Hollywood Acts Warily At Comic-Con 273
gollum123 writes "Peter Jackson wowed the crowd with 13 minutes of highly anticipated footage from the first of his two ultra-expensive Hobbit movies. But he also played it safe — very safe — by not so much as mentioning, much less demonstrating, the filmmaking wizardry at the heart of the project. That left big questions about the movie industry's future unanswered and added to a theme of this year's Comic-Con: Hollywood has come to fear this place. Mr. Jackson is shooting his two Hobbit movies, the first of which is to arrive in theaters in December, at an unusually fast 48 frames a second, twice the standard rate. But an estimated 6,500 fans did not have that experience when they gathered in Comic-Con's cavernous Hall H moments earlier to see the new footage. Still, Mr. Jackson, one of Hollywood's boldest directors, made the unexpectedly timid decision to present The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey in a standard format here — it was not even in 3-D — because he feared an online outcry that could hurt box-office results."
More like Peter was angry (Score:5, Insightful)
Reading all press it sounds like too much generalisation - in fact, it *feels* like Peter Jackson was more angry about backslash and calling a "cheap TV movie" just because you are used to different frame rate. So he decided that discussion about "be or not to be 48 fps" could actually overcome discussion about movie itself. I think it was wise decision and not Hollywood fear about CC. Come on, they *love* CC - it's amplified publicity with fans all around the world. What a better way to get movie going buzz rolling?
Or... (Score:1, Insightful)
did the place just lack the tech needed to show it to those 6500 fans in 3d at 48fps? The later seems more likely imho.
Enough with the gimmicks. (Score:5, Insightful)
Just give me a great story with great acting in the old school format and I'm fine with that. No 3D, no 48 fps.
People will go back to theaters when the social experience is positive again. No cell phones, more comfy seats, etc. Maybe I'm getting old but the experience these days seems to have been taken over by thugs.
Re:Enough with the gimmicks. (Score:4, Insightful)
3d (Score:4, Insightful)
it was not even in 3-D
GOOD!
Re:Why 2 Hobbit movies? (Score:5, Insightful)
Or perhaps more buck for bang.
Re:More like Peter was angry (Score:4, Insightful)
Fear is a poor choice of word. They want the publicity of CC, and they can't help but make a showing. But they do understand that this crowd has particular likes and dislikes, one of which is around, what I hope, is actually a dislike of technology gimmicks for sales $$$ sake.
It's hard to understand sometimes, since 3D in particular, generates such an angry outcry, and these statements of "cheap TV movie" sound like knee-jerk ludditism. From the director's perspective, his boss wants these gimmicks in since it boosts revenue (particularly weekend gross numbers). From our perspective they are just cost adders that sometimes detract from our enjoyment (if 3D makes you sick). But that's not what ends up being put in the press, from the geek crew you just hear bitching about 3D being some sort of unformed evil being silently served in our cereal, and 48fps being a dark stormcloud on the horizon that will poison all our crops.
It's not unreasonable for him to want to avoid that, since he's more focused (I hope) on the movie content itself. All I know is if the movie makes me want to vomit due to technology, or just poor camera technique (i.e. "shakeycam"), I'm going to hold that against him. But 3D movies look just fine on my 2D bluray or dish network spigot. I suspect 48fps will manage to work just fine too.
Re:More like Peter was angry (Score:4, Insightful)
It can also generate Internet levels of hate. Which the traditional media loves to report on.
It's not a theater (Score:5, Insightful)
It's a convention hall, not a theater. Bad acoustics, no projection room, no good audio system, folding chairs. Here's what the screens look like. [screencrave.com] Look at the screen size and quality. They have to have auxiliary screens around the room so people in the back can see. Some of the auxiliary screens are dim around the edges. That's a setup for a marketing presentation. Of course you don't introduce a new movie technology there.
