Tonight there’s a 4K DLP digital screening of ‘Spartacus’ – is it better than Universal’s hidef transfer that they released on bluray – I really hope so… Criterion needs to rectify and release a definitive proper bluray edition.
“Turner Classic Movies selects Barco’s 4K to show restored films at the TCM Classic Film Festival”
Barco has been selected as the exclusive 4K digital cinema projector supplier for the 2011 TCM Classic Film Festival, bringing to the big screen digitally-restored classic films like Citizen Kane, The Godfather and Breakfast at Tiffany’s. With more than 70 screenings planned and dozens of movie celebrities in attendance, Barco joins a highly celebrated event to honor the classic era of American and European cinema.
Barco, a worldwide leader in digital cinema, is partnering with Turner Classic Movies (TCM) to present some of the most iconic films of the 20th Century, projecting them in dazzling DLP Cinema® Enhanced 4K resolution to entertain classic film aficionados and a new generation of movie goers. Barco’s DP4K-32B will be showing films that have been painstakingly digitally restored to their original glory.
“Turner Classic Movies believes in the highest standards in presentation, and Barco’s unparalleled technology allows us to show these renowned classics in their most pristine form,” said Genevieve McGillicuddy, managing director of the TCM Classic Film Festival and senior director of brand activation for TCM. “We’re proud to work with Barco in presenting these films as they were meant to be seen.”
The flagship model among Barco’s fully DCI-compliant line of digital cinema projectors, the DP4K-32B features Texas Instruments' 1.38" DLP Cinema® chip to achieve stunning images in 4K resolution (4,096 x 2,160). Its ultra brightness and vibrant color accuracy produces razor-sharp images to offer a premium viewing experience. The DP4K-32B’s efficient optical design and patented DMD cooling system result in exceptionally long lifetime and the lowest total cost of ownership.
“We are honored that TCM has chosen Barco to help celebrate these internationally-acclaimed classics,” commented Patrick Lee, VP Digital Cinema for Barco North America. “Their choice of digital cinema projectors speaks volumes about their dedication to upholding the highest standards in presentation. We both admire and respect their commitment to restoring such an important part of motion picture history.”
The TCM Classic Film Festival runs April 28-May 1, 2011 in Hollywood, California. Screenings and events will be held at Grauman’s Chinese Theatre, the Chinese 6 Multiplex, the Egyptian Theatre, the Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel and the Music Box Theatre, which is celebrating its 75th anniversary.
~~~
Seattle’s Cinerama showcased ‘Breakfast at Tiffany’s’ and ‘The African Queen’ via DCI harddrive form – so thankfully a few studios are preserving and making the necessary steps in providing ‘the classics’ to theaters that do have digital projector systems.
I actually should make an addendum to the AFI Silver statement I made: all three screens are equipped to present films in 35mm (and 70mm on the big screen) and DLP digital projection, but appropriately the AFI favors 35mm over DLP (as they technically should). Thumbs up in my book.
spoke with the general manager this morning, he’s still vague on the time table on when screens 1,3, and 4 will get the digital conversion, although he did note that the size of screen #1 is an issue, I did mention though ‘well if they can put DLP on the Uptown screen it’s possible… with a Christie system’ – he totally agreed.
‘African Cats’ was visually stunning in Sony DP on screen 7.
oh here’s the story on the potential selling of Landmark (Los Angeles Times):
MARK CUBAN PUTS LANDMARK THEATRES AND MAGNOLIA PICTURES UP FOR SALE
(April 19, 2011)
Dallas Mavericks owner and media entrepreneur Mark Cuban confirmed Tuesday that he has put Landmark Theatres, the nation’s leading theater chain showing specialized movies, and his production and distribution company Magnolia Pictures up for sale.
“Prices for entertainment properties are up,” Cuban said in an email. “If we don’t get the price and premium we want, we are happy to continue to make money from the properties.”
Bids are expected as early as next week, according to Bloomberg, which first reported news of the auction.
Landmark operates 296 screens at 63 theaters in 17 states, including its flagship theater in West Los Angeles. Cuban and his partner Todd Wagner bought the Landmark chain, at one time under bankruptcy protection, from Oaktree Capital Management in 2003. They invested heavily in expanding and upgrading the circuit, including spending $20 million on its 2,000-seat, 12-screen multiplex at the intersection of Pico and Westwood boulevards.
