3D – The Real Future of Film

To quote the all seeing, all knowing wikipedia ‘the stereoscopic era of motion picture began in the late 1890’s when British film pioneer William Friese-Greene filed a patent for a 3-D movie process.’ I hope anyone reading this has just exclaimed the same kind of surprised ‘fuck off!’ I did upon first discovering this. I mean, WHAT?! Ok it wasn’t quite the 3-D we all know today, Mr. Friese-Greene preferring to look through a stereoscope at two films running side by side rather than through the retro blue-red cardboard shades we use today. Nonetheless this fact got me wondering, why 3-D has still not hit the big time. Well it has, apparently.

I seem to associate 3-D with the 80’s, I’m not entirely sure why (perhaps it’s the retro shades), but recently we have seen 3-D being used a fair bit, albeit by films such as My Bloody Valentine 3D and Robert Rodriguez’ Spy Kids series. It is odd then that such obscure films may have begun the 3-D renaissance that is heading our way courtesy of some of the best and exciting directors out there.

The first Tin-Tin film to be released in 2011 is undergoing post production as we speak and will be in 3-D. Why will it take so long to get to our screens? Because Steven Spielberg, directing the first film The Secret of the Unicorn with Peter Jackson producing (the roles will swap for the second film before each taking a share of the director’s role for the 3rd installment), has chosen to shoot the entire film, not only in 3-D, but in motion capture.

Tim Burton will hopefully be releasing his version of Alice In Wonderland (starring Johnny Depp as the Mad Hatter funnily enough) in 3-D, whilst the animator who bought us Burton’s The Nightmare Before Christmas has produced possibly the world’s first stop-motion film shot in 3-D, Coraline. Both Films look as though they will be visually stunning, as one might expect, but once in 3-D the films should hopefully take on another dimension (well, obviously).

However the film that has been one of the most talked about in history (possibly due to it taking over a decade to make. And still going) is the upcoming return of James Cameron (Titanic) with Avatar. Cameron literally had to invent the technology to make this film as he was making it and everything I’ve read about it seems to suggest it will revolutionize the way we experience film. However other than it being in 3-D and involving some kind of alien life-form called ‘Na’vi’ information on this film is fairly scarce, but if that doesn’t get you excited I don’t know what will.

3-D is back and if Steven Spielberg knows what he’s talking about (which I like to think he does) it will be around for a long time. I, for one, am just looking forward to wearing the cool glasses.