Movies with new technologies are typically previewed for critics in venues with ideal conditions, like the Technicolor Theater in Hollywood or the screening room at Dolby headquarters in San Francisco.
Re:More like Peter was angry (Score:5, Insightful)
Well who can blame him? I couldn't make any sense of the comments on /. about how 48fps looks "too real". Isn't that kinda the point? To make the TV show or movie look like just a window on another world? It's supposed to look real. (This reminds me of those persons who claimed CDs or lossless AACs were too perfect, and they'd rather hear the sizzle of downloaded MP3s. Illogical.)
Dude. If you have to tell people over and over that it's better because they don't see it in your demos, then you probably ought to think twice before spending a whole lot of money on it. If I were a theater operator, and Pete comes in and tells me I should spend tens of thousands of dollars to upgrade my equipment, but the buzz on social media is "I wouldn't pay more to see it in this format" why would I do it?
This seems a lot like the studios and Samsung screaming at me that I should buy a 3D TV and blu-ray player, even though the ones I've tried at Best Buy are fairly craptacular.
I'm with you on the CD / AAC thing, though. If you want to add MP3 sizzle to them, that's a straightforward problem. Going the other way, not so much...
Re:Uncanny valley (Score:5, Insightful)
It's supposed to look real.
I thought it was supposed to look just real enough (and conversely, just unreal enough) for your brain to suspend disbelief.
from what I've read about 48fps, that's exactly the problem people ran into. people said things like "my brain was not processing what I was seeing as 'two hobbits walking up a hill' but rather 'two actors in hobbit costumes walking up a hill'". They were having difficulty suspending disbelief.
I'll have to wait until I see it in person, but native 48fps will have to be a whole other world better than what the 120hz tv's software intrapolation does to 24fps film, cause that's distracting as all hell.
Re:Why 2 Hobbit movies? (Score:5, Insightful)
Remember: If Hollywood makes one movie out of a book, they suck because they cut out all those important scenes. If they make two movies, they suck because they are just trying to cash in.
Re:Enough with the gimmicks. (Score:5, Insightful)
Your post advocates a
(X) technical ( ) legislative ( ) market-based (X) vigilante
approach to fighting cell phones. Your idea will not work. Here is why it won't work. (One or more of the following may apply to your particular idea, and it may have other flaws which used to vary from state to state before a bad federal law was passed.)
(X) Emergency calls and other legitimate cell uses would be affected
( ) No one will be able to find the guy or collect the money
( ) It is defenseless against brute force attacks
( ) It will stop callers for two weeks and then we'll be stuck with it
(X) Users of cell phones will not put up with it
(X) Motorola will not put up with it
(X) The police will not put up with it
(X) Requires too much cooperation from cell phone users
( ) Requires immediate total cooperation from everybody at once
( ) Many cell users cannot afford to lose business or alienate potential employers
( ) Anyone could anonymously destroy anyone else's career or business
Specifically, your plan fails to account for
(X) Laws expressly prohibiting it
(X) Profit-minded mentality of wireless carriers
(X) RF uses beyond cell phones
(X) Asshats
(X) Jurisdictional problems
( ) Unpopularity of weird new taxes
( ) Public reluctance to accept weird new forms of money
( ) Huge existing infrastucture investment in cell technology
( ) Susceptibility of protocols other than TDFM to attack
( ) Willingness of users to install Flash games on their phones
( ) Armies of worm riddled SMS-hacked cell phones
( ) Eternal arms race involved in all filtering approaches
( ) Extreme profitability of cell phones
( ) Technically illiterate politicians
( ) Extreme stupidity on the part of people who use cell phones
( ) Bandwidth costs that are unaffected by client filtering
( ) Facebook
and the following philosophical objections may also apply:
(X) Ideas similar to yours are easy to come up with, yet none have ever
been shown practical
(X) Any scheme based on forced failures is unacceptable
( ) Blacklists suck
( ) Whitelists suck
( ) We should be able to talk about Viagra without being censored
( ) Countermeasures should not involve phone fraud or credit card fraud
(X) Countermeasures should not involve sabotage of public networks
( ) Countermeasures must work if phased in gradually
( ) Sending text messages should be free
( ) Why should we have to trust you and your phone company?