Magnolia Pictures distributes independent films, such as James Marsh’s 2008 documentary “Man on Wire,” about tightrope walker Philippe Petit, and last year’s love story and murder mystery “All Good Things,” starring Ryan Gosling. The company’s home entertainment arm also releases films simultaneously with their theatrical debut via cable channel HDNet, also owned by Cuban and Wagner.
“Given our unique position of enabling VOD day-and-date with theatrical, we wanted to test the market,‘’ Cuban said.
However, most theater operators, including the nation’s largest circuits — Regal, AMC and Cinemark —have been alarmed by Hollywood studios' plans to accelerate the early release of movies in the home through video-on-demand services. They fear that such offerings will significantly undermine ticket sales.
your kidding… right. ;) It’s actually under the ‘Washington DC’ listing. It’s pretty much common knowledge that Landmark’s Bethesda theater makes money hand over fist.
As for the Baltimore location, I thought there were at least three ‘digital’ screens – as of today, only one film is listed as such as ‘digital projection’ (huh??)
I know that the E Street theater has at least one Sony 4K projector – as for the planned mass theater DP installation, it’s been rather mum.
I’ve been to the Bethesda theater alot, and all I’ve ever seen are 35mm prints on all their screens – even with the notion and idea of theatres going all digital – I’d really like to know if any of the films currently playing at E Street and Bethesda are released digitally, at all:
Le Quattro Volte
The Human Resources Manager
The Princess of Montpensier
Win Win
Nostalgia for the Light
Jane Eyre
Pom Wonderful Presents: The Greatest Movie Ever Sold
Atlas Shrugged: Part 1
Bill Cunningham New York
Potiche
Winter in Wartime
The Conspirator
Of Gods and Men
African Cats (this I know is, as I saw it today at such at AMC Mazza)
Had not heard that Landmark is ‘tentaively’ up for sale, that’s new news to me. What’s wrong with Mark Cuban??
question though, if a arthouse theater were to go all digital – would all the studios that provide content to said theaters have all the new releases in hard drive form? Landmark and in particular their Bethesda Maryland location (their cash cow BTW) hasn’t made one effort to make the transition to ‘digital’ – for a theater chain of their stature to be this resistent is rather remarkable (or foolish) when you think about it. Interestingly, I think that Werner Herzog’s 3D documentary ‘Cave of Forgotten Dreams’ is more in align in Landmark booking it, than AMC or Regal. Time will tell.
We are writing to share two exciting announcements:
• The Avalon Legacy Campaign has reached $1.8 million!
• The Give Us a Lift initiative to fund the elevator project has been completed!
We are hopeful that we can complete the elevator project in 2012. This will be an exciting and challenging process and we will keep you informed as progress is made.
The next focus of our fundraising efforts will be the funding of new HVAC systems. The current system is a high maintenance, low energy efficiency unit that is operating well past its useful life. An upgrade is an essential infrastructure improvement and cost-saving opportunity for the theater.
We are $200,000 away from the $2.0 million goal and we are hopeful that we can reach that goal in 2012, the 90th anniversary of the building of the Avalon!
There is another piece of great news! Stone Soup Films recently produced a promotional film for the Avalon. I invite you to view it at: theavalon.org/about. I hope you will agree that this is a wonderful marketing tool as we carry on with the Campaign.
We are so grateful for your interest in and support of the Avalon. If you would like to learn more about the Campaign or make a donation, click on the links below.
See you at the Avalon!
Bill Oberdorfer, Executive Director
Sarah Pokempner, Campaign Manager
when the Film Forum and the AFI Silver (as well as ALL repetoire film centers) go all digital and no longer are able to present the ‘classics’ in 35mm – all will be lost. What happens though with the many Film Festivals (nationwide and internationally) where 35mm prints are more prevailent? – the recent FilmFest DC had many screenings in 35mm – if AMC Mazza (one of the festivals locations) had gone all digital, the feature ‘film’ in 35mm form, would not have been possible.
apparently after an email to corporate and a response from the manager of the Uptown, a Christie techie came out and fixed the aspect ratio problem – thank you!
Apparently ‘Scream 4’ is opening tomorrow – oh, wow, a horror movie on the Uptown screen – I’m siked!
