Name me one movie where the 3-D was necessary to the plot

[Admiral James Kirk]

BTW, this thread is the height of idiocy. What is this, the luddite forum?
New technology... scary!

That's what I think every time I hear somebody go off on CGI. "Oh I hate CGI I love models because they're practical effects and blah, blah,blah!"

Most of these dumbasses don't know the difference between a practical effect and a process shot so I don't know how the hell they can bash CGI.

 

[Klaus]

It's a gimmick, and it will be until we get a holodeck.

Coming soon: Flatland in 3D!!!

 

[Trekker4747]

So it's your contention that 3-D films coming out now aren't gimmicky in any way?

No. It's my contention that the new level of 3D isn't more gimmicky than sound, color, or various special-effects leaps over the years. Yes, some are using it as a gimmick, hell with Cameron it was a gimmick but the technology and use of it is at a point where it can be used as less of gimmick and more as another way to immerse the audience into the world the story is being told in.

Look at The Wizard of Oz, not the first film to use color but one of the first and the most renowned. The color was used as a gimmick, hell the story and movie itself is written to use color as a gimmick as the Kansas sequences are in sepia tone. The color in the movie added little to the story and movie itself except to pull in audiences (as the movie was billed as being in color) and to dazzle them with the effects of the day.

Avatar's use of 3D is no different and the other movies re-doing themselves in 3D are just trying to catch up. Yes it's mostly a "gimmick" but it's one of those gimmicks that could lead to better technology and more immersive movie-going experience.

 

[Zulu Romeo]

This guy has something to say about what 3D can do:

[yt]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=08FK7WghHSc[/yt]

 

[Klaus]

Speaking of sensory experiments in the theater, I saw Midway and the theatrical edition of Galactica TOS in Sensurround, which mainly was used for the guns, explosions and the Viper launches. We took pains to sit in the front row, with these six-foot-high subwoofers a few yards in front of us lol... it was fun but also proved a gimmick ultimately.

 

[Starbreaker]

Never. I guess I don't care. I think 3D movies are fun... and so did a billion other people.

 

[Admiral2]

OK, here's a bit of a challenge. Of course we hear people swearing left and right that 3-D is going to become the norm now, and those who don't like it, or who can't see the 3-D properly, or who just find the glasses a pain in the ass should move into the 21st century. Yadda-yadda.

These same folks bristle when guys like me pull out the "it's just a gimmick" argument.

So riddle me this: name me one 3-D movie ever made in which the 3-D is actually necessary to understanding the plot of the film, or is a major element of the storytelling.

Nothing to do with how the film looks. Nothing to do with "fully immersive" entertainment. I mean name me a single 3-D film made either going back to 1951-52 or even that's in production now in which the 3-D is no more than a gimmick.

I'll take a moment to diffuse the two obvious comebacks.

1. The move to color film. Yes, it too was a gimmick, except there have been thousands of movies in which the ability to see color in the image has been either helpful or necessary to understanding what is going on. "The man who killed the bank teller is the man wearing the red bandana". "Cut the BLUE wire". Film titles: "The Woman in Red" -- you don't see "The Woman in 3-D" making a lot of sense. Etc.

2. The move to sound. Well this one is a no-brainer. How many films can you name where "the creaking floorboard" moves the plot along? Or a character impersonating another person's voice is a plot point? Or the fact you can express a hell of a lot more plot in dialogue than in title cards with a half-dozen words (Shakespeare rendered as a silent film -- and it was attempted -- is too stupid to comprehend). In Robert Downey Jr.'s "Chaplin" there's a scene where Chaplin spends days trying to figure out how to express how a blind flower girl (in City Lights) mistakes the Tramp for a rich man, without using sound. He eventually figures out a workaround (the girl hears a car door slam and assumes the car belongs to the Tramp; the connection is made because in the Great Depression lots of people couldn't afford vehicles unless they were wealthy). But the point is made that sound could have been used to move the plot.

Other than "ooh it's neat" I can think of nothing that 3-D can offer other than a gimmick to sell 3-D TVs and movie tickets... can you?

Alex

Nope. It's a gimmick. I don't need to have an axe fly out of the screen at my head to understand the horror film I'm watching.

 

[JarodRussell]

Nope. It's a gimmick. I don't need to have an axe fly out of the screen at my head to understand the horror film I'm watching.

Think about it. If it's done well, you get a better shock effect. Why does a horror film get scare you? Because of a good combination of several different gimmicks. Color. Sound. VFX. 3D.


What you guys are complaining about is not the 3D effect itself, it's the way it is used in movies.
I personally hate the color filters in every Michael Bay movie. But is color an unneccessary gimmick that has no place in any movie because of that? Nope.

 

[Harvey]

I just hate the fact that 3D inflates the cost of a movie ticket between $5.00 and $7.50--a big jump considering the average price of a movie ticket was $7.50 in 2009. The studios and theatres claim that these surcharges are to pay for new 3D equipment, but does anyone honestly expect them to be reduced or eliminated once the equipment is paid for?

 

[Trilliam]

Think about it. If it's done well, you get a better shock effect. Why does a horror film get scare you? Because of a good combination of several different gimmicks. Color. Sound. VFX. 3D.

I find horror movies in B&W scarier than colour. Colour ones are just more gory.