( ) Incompatiblity with open source or open source licenses
( ) Feel-good measures do nothing to solve the problem
( ) Temporary/one-time phone numbers are cumbersome
( ) I don't want the government listening to my calls
( ) Killing them that way is not slow and painful enough
Furthermore, this is what I think about you:
(X) Sorry dude, but I don't think it would work.
( ) This is a stupid idea, and you're a stupid person for suggesting it.
( ) Nice try, assh0le! I'm going to find out where you live and burn your
house down!
Re:High frame rate (Score:4, Insightful)
Or most people over 35 can spot when they are being sold gimmicks at ridiculous markup?
Re:Film should NOT look 'real' (Score:5, Insightful)
That sounds like a bunch of nonsense to me. Cinema has been evolving towards more and more realism from the start. Sound, color, higher resolution, higher frame rates, larger screens, better speakers.... None of the limitations of the cinema experience were there for artistic reasons, they are purely technical and when the technical limitation was removed the cinema experience changed. There are always people who complain about new technologies but the reality is that no one is forcing these changes on directors. If they have an artistic reason for using b/w, or no sound, or lower frame rate they can still do that.
Re:Uncanny valley (Score:5, Insightful)
from what I've read about 48fps, that's exactly the problem people ran into. people said things like "my brain was not processing what I was seeing as 'two hobbits walking up a hill' but rather 'two actors in hobbit costumes walking up a hill'". They were having difficulty suspending disbelief.
They must have a REALLY hard time with live theatre.
Re:More like Peter was angry (Score:2, Insightful)
Well, technically, it still doesnt work. The iphone is a content consumer device, not a content producer device.
Re:Why 2 Hobbit movies? (Score:2, Insightful)
No, they suck because they cut the important scenes, and add some bullshit drama scenes that the writer bitch decided were more important. See the female writing lead on the LOTR movies for example. She wanted to add the warrior arwen bullshit.
Re:Uncanny valley (Score:5, Insightful)
from what I've read about 48fps, that's exactly the problem people ran into. people said things like "my brain was not processing what I was seeing as 'two hobbits walking up a hill' but rather 'two actors in hobbit costumes walking up a hill'". They were having difficulty suspending disbelief.
They must have a REALLY hard time with live theatre.
Actually yes!
I love human storytelling; I love reading plays; love the art of Theatre; love the techniques and methods of Theatre; love acting and creating and characterization and directing. But I. Hate. Live. Theatre.
Why? Because "it's one actor dressed up like Macbeth pretending to see another actor dressed up like Banquo's ghost, amidst a bunch of other actors dressed up like courtiers who cannot see the actor dressed up like Banquo's ghost".
But I love to watch movies. Can get caught up in movies and so carried away that it's jarring to walk out of the theatre and find myself in a cookie-cutter suburban strip mall.
I am one example of a person who needs the implied cinematic distance to immerse myself in the story. Because that's what it's about for me -- the story. Doesn't matter how crisp the textures or tangible the spray of alien blood looks. It's about that weird mental space when you can be temporarily deceived that what is being shown on the screen in front of you is what's being shown on the screen of your retina. It is the very realism and true 3-D of live theatre which pushes it inevitably out of this space. The stage is only so big, the proscenium and the band and the luxury boxes, or in small venues the proximity to the actors and the rest of the audience..... these are the very things which do not allow me to see a play as anything other than a play. It cannot ever be pure Story for me. And I have been to performances where I was assured by folks who would know, that these were top-notch productions that critics and theatre-lovers rave about.
When it comes to hyperrealism in theatre, I live in the uncanny valley.
