Theater Quality (No Spoilers) by DonCoat

GENERAL DISCUSSIONS

Theater Quality (No Spoilers)

POSTED BY: DONCOAT
UPDATED: Sunday, October 9, 2005 03:04
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VIEWED: 2132
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Friday, October 7, 2005 8:17 AM

Heading into Serenity Weekend Two, I have now seen the BDM at three different theaters. My experience has been that the quality of the presentation varied widely from one venue to another.

I first saw it in a traditional style theater with so-so sound quality -- one which was obviously once twice as large but had been split down the middle into two screens, so the seats didn't even point in the right direction. Of course, I was mostly watching in "what's gonna happen" mode (that is, plot dominated) so it wasn't a disaster, but it's not a theater I'd go back to for this kind of film.

Viewing two was at an awesome Regal Cinemas stadium theater. Outstanding all around, and especially notable for crystal-clear dialog quality. I heard a LOT more than on first viewing, but of course some of that was that I wasn't so focused on plot-plot-and-more-plot.

The third viewing was the most disappointing technically. It was at an almost new stadium-style house, very posh and comfortable. Yet, the movie was slightly out of focus, and the sound quality was abominable. There were lines of dialog I couldn't make out, even though I'd heard them twice before! On bass-heavy sequences, one of the subwoofers was badly overdriven and made a totally horrendous flapping/banging noise.

What's more, they had a bad print of the film! There were at least two jumps (as if the film had broken and been badly spliced), and it cut off before the end of the closing credits (right in the middle of the little audio Easter egg). This in a first-run theater in the first week of release!

In this day and age when moviegoing is a dying pastime, you'd think that a theater owner would be desperate to give the paying customer a top-notch experience. How do they hope to stay in business when it seems like they just don't care? I won't be going back there, unless it's to give the manager a piece of my mind.

My weekend viewings will be at the Regal, even though it's a good 15 miles further away than my local abomination of a movie house.

Anyone else have any notes on the technical aspects of your Serenity experience? (Please, no spoilers!)

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Friday, October 7, 2005 9:24 AM

EST120

Picture was fine (after they fixed the aspect ratio. during the previews, everyone's head was cut off!). My complaint? The sound was TOO loud. Gave me a bit of a headache.

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Friday, October 7, 2005 9:31 AM

SCHIZORABBIT

i made sure to watch it in a theater with good picture and sound quality, having made mistakes in a past movies in utterly crappy theaters. i watched sin city, for example, at a cool, little arthouse theater in atlanta (the lefont)--very old school, with lots of history--BUT it had the worst sound quality. none of the side speakers work, so i found myself leaning forward to figure out what was being said, and so on, as if i were watching a tv set far away up front.

anyway, i also found the regal theater down here to be the best in picture and sound quality. i love that surround-sound-you're-in-the-midst-of-things quality that a good theater can give. so my first experience with serenity was a good one.

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Friday, October 7, 2005 9:42 AM

DUG

I was very surprised to see several glitches in the film here in Tallahassee. It was at worst the 3rd showing of that print and it already had 3 sections that seemed to be spliced. I actually turned to my wife at one point and asked wtf?

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Friday, October 7, 2005 9:57 AM

ARAMINA

I had real trouble following the conversation sometimes, there was a really annoying hissing sound when some people spoke. But the worst thing.... the picture stopped and the lights came on part way into the Maidenhead scene... then the sound came back on with no picture for about 20 seconds. We were not a happy crowd (for those who are interested this was a n advanced screening in a small cinema, room with about 100 seats and it was about a third full.)

When I think of an interesting signature you'll be the first to know.

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Friday, October 7, 2005 10:11 AM

EMBERS

I was lucky, sitting in nice stadium seating with good sound systems,
the audio was near perfect...not too loud,
but clear, I could hear every line
(which was NOT true of the Advanced Screenings)

but the copy seemed very slightly scratched in two places,
not terrible...
it just took me out of the movie for a second.

Oh and the basic visual quality was also a HUGE improvement over the Advanced screenings,
those seemed to have some scenes so dark I couldn't see the characters.

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Friday, October 7, 2005 12:15 PM

MOOSE

My first viewing was a great older (but recently renovated) Regal theatre. Sound and visual quality was wonderful.

BUT...The film "skipped" right at the ending and we missed the last line of the movie.

