Christopher Nolan on 3D: 'Extremely Alienating'
Did you sit through Avatar -- or Alice in Wonderland or any other 3D film released over the twelve months -- and feel like you were watching it on a laptop with the brightness turned down? Well, Christopher Nolan feels your pain. While every other filmmaker in Hollywood -- even, sadly, Martin Scorsese -- embraces 3D imagery and technology, the Inception director is steadfastly holding out against the wave of extra dimensions and over-priced tickets.
Speaking at the Hero Complex Film Festival over the weekend, Nolan unleashed a torrent of mannered and thoughtful anti-3D speak that will likely get refuted by a publicist at some point in the next day or so. Said the director:
"The truth of it is when you watch a film in here, you're looking at 16 foot-lamberts, When you watch through any of the conventional 3-D processes you're giving up three foot-lamberts. A massive difference. You're not that aware of it because once you're 'in that world,' your eye compensates, but having struggled for years to get theaters get up to the proper brightness, we're not sticking polarized filters in everything. ... It's all based on all the visual-effects technology, you know, that we're currently most engaged in with match moving, so forth, and rendering 2-D imagery into a 3-D space. ... On a technical level, it's fascinating, but on an experiential level, I find the dimness of the image extremely alienating."
Yes! Thank you! Despite all that crazy science talk -- "foot-lamberts," whaaaat? -- Nolan gets right to the major issue with 3D: It's too darn dim. And that you have to watch these movies through crappy plastic lenses only makes matters worse.
Sadly, despite admitting to being "not a huge fan of 3D," Nolan did acknowledge that he wouldn't rule it out for Batman 3: "Well, let me put it this way: There is no question if audiences want to watch films in stereoscopic imaging, that's what the studios will be doing, and that's what I'll be doing." But that doesn't mean he has to like it.
· Christopher Nolan's dim view of a Hollywood craze: 'I'm not a huge fan of 3-D' [LAT/Hero Complex]
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Comments
He doesn't even get into how 3D optically goes against how the eye wants to behave, which is the major source of eyestrain.
And how eyestrain doesn't bother little kids as much because their eyesight is markedly less developed and, if 3D becomes pervasive, it's going to fuck them up.
How about how 3D is no substitute for story, dialogue and character? Or at least shouldn't be. Let's face it, Avatar's visual glory doesn't make up for its mediocre script. I would much rather see a smart story than a slight but glitzy 3D production.
In the future, mankind will be cross-eyed.
THANK YOU! I am behind you, 1000000% on Avatar's mediocre script. It's a shame box office battles might possibly be won by some average/ below average movie cause it has the 3D support. 3D has ruined the meaning of a good movie. SO sad.