{"id":1195,"date":"2013-10-15T08:55:55","date_gmt":"2013-10-15T14:55:55","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/sebersole.wordpress.com\/?p=1195"},"modified":"2013-10-15T08:55:55","modified_gmt":"2013-10-15T14:55:55","slug":"the-movie-experience","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ebersolemedia.com\/blog\/the-movie-experience\/","title":{"rendered":"The “movie” experience"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Gravity\"<\/a>I saw a movie last week. Not just any movie. Gravity<\/em>, in IMAX 3D. It was amazing. Not every movie needs (or benefits from) the big screen, 3D perspective and awesome surround sound…but Gravity<\/em> definitely brought it all together in a way that has to be experience to be appreciated. If you haven’t already seen Gravity<\/em>, don’t wait for the DVD or Netflix. Like Lawrence of Arabia<\/em> in 70mm (still remember seeing it at the Naro theater in Norfolk, VA in late 1989) some movies need to be appreciated as the “larger-than-life” event that they are.<\/p>\n

The great thing about IMAX is the sensation that comes from having your vision and hearing FILLED with the director’s creative vision. I suppose motion-controlled seating and “Smell-O-Vision” might have heightened the experience even more, but there was plenty of sensory stimulation as it was.<\/p>\n

Filmmakers have, almost from the start, longed to have complete control over the viewer’s experience. It didn’t take long for them to discover that a large screen in a dark room minimized visual distractions while an audio system capable of high-fidelity at high volume drowned out the coughing and fidgeting of the audience.<\/p>\n

At the turn of the last century, when motion pictures were the only game in town, projecting a grainy black-and-white image on a draped bed sheet was good enough. But that wouldn’t last long. Soon a soundtrack replaced the live pianist and speaking characters preempted the need for title cards and subtitles. Larger screens and Technicolor soon followed. Then TV was invented. Hollywood studios and producers, worried that their audiences would stay home and stop going to the movies, decided to try to create an even bigger experience. The list of bigger-is-better movie technologies exploded;\u00a0Todd-AO, Cinerama,\u00a0Cinemascope, \u00a0Super and Ultra Panavision, 70mm,\u00a0IMAX, and Vistavision are just a few. Advances in audio technology were just as spectacular. Stereo gave way to Surround Sound as Dolby Digital and THX found new ways to make us “feel” the soundtrack.<\/p>\n

At 4.5 years in the making, Gravity<\/em> is a tour-de-force of CGI and audio. Because I’ve never experienced space I was ill-equipped to determine whether anything looked or sounded “wrong,” but I do know that not once was I jarred back to reality by an errant shot or sound. The director launched me into space and I didn’t land on my feet until the 90-minute movie had run its course. \u00a0It was a great ride.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I saw a movie last week. Not just any movie. Gravity, in IMAX 3D. It was amazing. Not every movie needs (or benefits from) the big screen, 3D perspective and awesome surround sound…but Gravity definitely brought it all together in a way that has to be experience to be appreciated. If you haven’t already seen … <\/p>\n

Continue reading “The “movie” experience”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8,13],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1195","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-film","category-media-effects"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ebersolemedia.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1195","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ebersolemedia.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ebersolemedia.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ebersolemedia.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ebersolemedia.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1195"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/ebersolemedia.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1195\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ebersolemedia.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1195"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ebersolemedia.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1195"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ebersolemedia.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1195"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}