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Friday, October 7, 2005 12:26 PM

MIMA

Maybe you theater people can clarify for me:
I thought in this day and age, that it was impossible for the picture and sound to become 'off' from each other. yet the first 15 minutes of the film (in a modern regal theatre) had many instances of peoples mouths moving before/after they spoke, and where their mouths did not match the dialogue. it was EXTREMELY jarring and unprofessional looking. tell me that it was just my theatre and not sloppy dubbing by our crew!

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Friday, October 7, 2005 1:26 PM

HOWARD

I find all your accounts to be very disturbing. What kind of an industry is this? Well the truth is I know what kind. In the old days the CINEMA PARADISO rule applied movie theatres had a single screen with a projectionist handling real projection, analogue projectors and reels. The problem is that today's need for digital is a self fulfilling circumstance. Born out of the fact that the corporatisation of cinema has downsized both staff and skills as it has increased the number of screens. So in many multiplexes you will have one projectionist handling 16 screens down a long corridor or a two storie corridor. The reels run on horizontal flatbeds not traditional vertical projectors and 80% of the time there is NO one there to check focus. In the end MOVIE THEATRES will be not only 100% digital in projection but in operation. Only janitors to clean the toilets will be on-site. You will enter with a credit or debit card, your ticket will be automated as will be all refreshments and the screens will be controlled by a command centre hundreds of miles away that will run thousands of screens just like a telephone company or electricity utility.
There will of course be CCTV and a private security firm with quasi-police powers to come and remove you from the theatre if you behave "badly".
I already find cinemas to be awful compared to my childhood experiences.
This is why I have an LCD video-projector, a progressive-scan DVD player and a good old fashioned pull-down screen. Audiowise I am a purist I have a two channel system with excellent results. Human Beings along with just about all other species you may have noticed have 2 ears not 5:1 ears. Good quality HiFi Stereo is always the superior phased sound. It is in our biology.
Bad stereo is bad because it is bad not because it is 2 channel.
I thus eagerly await the North American Region 1 issue of SERENITY on DVD.

Howard
Manchester UK

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Saturday, October 8, 2005 4:58 PM

DONCOAT

Returned to the Regal tonight for viewing #4. Serenity had been moved from the largest theater to one of the smaller ones...

However, this screen was still very good in quality (audio and video), and while not full, there were quite a few people. Strangely, though, this group was less responsive to the events in the film than some of the other (smaller) crowds. Not sure why.

A change from the first viewing at the same theater: one reel had a noticable scratch just left of center. Distracting.

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Saturday, October 8, 2005 7:17 PM

DREAMS2

I also went to the 4th viewing in a smaller theater after it was moved from the large one. The small size made the moive sharper in picture and sound closer not louder. I come from the TV generation and like a smaller screen not the IMAX.

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Sunday, October 9, 2005 3:04 AM

FUTANTS

I used to love to go the see films/movies in the Theaters as a kid, but I can't say the same anymore for various reasons.

I've noticed that after Stadium-style and revamped cinemas came about, there was a huge drop in quality in numerous areas,

The film has an insane amount of markings on it

The SCREEN IS TOO WIDE AND SHORT( sure it's meant to be 16:9 ratio, but when the screen is too large, the ratio means nothing, especially if the characters either look too squished on screen or all you see is part of a giant torso and head...wtf?

the SCREEN IS TOO DIM and makes me want to fall asleep (was bad for Serenity and extremely noticeable, but was the worst for The butterfly effect, which made me really sleepy during scenes of harsh light on film shown in extremely dim light on the screen)

THE SCREEN SHOWS THE COLORS AS TOO DULL with about a 40-50% color range.....wtf? why not just show the film in black and white

TONS OF BLURRINESS in certain areas of the film in countless scenes wtf?
and it's not that it was a problem that the projector was out of focus, but some bizarre issue w/ the film itself
THE SOUND surround sound and big booming bass is one thing, and I even like to feel like I'm right there while watching a film like Serenity, but there were times(mainly the surprise huge action sequence towards the end)I nearly wanted to crawl out of my skin from the insane bass and volume

and they wonder why, other than the prices and the movies being total crap, that people don't like to go to the theaters anymore.

How about the geniuses that run the theaters actually test the visual quality for each movie on each screen before they run it? Is that too much to ask of them after paying 9 dollars a ticket?

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