P3D Reporting from the 3-D Film Festival!

[Gabriel Jacob <jacob@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

First I'd like to say THANKS Andrew for the link to your web
page with the reviews from the 3-D festival a few years ago,
down under! Your right the link didn't work a few days ago,
so the attachment was much appreciated. 

The festival opened on July 2 with House of Wax. Arriving
downtown, I could see a big colorful 3-D banner that was
hanging from the theatre and the building across the street.
There were thousands of people and loud music playing and
large stages, but alas this was for the Jazz Festival that
was just around the corner. I don't know if this was a good
thing or a bad thing for the 3-D festival! There was never-
theless a respectable turn out at the 3-D opening.

I ran into the person (Sandros) that was in charge of
organizing and aquiring all the movies for the festival.
He had to look long and far to get these movies and went
as far as New Zealand! The person from New Zealand (Anthony)
is a film archivist and was present for the screenings! I told
him about the NSA convention next week and gave him the
details if he wished to attend. He was definitely interested
but wasn't sure if he would drive that many hours, although
he would be in New York next week. Another film distributer
from California will be coming up next week (to screen some
other 3-D movies) but his name escapes me at the moment.   

For the House of Wax, I met an interesting gentlemen (Tom) in
the lobby that had seen the original screening in the FIFTIES!
It was very interesting talking with him and he mentioned how
they had live entertainment before the movie. This was in a
theatre in New York City. Paramount, I think. Interestingly
enough, we had a comedian introduce the opening of the festival
and the movie and who also introduced the sponsors to this 
event. He also said a few lame jokes! The movie itself was alot
of fun (although there were some vertical misalignments). After
the movie, Tom mentioned to me that the character playing Igor
was actually Charles Bronson! I never would have guesssed,
although I did recognize Clint Eastwood (and some other actors)
in, Creature from the Black Lagoon.

House of Wax was of course projected polarized but I found
it interesting that they had plastered polarized and 
anaglyph glasses on the front windows of the theatre. I
thought this was for publicity purposes but they said that
some of the movies would be shown as anaglyphs. I never
seen an anaglyph 3-D movie, so this was going to be a treat.

Sure enough the next day the Creature from the Black Lagoon,
and Revenge of the Creature were shown as 16mm anaglyphs.
During the movie they had a photographer from the Mirror
newspaper, taking pictures of us (the audience) wearing
those silly ;-) anaglyph glasses. The Black Lagoon was very
good although again there was some vertical misalignment.
Surprisingly the underwater scenes didn't have any alignment
problems (I would have thought these would have been much
harder to film 3-D wise)and were especially well done. I
couldn't say as much for the second movie, Revenge of the
Creature. This one had almost no alignment problems but the
3-D effect was very poor. I don't know if it was a problem
with the colors or just a bad copy.

Most of the people that I met so far have been primarly
movie buffs first rather than 3-D buffs. Hopefully this
will change! ;-) 

Anyways, so far it's been a blast and funny enough, through
all the screenings so far, the audience actually claps and
cheers at the end of the movie. I don't think I've seen this
happen at an Imax 3-D movie!  

Screening continue till July 18 and aDDDmision is only $5,
and that is in our devalued Canadian (CDN)money (which currently
in US currency would be $3.30). The glasses costed an extra
dollar CDN. For those brave enough to sit through multiple 
screening or feast on over two weeks of 3-D movies, they 
also have a passport for $45 CDN, which allows you to see
as many 3-D movies as your eyes can tolerate!

As mentioned a few days ago, there was an interesting article
on the 3-D festival and 3-D in general, in the Saturday Gazette
(Arts & Entertainment section). There were quite a few factual
errors but I guess that is usually the case! Incidentally this
weeks (July 1) free Mirror newspaper also has an article on the
festival (page 36) AND there is also funny cartoon taking a
satirical look at the IMAX movie, "Encounter in the 3rd
Dimension." This is on page 29 but luckily enough those outside
Montreal who don't have access to the Mirror can check it out
on the Web (which is also in color unlike the one in the news-
paper) at, http://www.montrealmirror.com/meat/mpp.html

Gabriel, reporting from the 3-D festival in Montreal and who
wished he could be reporting from this years NSA convention
in Green Bay! Best wishes to those that do attend and please
report back to P3D! See ya next year! :-)

  


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