By Gregg Kilday - Analysis
LAS VEGAS (Hollywood Reporter) -
Everywhere you turned at
the movie industry's annual ShoWest convention this week,
executives were looking at the future of the film business
through rose-colored, albeit polarized, glasses.
Real D 3-D and Dolby Digital 3-D were busy showing off
their competing wares, and the studios were just as busy doing
a little branding of their own. Disney, a pioneer in modern-day
3-D, boasts that its offerings come in Disney Digital 3-D,
naturally, while DreamWorks Animation, which will be rolling
out all its movies in digital 3-D starting next year, will bill
its movies as Ultimate 3-D.
"I believe this is an opportunity for all of us to actually
grow admissions, not just revenues," he said.
But for all the talk surrounding born-again 3-D, the new
crop of 3-D movies on display here suggests that the more
things change, the more they stay the same.
3-D might bring added value to the movies, but 3-D by
itself is not likely to push a movie beyond its targeted
demographics. It will allow theater owners to charge higher
ticket prices, but will it necessarily attract more admissions?
Upcoming titles might offer some answers.
New distributor Summit Entertainment, for example, showed
off an extended sequence from its August 22 release "Fly Me to
the Moon," directed by Ben Stassen. The film revolves around
three houseflies that tag along on the historic Apollo 11 moon
landing. The 3-D allows the weightless objects on board to
drift out over the audience, and there are nice shots of the
lunar landing. But "Fly" has to be classified as a cute kids
movie with an overlay of historical fact to appeal to the
parents who accompany their children to the multiplex.
Currently, Disney's "Hannah Montana and Miley Cyrus: Best
of Both Worlds Concert" is spoken of reverentially, as if it
were the holy grail of 3-D. Thanks in part to those
premium-priced tickets, the concert movie climbed above the $60
million mark in little more than three weekends. But the
unanswerable question is whether a 2-D movie devoted to preteen
favorite Hannah would have attracted just as many ticket
buyers.
For once 3-D is in place and the initial novelty wears off,
filmmakers probably will find themselves back where they began.
All those 3-D effects aside, it's still the story that
ultimately puts moviegoers in those seats.
Reuters/Hollywood Reporter
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