I always remembered that it was one of the first theatres in the DC area to be equipped with Dolby Digital EX surround sound, ‘Toy Story 2’ sounded amazing when played back as such. As for the seats ALL the National Amusements had these really crummy seats where they were both ultra-squeaky and/or reclined back so far that you felt like you would flip backward off the seat. Will be interested in seeing the detwinned auditorium. I hope that Bow Tie can install some of the auditoriums to playback discrete 7.1 soundmixes – something that Rave hasn’t done over at their Centreville or Fairfax Corner theaters.
Glad to hear the Reston multiplex is getting a makeover, I recently was there for ‘Take Me Home Tonight’ and thought the complex felt and looked a bit antiquated.
As for the Brandywine plex here’s what planned (notice fourth one down Jodar):
Features:
• 15 giant screens
• All Stadium Seating with Custom Built Seats
• True Digital Projection with 3-D Capability
• BTX —– Bow Tie XTreme Large Format Auditorium
• Fresh Hot Bow Tie Signature Popcorn popped fresh
• Upgraded Concession Offerings featuring hot snacks
• Birthday Party Rooms
• Acres of Free Parking
@ Joe Masher: do you know if any of the auditoriums (at Annapolis Mall plex or the upcoming Brandywine location) features 7.1 sound?
so I saw ‘Source Code’ this evening, and I have say, again it was a mixed bag. During the trailers, the lower left of the screen was displaying a double image and out of focus, thankfully for the main feature it was corrected. But… for a 1.85 film, the framing was all off, the credits at the beginning were barely there, and only a few instances where heads at the top of the screen were slightly cropped off – this never happened for 35mm prints. Audio at a moment near the end lowered in volume unexplainably. On the plus side the image was consistently sharp, as was the light output – if the projector had displayed the 1.85 aspect ratio, it would have looked great
so now the DC metro area will have ETX at Tysons, XD at the Cinemark, three IMAX (15perf/70mm) theatres, five IMAX-Digtal screens, DLP at the Uptown – the circle’s complete: RPX at Regal Manassas
oh and the ETX system is comprised of a Christie 4K upgradable DLP projector. Like IMAX-Digital/XD systems the screen is floor to ceiling, wall to wall, a scope (2.35) film will have black borders above and below the image, a 1.85 (flat) film will fill up the entire screen (essentially there is no masking of the screen in any way).
oops, oh well, the price did go up… ten dollars for the pre-noon shows, $15.50 (regular evening pricing). So… I can’t say that ‘Battle: Los Angeles’ is a great movie, but the ETX system is also a mixed bag. Visually the system brightness needs to be tweaked – essentially it’s too bright – the white lettering throughout the movie suffers and makes them fuzzy and out of focus looking; also black levels aren’t deep. Now, aurally the ETX system is a knockout, granted that ‘Battle’ could be best described as ‘Saving Private Ryan vs. the Alien Robots’ the sound is a juggernaut – sure it’s loud, but unlike say last year’s ‘Expendables’ it doesn’t give you a migrane. The various battle guns and airships and ufo’s sounds, and their corresponding explosions vary, it never drowns out the film’s moronic script (i.e, cringe inducing cliched dialogue) the bass is tight and in several key scenes drops several octaves, so much so, the floor literally shakes – I’ve never experienced that before (okay, sans ‘Honey I Shrunk the Audience’ at Disney World). While the film never achieves the beautiful soundmix of say ‘Avatar’ – the front heavy battle scenes and aggressive as sin mix compensate the film’s myriad other flaws.
and yes … according to Movietickets.com and AMC’s own website ‘Battle: Los Angeles’ will be on the new ETX screen beginning Friday, however tix price are on the low end, which I assume will be corrected once they note this mistake.
Auditorium 11’s getting the ETX makeover. As to what new movie will make the system’s debut won’t be known until Wednesday, I’m hoping that I’ll be ‘Battle: Los Angeles’ since there is no real big action film opening this coming weekend.
