Buchanicus
Menegroth
Aug 22 2009, 11:02pm
Views: 1395
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Impressions after attending "Avatar Day" event.
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First of all, I'd like to say this was the most uneventful, event. (footage aside). There was nothing at my screening to make it special really. With all the hype and all the secrecy surrounding this project, and with the whole thing being tagged "Avatar Day", I expected a little more "hoopla". There wasn't really security (not that i'm objecting) monitoring anything. There was a warning about recording devices in the email, and I overheard a manager politely tell a coupol eof people individually that mobile devices were not allowed inside, but that was it, they didn't announce that to the whole crowd or even check (I've been to advance screeings before in which the "wands" were used to make sure no one was taking in their phone or recorder or whatevere). Once 6pm rolled around, an uncomfortable woman (who may or may not have worked for FOX) read a very short greeting from an email she apparently just received and hadn't read before right then..learning what Avatar was, what was happening and where she was all at the moment she read it on the sheet of paper, and basically all she said was "thanks for coming to Avatar Day", that was the extent of the information. And once the footage was over, no one said anything, in fact, everyone in the theater kinda had to guess that we should all get up and leave. No SWAG, no questionaires, no nothing. Now I'm not really complaing about the lack of all this stuff, I just thought it was eally weird, especially since the whole point of this was to hype the movie.
Now as far as what we saw...
There was 16 miutes of footage, I believe it was 5 scenes and about a minute and a half of montage/trailer footage at the end (It was basically all the footage from the trailer that hadn't beeen included within the completed scenes).
I thought that the movie and FX and environments and design and all that were very, very cool. I'm excited about seeing this movie, and learning what the story is, and immersing myself into this new world. Based on all those elements, I think this movie truly has potential to be one of the SciFi/Fantasy greats.
But as far as the 3D/IMAX experience...I was truly underwhelmed. Now after reading and hearing other peoples reactions to the footage, i know that there are many who were blown-away and thought it all looked amazing, but I also know I'm not alone in my thoughts and opinions on the matter.
I do realize that a lot of this has to de with personal preference, but I just do not care about the 3D experience. I'm not a casual movie-goer by any means, I go to the movies usually at least one a week and see a lot of "genre" type films multiple times in the theater. I do have experince with 3D films ever since they were reintoduced and once again pushed on the american public, but generally, if I have a choice I go to see the "2D" screening instead.
To me, Avatar looked like just another 3D movie (and I will point out again this was an IMAX 3D screen). Nothing looked particularly ground-breaking to me. Did it look cool/really neat? Yes it did...and I was relieved that the 3D served to add depth instead of use "3D gags". but I did not think it looked THAT cool. There was blurring, focus issues...to me the overall picture didn't look very sharp or clear, and it seemed to be a little dark. And those glasses...let me tell you I was sick of wearing them even after only 16 minutes, especially since I myself wear glasses to see. It wasn't comepletely miserable or anything like that, but it was distracting and not something I'd prefer. I did not leave the theater experience with anything that would get me excited or on-board with seeing a 3D movie, especially since this is the film that it suppose to change the way we view films and 3D and expand to technology and all that.
Personally, I thought the trailer on my computer looked better (granted I watched it in HD on an HD monitor) actually looked better. I thought the colors were more vibrant, the picture was clearer and brighter...I just thought overall it looked better, and the two people I was with agreed with me. Since my local theater has digital projectors and digital sound in all of its auditoriums, I can tell you now that is how I will be seeing this film come December. I definitely prefer the digital experience over the 3D/IMAX one.
Now these are just my opinions, I think 3D and even IMAX to a point are overated, I have never had an experience with either on that have truly blown me away in a manner that would make want to prefer those formats. But I hope everybody would make up their own minds. but I will say that whenever people say "have you seen it in 3D on IMAX?!? That's how you should see it!", my reaction is to say, "well have you seen it in digital, form a real digital projector?"
TORn member formally known as ryan1976.
(This post was edited by Buchanicus on Aug 22 2009, 11:04pm)
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