The Wandering Chicken

Adventures in the Third Dimension

Roger Ebert has been riling up folks a lot lately. First, he offended a young generation of avid gamers when he dismissed the artistic merits of video games. Now, on the trend of 3-D movies, he’s written the provocatively titled “Why I Hate 3-D (And You Should Too)” in Newsweek.

It should be noted that the title was probably an editorial decision, not the author’s. Ebert doesn’t actually hate 3-D; he simply hates the trend, driven mostly by marketing, to convert 2-D movies into 3-D. And on that score, he’s absolutely correct. These “3-D” versions “add nothing to the experience” (I’d argue they detract from it), “can be a distraction,” and suffer from the noticeable dimness he mentions. As such, these fraudulent 3-D movies are indeed a trick to get the audience to pay a premium for what is actually an inferior experience.

That said, I am not pessimistic on the prospects for 3-D movies, at least in certain applications. “Avatar” on true IMAX in 3-D was pretty remarkable, and I suspect the technology will only get better and the production cost lower.

But I do struggle with 3-D. Until the technology is good enough that the 3-D film experience is indistinguishable from real life (and you don’t have to wear glasses), the films themselves will suffer. What I mean is: until you can look at any part of the screen and it is in focus and three dimensional, there will be a disconnect that throws you out of the story. Until the technology succeeds in drawing no attention to itself, the technique will distract from the basic goal of the film - to absorb you in the story.

I think this is what Ebert’s getting at when he says he can’t imagine a “serious drama” in 3-D. With the technology available, neither can I. But I don’t think it’s because you couldn’t tell a great story in 3-D (artists do it all the time - it’s called a play), but because in movies with live human beings and material sets, the sort of randomness of what is actually 3-D and what is not creates a distance between audience and story.

I think “Avatar” is useful in illustrating the point. The small portion of the movie that included mostly live actors and physical sets was vastly inferior to its computer-generated counterpart of Pandora. Where everything (ironically?) felt natural in the digitized world of Pandora, the scenes on the spacecraft felt slightly off, the movements and focus askew. At least that was my experience.

It’s a matter of expectation, I think. I have no frame of reference for Pandora. It’s make-believe, so I am not burdened by how I actually view things in real life. I assume a Pixar movie in 3-D would be similarly mind-blowing. But I do have a frame of reference for how I view people and how they interact with others and objects. Where in 2-D, a director can direct my focus and I’m willing to be directed because I have mentally accepted that there will be certain limitations in how I can view a moving picture on a screen, 3-D makes a promise it can’t currently keep. Occasionally I want to look at the extra in the background, not the giant star hovering in front. But the film doesn’t refocus on what I want. That’s what your mind expects from three dimensional perception.

My guess is we’ll get there eventually and everything we watch will be like being in the Holodeck on the Enterprise. But it’s a long ways off, and I agree with Ebert that Hollywood’s insistence that 3-D is the savior for ALL movies is misguided and shortsighted.

I am interested more though in the two technologies Ebert mentions as alternates to 3-D - MaxiVision48 and Showscan. Those sound at the very least like a tremendous bridge between the current 2-D world of film and a truly immersive 3-D one.