I’ve been ‘Bieber-fied’. Saw the Justin Bieber 3D film today on screen 5, and even though the film was shot with HD-3D cameras and in an aspect ratio of 1.85 – which took most of the wall (2.35 films look terrible on already small screens) – it was quite impressive nonetheless (the movie itself might not have been all that) – the 3D had appropriate depth and the 5.1 lossless sound had tremendous punch.
sorry, I’m on a stream of consciousness – since it appears that AMC now has the money and the actual effort in adding Sony 4K systems in and around it’s theaters in the DC metro area, it would behoeve them to upgrade a couple of other screens here at Tysons, so the films released in harddrive form to the digital projectors and specifically the ETX screen can move inbetween different auditoriums in the complex – it works for the Cinemark Egyptian since all the screens are digital alot of diverse films get the chance to be on the XD screen (examples being ‘The Karate Kid’, ‘Piranha 3D’ ‘Unknown’ etc,)
I’m assuming ETX is like Cinemark’s XD screens where it’s a basic 7.1 set up, but with an 12 speaker configuration (I was off by one) with most of them behind the screen doing alot of matrixing and a couple of bass speakers.
AMC’s explanation of an ETX screen:
“ETX includes a 20-percent larger screen, 3D technology, digital projection and an upgraded sound system. Specifically, the digital projection system produces images comprised of 2 million pixels, which delivers a higher resolution than HD. This eye-popping image is then showcased on a wall-to-wall, floor-to-ceiling screen that immerses guests in the image.
The ETX auditorium also boasts 12 audio channels fueled by 50,000 watts of power, which is a major upgrade and three times the power of typical auditoriums with six audio channels. As a result of this improved sight and sound experience, guests will not simply watch a movie. They will live it in ETX."
I can’t wait to see what film debuts on the ETX screen unfortunatly the date is right inbetween ‘Battle: LA’ and ‘Suckerpunch’
oh and I understand it, ETX screens allow up to 11 channels of sound with the minimum of 7.1 with discrete 4-channel surround sound that is not achievable on the IMAX screen – these ETX presentations could easily sound superior to the IMAX sound setup.
Tonight there’s a 4K DLP digital screening of ‘Spartacus’ – is it better than Universal’s hidef transfer that they released on bluray – I really hope so… Criterion needs to rectify and release a definitive proper bluray edition.
on a similiar note, there’s this bit of news:
“Turner Classic Movies selects Barco’s 4K to show restored films at the TCM Classic Film Festival”
Barco has been selected as the exclusive 4K digital cinema projector supplier for the 2011 TCM Classic Film Festival, bringing to the big screen digitally-restored classic films like Citizen Kane, The Godfather and Breakfast at Tiffany’s. With more than 70 screenings planned and dozens of movie celebrities in attendance, Barco joins a highly celebrated event to honor the classic era of American and European cinema.
Barco, a worldwide leader in digital cinema, is partnering with Turner Classic Movies (TCM) to present some of the most iconic films of the 20th Century, projecting them in dazzling DLP Cinema® Enhanced 4K resolution to entertain classic film aficionados and a new generation of movie goers. Barco’s DP4K-32B will be showing films that have been painstakingly digitally restored to their original glory.
“Turner Classic Movies believes in the highest standards in presentation, and Barco’s unparalleled technology allows us to show these renowned classics in their most pristine form,” said Genevieve McGillicuddy, managing director of the TCM Classic Film Festival and senior director of brand activation for TCM. “We’re proud to work with Barco in presenting these films as they were meant to be seen.”
The flagship model among Barco’s fully DCI-compliant line of digital cinema projectors, the DP4K-32B features Texas Instruments' 1.38" DLP Cinema® chip to achieve stunning images in 4K resolution (4,096 x 2,160). Its ultra brightness and vibrant color accuracy produces razor-sharp images to offer a premium viewing experience. The DP4K-32B’s efficient optical design and patented DMD cooling system result in exceptionally long lifetime and the lowest total cost of ownership.
“We are honored that TCM has chosen Barco to help celebrate these internationally-acclaimed classics,” commented Patrick Lee, VP Digital Cinema for Barco North America. “Their choice of digital cinema projectors speaks volumes about their dedication to upholding the highest standards in presentation. We both admire and respect their commitment to restoring such an important part of motion picture history.”
The TCM Classic Film Festival runs April 28-May 1, 2011 in Hollywood, California. Screenings and events will be held at Grauman’s Chinese Theatre, the Chinese 6 Multiplex, the Egyptian Theatre, the Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel and the Music Box Theatre, which is celebrating its 75th anniversary.
