No I’m not talking about CGI, but the 3D stuff. I know I can’t be the only one who has noticed how much crap is flying at the screen lately, possibly the absolute worst offenders are the recent installments of the Resident Evil franchise but its pretty much across the board in kids films even. I know its to take advantage of 3D cinemas, but it seems at home 3D has become a niche product so at least for the foreseeable future no home viewers will be taking advantage of 3D.
Will people a decade or two from now be wondering what is up with all the crap flying at the screen?
Well, this has already happened – look at the 3D films from the 1950s, and say whether or not you think they’re “weird”. Or the ones from the 1980s 3D boom.
My feeling – the older films don’t stand out as particularly weird, except when they go out of their way to be outrageous. I first saw most of these in 2D and didn’t even know they were supposed to be in 3D. Creature from the Black Lagoon, It Came from Outer Space, Murders in the Rue Morgue, House of Wax, even Dial M for Murder all work prerfectly well as 2D flicks. It’s only after I learned that they were 3D that I understood exactly why some shots were made the way they were – the close-up of the fossil Cresature’s hand in tCftBL, the head-on crash of the spaceship in ICfOS, and so one. The paddle-ball ballyhoo guy in House of Wax and the guy falling toward the camera (into a net) in Rue Morgue are obvious, showy tricks meant to showcase trhe 3D, but they just look like camera tricks if you don’;t know it was a 3D film. The climactic urder scene in Dial M for Murder works without the 3D. And Robot Monster is not a whit less cheesy vfor being in 2D.
On the flip side, please note that the remake of Clash of the Titans was originally supposed to be 2D, and it was all turned into 3D as a last-minute post-production thing. I would have sworn that all that flying through the Kraken’s arms was designed specifically to show off the capabilities of 3D – only that’s fdemonstrably not the case. It’s just the way it was visualized.
My verdict: Today’s movies won’t look weird because they were intended for 3D, any more than House of Wax or The Bubble or Friday the Thirteenth part III look weird today.
But today’s movies will look weird in the future, simply because they’re little time capsules of the year 2012, fossilizing our styles, attitudes, culture, and slang. Our “histirical” films will look quaint in the future because they embody the way we think about the past now, and impose on people of the past our current language, attitudes toward sex, religion, and government, and our outrageous clothing and hair styles, all of which will be obviously out-of-period when seen in another era.
Yeah – I was actually thinking about that routine. Even at their worst, 3D movies are rarely so obvious. The movie Comin’ at Ya!, whose only reason for existence is to push stuff out of the screen at you ( Truth in Advertising!) will look weird in the future (if anyone ever watches it. I’ve never seen it broadcast or on home video. Mayube it’ll show up as a curiosity for 3D televisions), but directors and producers seem to reign in the extravagance, so that the films won’t look so odd when viewed in 2D.
Certain classics live on, despite being somewhat “weird” looking today.
Wizard of Oz has some pretty cheesy special effects, but it certainly doesn’t make the film any less entertaining.
Casablanca will always be a classic, despite being in B&W (forget Turner’s colorized version).
Gone With The Wind will remain a must-see film for every student of cinema, as well as fans of classic films.
I do think a lot of the films in the 1970’s were cool then, but look woefully weird today in terms of color and set designs and clothing…and well, everything. But you can say the same for many of the films of any era when you start to notice fashions and music and lingo of the day.
It comes down to story, plot, acting and directing. If a film is good, it will remain good for generations to come. It is easy to overlook generational preferences in terms of style if the film itself is compelling enough.
Some might disagree, but I bet kids born in 2030 will grow up and like the LOTR trilogy when they get old enough to see it.
Not “supposed to be”. It was. I’ve seen it in 3D. Hitchcock didn’t want to make it, but the studio made him do it.
It has the single most effective (and dramatically justified) 3D scene I’ve ever seen.
When they were making it, they had to build special oversize props for close-ups of the phones (3D photography of real phones didn’t work very well. The oversized props photographed much better). Hitchcock staged a number of publicity photos with himself and these props.