 

[Hyperspace05]

I just hate the fact that 3D inflates the cost of a movie ticket between $5.00 and $7.50--a big jump considering the average price of a movie ticket was $7.50 in 2009.

The 3D surcharge is only $2 where I live. Lucky me, I guess...

The studios and theatres claim that these surcharges are to pay for new 3D equipment, but does anyone honestly expect them to be reduced or eliminated once the equipment is paid for?

Of course not. But it is all and supply and demand. If you don't think it is worth it, don't go. Who's the bigger fool - the one who sells an overpriced item, or the one who buys it?

 

[Harvey]

With the exception of Avatar, I certainly haven't been going. The $5.00-7.50 figure comes from Roger Ebert's rant against 3D that appeared in Newsweek this week, but looking online just now has produced various figures.

 

[Hyperspace05]

The $5-7.50 is certainly not an average, and it tells you something about the validity of the rest of Ebert's arguments.

 

[Kaijima]

In this topic, a poster on a SCIENCE FICTION FORUM mocks and derides technological advances in special effects (because that's what 3D essentially is) - advances which have largely benefited the imagery in SCIENCE FICTION AND FANTASY films.

Somewhere, there's an 80 year old man clutching a battered first-edition copy of Foundation to his chest while shaking his cane at a Laserdisc (tm) of Star Wars while griping that these moving picture gimmicks are not necessary at all to tell a story set in outer space.

 

[Level 2 Diagnostic]

In this topic, a poster on a SCIENCE FICTION FORUM mocks and derides technological advances in special effects (because that's what 3D essentially is) - advances which have largely benefited the imagery in SCIENCE FICTION AND FANTASY films.

Somewhere, there's an 80 year old man clutching a battered first-edition copy of Foundation to his chest while shaking his cane at a Laserdisc (tm) of Star Wars while griping that these moving picture gimmicks are not necessary at all to tell a story set in outer space.

I can't speak for the OP but I have no real issue with the 3-D technology. I saw Avatar in 3-D and I might be willing to see other 3-D films in the near future, provided I felt they were worth the extra cost.

My main issue with 3-D is that it's giving Hollywood a way to charge a premium for the same shitty movies they've been making for years. So instead of investing more time in finding better scripts or more original stories, they just churn their crappy movies through a six-week 3-D "conversion" and voila, they get a whole bunch of suckers to line up to pay extra to watch the same old crap.

I really wonder how many honest, daring, heartfelt, and thought-provoking scripts are going to be passed over in favor of stupid, soulless spectacles just because they can be shot in 3-D. Do you really think movies like The Road, Hurt Locker, A Serious Man, or (500) Days of Summer would have ever been filmed in 3-D? Do you think people would actually pay extra to see these kinds of movies in 3-D? Guess what, folks? More 3-D means more dumb remakes and sequels that nobody wanted in the first place!

So in a nutshell, the whole 3-D craze is really just rewarding the big studios even more for their worst tendencies.

 

[Harvey]

The $5-7.50 is certainly not an average, and it tells you something about the validity of the rest of Ebert's arguments.

I wouldn't go that far. That he's wrong on the price range of 3-D surcharges hardly invalidates the rest of his argument. Though his charge that "it adds nothing to the experience" I wouldn't agree with, he makes some valid points. It's true that the new projectors aren't as bright, that some people do experience nausea, that digital projector manufacturers have a vested interest in making the switch, and that a surcharge is attached to 3-D films even though they use the exact same equipment projecting (without charge) 2-D films.

I'd also agree with Ebert's comment that 3-D would be entirely gratuitous and indeed distracting when it comes to many films, but this is of course more subjective than his other complaints.

 

[Grant]

Cinemascope wasn't vital to the plot either... but I wouldn't call anamorphic widescreen a fad. Same with surround sound. It's about enhancing the movie-going experience.

Dumb question.

100% right. It's a really dumb question.

Name a movie where color is necessary to the plot.

Idiotic question.

How did widescreen help the plot?
How did color help the plot?
How did surround sound help the plot?


The technology enhances the experience--not the plot.

Audiences have shown they want the experience enhanced by many 'new' methods since cinema started...

larger screens were not a fad
Color was not a fad
widescreen was not a fad
stereo was not a fad


there is no reason 3D is to be considered a fad or unnecessary.

Time will answer wether it proves to be an technological addition the public wants.

3D showings are always sold out in my town---so far so good for 3D.

 

[Trilliam]

deleted.

 

[JarodRussell]

Cinemascope wasn't vital to the plot either... but I wouldn't call anamorphic widescreen a fad. Same with surround sound. It's about enhancing the movie-going experience.

Dumb question.

100% right. It's a really dumb question.

Name a movie where color is necessary to the plot.

Idiotic question.

How did widescreen help the plot?
How did color help the plot?
How did surround sound help the plot?


The technology enhances the experience--not the plot.

Audiences have shown they want the experience enhanced by many 'new' methods since cinema started...

larger screens were not a fad
Color was not a fad
widescreen was not a fad
stereo was not a fad


there is no reason 3D is to be considered a fad or unnecessary.

Time will answer wether it proves to be an technological addition the public wants.

3D showings are always sold out in my town---so far so good for 3D.

ZING!

 

[Level 2 Diagnostic]

there is no reason 3D is to be considered a fad or unnecessary.

You mean, other than the fact that 3-D has already been a passing fad that came and went, twice? That's not reason enough to be skeptical?