~~~
Seattle’s Cinerama showcased ‘Breakfast at Tiffany’s’ and ‘The African Queen’ via DCI harddrive form – so thankfully a few studios are preserving and making the necessary steps in providing ‘the classics’ to theaters that do have digital projector systems.
I actually should make an addendum to the AFI Silver statement I made: all three screens are equipped to present films in 35mm (and 70mm on the big screen) and DLP digital projection, but appropriately the AFI favors 35mm over DLP (as they technically should). Thumbs up in my book.
spoke with the general manager this morning, he’s still vague on the time table on when screens 1,3, and 4 will get the digital conversion, although he did note that the size of screen #1 is an issue, I did mention though ‘well if they can put DLP on the Uptown screen it’s possible… with a Christie system’ – he totally agreed.
‘African Cats’ was visually stunning in Sony DP on screen 7.
oh here’s the story on the potential selling of Landmark (Los Angeles Times):
MARK CUBAN PUTS LANDMARK THEATRES AND MAGNOLIA PICTURES UP FOR SALE
(April 19, 2011)
Dallas Mavericks owner and media entrepreneur Mark Cuban confirmed Tuesday that he has put Landmark Theatres, the nation’s leading theater chain showing specialized movies, and his production and distribution company Magnolia Pictures up for sale.
“Prices for entertainment properties are up,” Cuban said in an email. “If we don’t get the price and premium we want, we are happy to continue to make money from the properties.”
Bids are expected as early as next week, according to Bloomberg, which first reported news of the auction.
Landmark operates 296 screens at 63 theaters in 17 states, including its flagship theater in West Los Angeles. Cuban and his partner Todd Wagner bought the Landmark chain, at one time under bankruptcy protection, from Oaktree Capital Management in 2003. They invested heavily in expanding and upgrading the circuit, including spending $20 million on its 2,000-seat, 12-screen multiplex at the intersection of Pico and Westwood boulevards.
Magnolia Pictures distributes independent films, such as James Marsh’s 2008 documentary “Man on Wire,” about tightrope walker Philippe Petit, and last year’s love story and murder mystery “All Good Things,” starring Ryan Gosling. The company’s home entertainment arm also releases films simultaneously with their theatrical debut via cable channel HDNet, also owned by Cuban and Wagner.
“Given our unique position of enabling VOD day-and-date with theatrical, we wanted to test the market,‘’ Cuban said.
However, most theater operators, including the nation’s largest circuits — Regal, AMC and Cinemark —have been alarmed by Hollywood studios' plans to accelerate the early release of movies in the home through video-on-demand services. They fear that such offerings will significantly undermine ticket sales.
your kidding… right. ;) It’s actually under the ‘Washington DC’ listing. It’s pretty much common knowledge that Landmark’s Bethesda theater makes money hand over fist.
As for the Baltimore location, I thought there were at least three ‘digital’ screens – as of today, only one film is listed as such as ‘digital projection’ (huh??)
I know that the E Street theater has at least one Sony 4K projector – as for the planned mass theater DP installation, it’s been rather mum.
I’ve been to the Bethesda theater alot, and all I’ve ever seen are 35mm prints on all their screens – even with the notion and idea of theatres going all digital – I’d really like to know if any of the films currently playing at E Street and Bethesda are released digitally, at all:
Had not heard that Landmark is ‘tentaively’ up for sale, that’s new news to me. What’s wrong with Mark Cuban??
question though, if a arthouse theater were to go all digital – would all the studios that provide content to said theaters have all the new releases in hard drive form? Landmark and in particular their Bethesda Maryland location (their cash cow BTW) hasn’t made one effort to make the transition to ‘digital’ – for a theater chain of their stature to be this resistent is rather remarkable (or foolish) when you think about it. Interestingly, I think that Werner Herzog’s 3D documentary ‘Cave of Forgotten Dreams’ is more in align in Landmark booking it, than AMC or Regal. Time will tell.
Dear Friend of the Avalon,
We are writing to share two exciting announcements:
• The Avalon Legacy Campaign has reached $1.8 million!
• The Give Us a Lift initiative to fund the elevator project has been completed!
We are hopeful that we can complete the elevator project in 2012. This will be an exciting and challenging process and we will keep you informed as progress is made.
