I have just got back from seeing this at the Bradford IMAX.

Has anyone else seen it on IMAX ??? I felt like all I had to do was sit on the front row of my local cinema, have a few beers so every thing looks fuzzy, and I would have had the same experience, but only paid half as much for the ticket.

I feel a bit ripped off, they only use the middle 2/3's of the screen !!! I assumed when it said it had been remastered they would have used the full IMAX screen size.

Was this just Bradford, or is it like this at other IMAX's ???

Cheers

Cris.

I have seen it, It was nothing special. Since the movie was not filmed on 75 mm getting the full resolution would have required going to PAN & SCAN (UGGG) to kept the aspect ratio. Now the one thing the theater did have over other local theaters was the sound was actualy good.

Now I have also seen Beauty and the Beast in an IMAX theater and it was great.

Weird, it seems the local theaters here have been waging a techno-war. Every single cinema in the city has at LEAST 6 THX screens, and the rest are dolby digital. And they ALL have stadium seating. I must admit I've become rather spoiled. I won't even bother going to a movie that doesn't have these 2 requirements. Otherwise, I'd rather wait till I can rent/buy it and watch it at home where there are no screaming kids, killer sound, and I can sip margaritas and pause when I have to pee.

I know people that keep wanting to press the Tivo rewind button whilst at the cinema

The theaters have stadium seating and large screens but none of them have THX. They have Sony Digital Sound, but they just never have the settings right for the movie. The highs are so over powered that you can see people cringe when certian tones are played in songs. I used to see about 3 movies a week util about a year ago because of how crappy the theater is at getting anything setup correctly. The movie is in the wrong aspect ratio (It always turns out that the person used the wrong lense) and I ask since this is someone's job to make sure this looks good why do I need to complain about 1 in 4 movies I see here? They never do anything about it so I only go and see movies I really can't wait for the DVD like LOTR.

Plus I am spoiled since I have a theater room at home with a 110 inch screen and 7.1 audio system.

> Has anyone else seen it on IMAX ???

I did. It was great. Very clear (in some cases TOO clear, I got tired of noticing skin problems) and didn't notice screen size problems. I loved it.

I saw it at the Metreon in San Francisco and it looked great. Well worth the inflated ticket prices. I had the opposite feeling about it not taking up all of the screen, as I would have been very disapointed if they'd chopped it to pan&scan. I ended up sitting the seccond to the last row, and it was the closest I'd have wanted to be. Considering the Matrix DVD is the first one I pop in when I'm testing a new home theater component, seeing this one in the ultimate setting just seemed a requirement.

Matthew

I know people that keep wanting to press the Tivo rewind button whilst at the cinema

I keep expecting the Replay commercial advance to pop up when the commercials at the start of the film play.

Back when I got my first PVR, the DishPlayer, I kept wanting to see its pause indicator in the upper right when I needed to use the restroom.

none of them have THX. They have Sony Digital Sound...

Hmmm, everyone keeps talking as though THX was some kind of sound delivery technology like DTS or Dolby Digital.

But I thought THX was merely a certification program that said (essentially) "this theater will have really good sound that meets a minimum standard", based on the various components that make up the sound system.

/me goes over to THX.com to check...

AFAIK, you're right about that Tony. THX is a norm, nothing more, nothing less.

Exactly. THX implies that some Lucas-blessed engineers went out to the theater and gave them hell to get their sound system set up properly, going as far as having them relocate A/C units on the roof to get the noise floor lower in the THX auditoriums.

Here in Houston, I think there's only one theater left that's THX certified (or was, at some point certified -- it's no longer listed at THX.com). It was a state-of-the-art AMC 8-room theater back before stadium seating and 30-screen theaters warped the movie business. It's now owned by some no-name company, but it still shows first-run films and tends to be blissfully empty, since most moviegoers seem to insist on stadium seating and 30 screens. I just hope they manage to stay in business, otherwise I won't have a a THX theater to patronize any more.

The official (consumer-comprehensible) definition is at the THX website. They even have a snitch page, where consumers can gripe about cinema quality, possibly generating inspections and loss of certification. In a nutshell, the THX people seem to treat theater certification the way that city health inspectors must (hopefully) treat the quality of food concessions.