Re:Uncanny valley (Score:5, Insightful)
You are correct that many present day movie actors make terrible stage actors, but not all. Also, it's not that stage actors "overact" it's that the stage requires one to be "bigger". There is a huge difference between overacting (bad) and being "bigger" (good). Overacting, regardless of medium is bad. Modulating your tone for the medium is good.
Camera captures everything so all you really need to do is capture the emotional tone for a given moment and the eyes take care of everything for you (assuming you're one of them expressive types). Stage requires you to bring more of yourself to the character in order to reach the entire audience thus the requirement to be bigger.
TLDR: bigger...not overacting
Re:Enough with the gimmicks. (Score:4, Insightful)
(X) Emergency calls and other legitimate cell uses would be affected
Yes this is a serious problem. Before the advent of cellphones, people were dying in droves in the cinema. Back in the 80's life expectancy was in the 30s, sometimes lower if you wnet to the cinema really often.
Also, I've been in cinemas (especially in London, where there is lots of concrete and high rise buildings) which are mobile phone blackspots. The carnage is terrible, I would never go back. People were dying in the aisles and noone lifetd a finger to help.
(X) Users of cell phones will not put up with it
That's rather the point. If they want to us their phone, don't go to the cinema.
(X) Motorola will not put up with it
(X) The police will not put up with it
There's lots of crap reception everywhere in a city. One building more or less won't bother the police.
(X) Requires too much cooperation from cell phone users
Um, how does poor reception require the cooperation of phone users?
(X) Laws expressly prohibiting it
(X) Profit-minded mentality of wireless carriers
(X) RF uses beyond cell phones
(X) Asshats
(X) Jurisdictional problems
Again, "Farady Cage" pretty much covers any building with significant amounts of rebar. There are no laws prohibiting it, and wireless carriers have no say. RF beyond cell-phone usage won't necessarily be affected, especially at longer wavelengths. The farady cage prevents asshats because they have no choice and again, there are no laws prohibiting bad reception.
(X) Ideas similar to yours are easy to come up with, yet none have ever
been shown practical
Really, because bad reception is often a fact of life without specifically trying to engineer it.
etc.
The thing with the old spam form was that it was accurate. Your post isn't.
Re:Uncanny valley (Score:4, Insightful)
A) They're fucking HOBBITS.
B) That big giant screen/TV you're watching? It is definitely not a window into the Shire, I promise. Do NOT attempt to go through it; you will quickly be disappointed.
C) You know that sound you hear, coming from the speakers? Try REAL hard and you can train your ears to see the millisecond discrepancy. It's always there, I promise.
D) Remember buying the ticket? Popcorn? That drink you're holding? Remember choosing a seat without the sticky floor? Now, realize you've set all those annoyances aside after the movie started.
E) They're still HOBBITS. These do not exist. This story is not a documentary; it is fiction. I know, I know, it's fun to pretend it really happened, or even that we are a part of it, but it did not.
Part of the fun of the experience is guiding your thinking, accepting the fantasy as a whole new world that is real for you. It's really not that difficult to do this, regardless of the visual or audio quality. It's even possible to ignore super shitty acting (though this is probably the toughest thing to ignore). This is why people can go to see a live performance and not lose their shit about how ZOMG FAAAAKE it looks.
I liken it to the printing industry, for I am a printer. I could whip out my trusty loupe when I'm looking at a fine-art print, examining the ink droplets to tell which pass count was used, on which printer, using dye or pigment inks, on which general substrate, and whether proper color management was used. I have the expertise and experience to determine all that very easily, but it's a shit-ton more satisfying to step back and enjoy the fuckin painting.
Re:Uncanny valley (Score:4, Insightful)
I am one example of a person who needs the implied cinematic distance to immerse myself in the story. Because that's what it's about for me -- the story.
Actually it sounds like the story is NOT what it is about for you. If it was about the story, you wouldn't have a problem with live theatre.