The next focus of our fundraising efforts will be the funding of new HVAC systems. The current system is a high maintenance, low energy efficiency unit that is operating well past its useful life. An upgrade is an essential infrastructure improvement and cost-saving opportunity for the theater.
The list below shows what we have already accomplished and the work that lies ahead:
• Completed- Jun 2008! Reduced the building mortgage by $200,000
• Completed- Apr 2009! Built out and opened the Avalon Theatre Café
• Completed- Oct 2009! Repaired the crumbling vault space and Café sidewalk
• Completed- Nov 2009! Replaced the building’s electrical infrastructure
• Completed- Sep 2010! Restored the Avalon 1 ceiling
• To do: Install an elevator to Avalon 2 â€" funding obtained
• To do: Install an enhanced lighting system in Avalon 1
• To do: Upgrade to energy efficient heating and cooling systems
• To do: Reduce the building mortgage by an additional $350,000
We are $200,000 away from the $2.0 million goal and we are hopeful that we can reach that goal in 2012, the 90th anniversary of the building of the Avalon!
There is another piece of great news! Stone Soup Films recently produced a promotional film for the Avalon. I invite you to view it at: theavalon.org/about. I hope you will agree that this is a wonderful marketing tool as we carry on with the Campaign.
We are so grateful for your interest in and support of the Avalon. If you would like to learn more about the Campaign or make a donation, click on the links below.
See you at the Avalon!
Bill Oberdorfer, Executive Director
Sarah Pokempner, Campaign Manager
when the Film Forum and the AFI Silver (as well as ALL repetoire film centers) go all digital and no longer are able to present the ‘classics’ in 35mm – all will be lost. What happens though with the many Film Festivals (nationwide and internationally) where 35mm prints are more prevailent? – the recent FilmFest DC had many screenings in 35mm – if AMC Mazza (one of the festivals locations) had gone all digital, the feature ‘film’ in 35mm form, would not have been possible.
apparently after an email to corporate and a response from the manager of the Uptown, a Christie techie came out and fixed the aspect ratio problem – thank you!
Apparently ‘Scream 4’ is opening tomorrow – oh, wow, a horror movie on the Uptown screen – I’m siked!
I always remembered that it was one of the first theatres in the DC area to be equipped with Dolby Digital EX surround sound, ‘Toy Story 2’ sounded amazing when played back as such. As for the seats ALL the National Amusements had these really crummy seats where they were both ultra-squeaky and/or reclined back so far that you felt like you would flip backward off the seat. Will be interested in seeing the detwinned auditorium. I hope that Bow Tie can install some of the auditoriums to playback discrete 7.1 soundmixes – something that Rave hasn’t done over at their Centreville or Fairfax Corner theaters.
Glad to hear the Reston multiplex is getting a makeover, I recently was there for ‘Take Me Home Tonight’ and thought the complex felt and looked a bit antiquated.
As for the Brandywine plex here’s what planned (notice fourth one down Jodar):
Features:
• 15 giant screens
• All Stadium Seating with Custom Built Seats
• True Digital Projection with 3-D Capability
• BTX —– Bow Tie XTreme Large Format Auditorium
• Fresh Hot Bow Tie Signature Popcorn popped fresh
• Upgraded Concession Offerings featuring hot snacks
• Birthday Party Rooms
• Acres of Free Parking
@ Joe Masher: do you know if any of the auditoriums (at Annapolis Mall plex or the upcoming Brandywine location) features 7.1 sound?
so I saw ‘Source Code’ this evening, and I have say, again it was a mixed bag. During the trailers, the lower left of the screen was displaying a double image and out of focus, thankfully for the main feature it was corrected. But… for a 1.85 film, the framing was all off, the credits at the beginning were barely there, and only a few instances where heads at the top of the screen were slightly cropped off – this never happened for 35mm prints. Audio at a moment near the end lowered in volume unexplainably. On the plus side the image was consistently sharp, as was the light output – if the projector had displayed the 1.85 aspect ratio, it would have looked great
how well is the theater doing since ‘Mars Needs Moms’ has turned out to be an outright bomb for Disney?
