 45-60 minute mini-features) including Kelly Reichardt and Francois Ozon. Therefore if anything I should work on making the film better, not worry about classification and accept it. There are festivals that do show “mini-features” so perhaps Hollow Spaces will have a life there, I’d like to think it just might.