I go to the cinema a lot, at least once and week, and sometimes twice a week when the releases are coming thick and fast.

I’ll watch and enjoy a range of films, from gritty thrillers to foreign cinema to ‘for the kids’ animation. During the last 9 months 3D films have been cropping up more and more at the local multiplex, Bolt, Monsters vs Aliens, Coraline and Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs which has since gone on to be the highest grossing 3D film in the UK.

The film’s marketing companies shout the line of “3D is a better, more enjoyable cinema experience”, and they are correct in some cases, Coraline’s 3D was excellent and the best show case for the technology so far, it was immersive and added a great deal to the experience – it did improve an already very good film. Other films haven’t impressed as much, Bolt was good, but Monsters vs Aliens was pretty average and Ice Age 3’s 3D was hardly noticeable and pretty pointless.

Now, if you listen to the film studio owners – they will say that 3D is a technology brought in to help stop piracy. Reports suggest that 25% of potential revenue is lost due to film piracy – illegal downloads of films, and 90% of those have allegedly been filmed with a camcorder in a cinema. So to stop this, 3D films can’t be recorded with a camera – with a single lens camera and obviously one that isn’t able to wear a pair of 3D glasses, the result of trying to capture a 3D film this way is a blurry picture.

From these 2 points it all sounds very good – the cinema goers gets a better experience [albeit not always], and the film studios hopefully make more money, or at least they don’t loose some of the revenue that was previously lost to piracy.

Now, for the errors that have been made since the launch of 3D films, and this is mostly the fault of the actual cinemas.

Our cinema of choice is Cineworld in Ipswich, we have monthly cards allowing us to watch unlimited films for £13.50 each Рwhich is great. The price of a cinema ticket is about £7.00, so we only have to go twice in the space of a month for it to work out cheaper. Now, for 3D films they have been adding on an extra charge (£2.00 each, or £5.00 for a family ticket) Рnot to pay for the glasses, but for the extra cost that the cinema has had to make in buying the special 3D projectors it needs to show the films.

Following this, and I’m sure to appease their customers they have been putting on 2D versions of the films for people that don’t want to spend the extra on a 3D ticket. After the films I’ve seen I’m not fussed about seeing the 3D version and I’m certainly not going to spend an extra ¬£2.00 on seeing the 3D version. Now, if I’m not unique others will think the same and have possibly forced the hand of the cinema to put on the 2D versions. And of course, these 2D versions are able to be filmed by pirates.

This is evidence that 3D films are not drawing in the extra crowds. Surely if 3D films were doing their job they would create extra revenue and profit for the cinema, this extra revenue would cover the costs of the equipment upgrade and they wouldn’t need to be passed on to the customer. Or that the cinema is milking the excuse for extra revenue. I for one will only be watching the 2D versions in the future.

i only subscribed to my first podcast around 6 months ago, but i very quickly found the variety and quality of audio content out there rather appealing. so i thought i would share a list of my favourites with you, starting with film podcasts.

the film program is bbc four’s half hour show presented by francine stock, it features interviews with cast and directors from british classics, forgotten oldies and recent cinema releases. so if you like finding out about films you may of missed first time around – then this is definitely recommended. they also feature a recommended dvd release and a film from the week’s schedule to watch (uk focused). subscribe

mark kermode’s film review’s is one of my favourites, produced by bbc five live and featuring simon mayo and mark kermode. ‘dr kermode’ is usually spot on with his commentary and reviews – it’s hard for me to disagree, even when he’s in full rant mode about a film i should (and sometime do) really like. the show features reviews from each of the week’s cinema releases, as well as having a run down of the box office top 10. subscribe

movies you should see features a bunch of northerners discuss at length one film, usually taking around an hour to dissect all the parts of a film, from the actors, director, script, music, location, cinematography and special effects. it can occasionally fall into a laughing fest and there’s quite a bit of swearing, but their enthusiasm for film shines through. subscribe

i went to see ‘the dark knight’ yesterday evening, a special advance preview at my local cinema – a day before the official release tonight.

the film impressed me, it was as good as the first – if not better, and christopher nolan has again raised the bar for superhero films.

