I had planned to fill the slow days on this blog with insightful words on films and film history, and I may well do so in the future, but it’s come down to a decision not to fill this thing with crap just so I have something to post everyday.
My new job is going well enough, due to some people leaving I’m going to get the full time overnight hours I want which should help on this front (this is my first post from work…) I’ve got the next two days off and I’m going to finish up reel 5, which is about halfway done, and that’s where I’m going to be at the “deadline” I self imposed about 2 weeks ago. Considering these factors, I’m gong to convert that into a “Reel 5 deadline” and then 3 more weeks to finish up (I’m going on a family reunion so that weekend is lost for working on the cut) that puts the new deadline out to : August 10.
And I know I would have made that deadline of July 20 if I wasn’t working too.
Now, as I typed I realized the perfect thing to talk about today – The new releases for this Friday, July 18, 2008.
The Dark Knight
Now this isn’t really Heath’s last performance – that will be in the upcomming 2009 Terry Gilliam film “The Imaginarium of Dr. Parnassus” but I guess I can’t begrudge them trying to hype it as such. One thing I reccommend to all and sundry – go see this film in an IMAX theater if you at all can. Christopher Nolan has done something that is almost unique. If you’ve seen regular movies at IMAX before, you know it’s a neat experience, but the film doesn’t use the whole screen. That’s because IMAX is such a huge negative that to fill the screen they’d have to blow up the 35mm so much (and crop the sides off) that just running it across the bottom is all they can really do. The sound systems there are amazing too. But Nolan this time has taken 4 scenes in the film and used IMAX cameras so that at those moments the film will become even more giganticer and fill the screen. 35mm anamorphic is squeezed onto film and is 4 sprocket holes tall. IMAX film is 70mm film, twice as large, but also run SIDEWAYS and covers 15 70mm sprocket holes – to give you a difference in the size of film and quality that that allows when thrown up on that massive screen.
Now remember how I said this is almost unique? Like everything – it’s been done before. In 1926.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0017226/trivia
Magnascope was a process that allowed the size of the image to become huge for climactic sequences, first used for “Old Ironsides”, and it was a sensation, as I’m sure these IMAX screenings will be. I can’t wait to go myself.
Mamma Mia
I’m a massive ABBA fan, and yet I’ve never gone to see this musical. I guess I just wanted to hear the music done by ABBA and not random people on stage, and I’m not a big stage person to begin with. But the movie, I’m there. The story is tissue thin, but I’ve known that for 10 years (yeah it’s been around that long) and this is a chance to hear Benny Andersson going back to these songs and reproducing them, so they’ll be like reinterpretations by the original artist – that interests me. Also Meryl Streep is a really great singer (see Postcards From The Edge if you don’t believe me) My Mom and I were supposed to go see this today, but she forgot about this and is already heading down to Missouri and the reunion. I’m not so sure I want to see it in the crappy theater there, but I think this is a movie I’ll enjoy anywhere – unlike Dark Knight which I know I want to see in IMAX for the first time at least.
OK, time to get some work done…
2 days til Reel 5 Deadline
23 days til Reel 6 Deadline