so now the DC metro area will have ETX at Tysons, XD at the Cinemark, three IMAX (15perf/70mm) theatres, five IMAX-Digtal screens, DLP at the Uptown – the circle’s complete: RPX at Regal Manassas
oh and the ETX system is comprised of a Christie 4K upgradable DLP projector. Like IMAX-Digital/XD systems the screen is floor to ceiling, wall to wall, a scope (2.35) film will have black borders above and below the image, a 1.85 (flat) film will fill up the entire screen (essentially there is no masking of the screen in any way).
oops, oh well, the price did go up… ten dollars for the pre-noon shows, $15.50 (regular evening pricing). So… I can’t say that ‘Battle: Los Angeles’ is a great movie, but the ETX system is also a mixed bag. Visually the system brightness needs to be tweaked – essentially it’s too bright – the white lettering throughout the movie suffers and makes them fuzzy and out of focus looking; also black levels aren’t deep. Now, aurally the ETX system is a knockout, granted that ‘Battle’ could be best described as ‘Saving Private Ryan vs. the Alien Robots’ the sound is a juggernaut – sure it’s loud, but unlike say last year’s ‘Expendables’ it doesn’t give you a migrane. The various battle guns and airships and ufo’s sounds, and their corresponding explosions vary, it never drowns out the film’s moronic script (i.e, cringe inducing cliched dialogue) the bass is tight and in several key scenes drops several octaves, so much so, the floor literally shakes – I’ve never experienced that before (okay, sans ‘Honey I Shrunk the Audience’ at Disney World). While the film never achieves the beautiful soundmix of say ‘Avatar’ – the front heavy battle scenes and aggressive as sin mix compensate the film’s myriad other flaws.
was the theatrical run of PATTON in 70mm? what else played here as such?
and yes … according to Movietickets.com and AMC’s own website ‘Battle: Los Angeles’ will be on the new ETX screen beginning Friday, however tix price are on the low end, which I assume will be corrected once they note this mistake.
Auditorium 11’s getting the ETX makeover. As to what new movie will make the system’s debut won’t be known until Wednesday, I’m hoping that I’ll be ‘Battle: Los Angeles’ since there is no real big action film opening this coming weekend.
according to AMC’s website, 7 auditoriums have changed over to digital projection.
I’ve been ‘Bieber-fied’. Saw the Justin Bieber 3D film today on screen 5, and even though the film was shot with HD-3D cameras and in an aspect ratio of 1.85 – which took most of the wall (2.35 films look terrible on already small screens) – it was quite impressive nonetheless (the movie itself might not have been all that) – the 3D had appropriate depth and the 5.1 lossless sound had tremendous punch.
sorry, I’m on a stream of consciousness – since it appears that AMC now has the money and the actual effort in adding Sony 4K systems in and around it’s theaters in the DC metro area, it would behoeve them to upgrade a couple of other screens here at Tysons, so the films released in harddrive form to the digital projectors and specifically the ETX screen can move inbetween different auditoriums in the complex – it works for the Cinemark Egyptian since all the screens are digital alot of diverse films get the chance to be on the XD screen (examples being ‘The Karate Kid’, ‘Piranha 3D’ ‘Unknown’ etc,)
I’m assuming ETX is like Cinemark’s XD screens where it’s a basic 7.1 set up, but with an 12 speaker configuration (I was off by one) with most of them behind the screen doing alot of matrixing and a couple of bass speakers.
AMC’s explanation of an ETX screen:
“ETX includes a 20-percent larger screen, 3D technology, digital projection and an upgraded sound system. Specifically, the digital projection system produces images comprised of 2 million pixels, which delivers a higher resolution than HD. This eye-popping image is then showcased on a wall-to-wall, floor-to-ceiling screen that immerses guests in the image.
The ETX auditorium also boasts 12 audio channels fueled by 50,000 watts of power, which is a major upgrade and three times the power of typical auditoriums with six audio channels. As a result of this improved sight and sound experience, guests will not simply watch a movie. They will live it in ETX."
I can’t wait to see what film debuts on the ETX screen unfortunatly the date is right inbetween ‘Battle: LA’ and ‘Suckerpunch’
oh and I understand it, ETX screens allow up to 11 channels of sound with the minimum of 7.1 with discrete 4-channel surround sound that is not achievable on the IMAX screen – these ETX presentations could easily sound superior to the IMAX sound setup.