but what impressed me more was the the experience at my local cinema, one that i’d been going to for over 20 years. firstly, the screen and cinema is huge – a lot bigger than any of the screens at a near by mutliplex. the sound system was recently upgraded and is as good as you will find in an odeon, a uci or whatever and it’s also a lot cheaper. last night’s ticket was √Ǭ£5.50, the last time i went to a big chain cinema is was nearly √Ǭ£8.00 for the ticket!
one thing that i didn’t expect in the middle of a 152 minute film was an intermission, but an intermission we got and it was a chance to dehydrate ourselves with an ice cream. i always thought that intermissions were forced on the cinema if the film was too long and the roll needed changing – this may or may not be true. i think the reason in this case was to sell a few more ice creams and drinks and i don’t mind that at all – independent cinema needs all the help it can get on the financial front.

the best thing about last nights cinema were the adverts, the screening was at 7:30 and i wasn’t prepared for the film to start for at least 20 minutes after that – but the adverts started at 7:15, there was only one trailer and the actual film got under way at a couple of minutes past 7:30pm. i’ve been saying for ages they should show the adverts on loop before the actual screening time – but i know advertisers would never go for it, because it would miss out on the greatest possible amount of viewers for that screening.

so the film was great and the experience was a memoriable one and that has a lot to do with our local, 2 screen independent cinema. well done flicks

photograph by microbi

a short while ago i was contacted by a nice chap called scott, and he asked me if he could use one of my photographs [this one] on a dvd case for a new film that was about to be released.

he didn’t give me any information, apart from the fact there was no budget to pay to use the photo – my thinking at the time was some money would of been nice, but having my photo on the case was pretty cool, so i didn’t grumble and i let them use the photograph in question.

that was 2 months ago, and last week scott contacted me again and this time he sent through the final design for the case. it’s not the best design that i’ve ever seen – but, my photo is on the back and as it turns out the film stars ice t and gary busey – people who i’ve actually heard of – so that’s pretty cool.

here’s the layout.

the funny thing is that the photograph was taken using a 1.3 mega pixel camera phone, not exactly state of the art photography equipment.

i’m having a bit of a movie weekend, and it was rounded off with watching this cute little song and dance penguin film which also has a strong environmental theme. sounds like it is trying to do too many things – and that does hurt the story telling. it does make you smile and chuckle out loud, but the one thing that did it for me was the animation – it really was stunning, the makers went for photographic realism and it works. the water scenes are especially realistic, it’s a shame the dvd extras didn’t go very far into the geeky side of the film making process as it would of been interesting to see what the makers process was.

night watch was probably the best Russian film i’ve ever seen… OK, it was the first and only Russian film i’ve ever seen! But it was an inspired piece of film making from highly acclaimed director / writer Timur Bekmambetov.

the sequel’s trailer has just been released on the apple trailers website and it looks stunning – check out the high def trailer here.

Oh, and the third installment is in production at the moment, imaginatively called ‘Dusk Watch‘ and it’s being filmed in English unlike the previous two as this one is being co-financed by Fox.

one of the most visually stunning trailers currently circulating the internet is for 300. a story about the 480 B.C. Battle of Thermopylae, where the King of Sparta led his army against the advancing Persians. adapted from a frank miller novel, this looks like gladiator only on a high dose steroids! check out the hi-def trailer here.

i’ve just finished watching cars from the kings of the animated film, pixar. in my opinion it’s not their best film as it doesn’t top finding nemo, the incredibles or monsters inc but visually it is stunning. you could pause the film at any moment and there is so much detail in the frame and this is only their 7th film – they are going to keep getting better at this animation game!

one of the fun things with a pixar animation is spotting the voice talent behind the different characters and apart from the usual hollywood actors and actresses there’s some surprising people in there – including the uk’s very own motor mouth, jeremy clarkson who pop’s up as lightening mcqueen’s agent in cars.

up next for pixar is Ratatouille, a story about a parisian rat who enjoys the finer foods that’s available to him. watch the trailer here.

i know this sounds ridiculous and believe me, my girlfriend called me something along those lines when i started swinging my powerbook around the room like a sword, but it’s now possible with this little application called macsaber.

you need a SMS (Sudden Motion Sensor) enabled mac for this to work, the application picks up the motions and movement of your mac and turns them into really realistic light saber type noises. oh, and if you’ve got a mac laptop with a backlit screen it will create brighter flashes with the more violent movements!

going on the trailer, this film looks fantastic – but trailers always make films look good don’t they?!

plus point number 1, it’s directed by Joe Carnahan who directed narc (which was great) and was at one time signed up to direct mission impossible 3. second plus point, the cast is really cool. some big names along side some real talent (ben aflect, jason bateman, andy garcia, ray liotta and alicia keys). final plus point, i really can’t imagine how this can be anything but cool – just watch the trailer – how many characters and action sequences and possible black comedy moments does this one film have? expectations are high with this one.