Jason watches THE WALK in IMAX 3-D

I'm a bit acrophobic, so I fully expected to have to flinch and squirm in my seat at scenes of a man walking a tightrope across the Twin Towers. Especially in IMAX 3-D. And I was mostly right, although surprisingly most of that was in the lead-up and preparation. The walk itself was shot almost serenely, matching wire-walker Philippe Petit's mood. The story I already knew from the excellent documentary MAN ON WIRE (2008, and highly recommended.) THE WALK just gives it breathtakingly realized life. And that's a good thing.

As for the 3-D, I figured there would be little chance of it breaking my rule (into the screen is good, out of the screen is bad.) After all, the money shot is looking down from great distance. But Zemeckis found plenty of ways to create annoying action out of the screen, be it an arrow in flight or a bird. But still, it's mostly good.

Running Time: 123 minutes
My Total Minutes: 406,134

Jason watches THE MARTIAN in 3D

Now that's some smart sci-fi. I can't take credit for this, but a friend of mine pointed out that in many good sci-fi movies there's the moment where smart people have to figure out how to improvise some way to survive. That's the whole movie of THE MARTIAN. Only complaint--and this is really a nitpick--is when Matt Damon says he'll have to "science the shit out of this" he's technically engineering the shit out of this. Now, if he had a control Matt Damon to see what happened if he didn't do any of the stuff he did, that would be science.

Oh yeah, and as for the 3D, it mostly follows my rule of action into the screen = good, action out of the screen = bad. Only time I noticed it breaking the rule was during the storm in the beginning. Had to have dust and rocks flying at your face.

Running Time: 144 minutes
My Total Minutes: 406,011

Jason watches THE HOBBIT: THE DESOLATION OF SMAUG in IMAX 3-D HFR

I'm falling way behind in my blog, I guess I should at least finish up 2013.

We're back in Middle Earth, and it feels good, even if it doesn't feel the same as our first trip. The 3-D is fine, although it breaks Jason's Rule of 3-D several times, it wasn't too distracting. Interesting, the HFR (High Frame Rate--48 frames/sec) which I thought looked weird all through THE HOBBIT: AN UNEXPECTED JOURNEY didn't bother me at all this time. And the story is really picking up, too. Peter Jackson took on the difficult job of adapting what is essentially a children's story and trying to fit it with the darker tone of his LORD OF THE RINGS movies (and the LOTR books.) And he does...an okay job. There's still an uneasy fit of silly slapstick and dark themes (including the introduction of a resurgent Sauron.) But it still a fun ride (often, quite literally looking like an amusement park ride) and Smaug in all his glory is pretty damn impressive. I still think he stretched things pretty far to get 3 movies out of the source material, but I'll be ready and eager for part 3 same time next year.

Oh, and we get to see Legolas many years before he appears in LORD OF THE RINGS. I want to know his fitness plan, because I swear he looks a decade younger than when we see him some 77 years later.

Running Time: 161 minutes
My Total Minutes: 346,589 (adjusted downward due to discovering an error in my record-keeping, I double-counted ~1500 minutes)

Jason watches GRAVITY in IMAX 3-D and then again in D-Box 3-D

And I am blown away. I think it's fair to say I watch a lot of movies, and I love a lot of movies. I haven't been blown away by a movie like this since...ever, maybe?

Expansively claustrophobic, epic, and stripped-down (only two actors appear on screen, and for most of the movie it's only one,) Alfonso Cuarón (who directed one of my other favorite movies, CHILDREN OF MEN) has invented a new kind of cinema. Astronauts are doing repairs on the Hubble telescope when the serenity of space is broken by word from Houston that a scuttled Russian satellite has triggered a chain reaction (this isn't said in the movie, but it's based on the theoretical Kessler effect) and debris is heading straight for them. The result is catastrophic, with only mission commander Matt Kowalski (George Clooney) and medical engineer Ryan Stone (Sandra Bullock) surviving. And so, they begin a perilous journey in orbit around earth to try to get to the International Space Station and take a Soyuz module home.

Cuarón never lets up, never leaves the astronauts to check in on mission control, or present flashbacks of their earlier lives. Only two actors, and space. We get a few voices through the intercom from Earth, most notably Ed Harris as mission control. But I'd also like to point out the amazing scene with the voice of Orto Ignatiussen as Aningaaq (and no, I had no idea who Orto was before.) The scene where Dr. Stone raises him on the radio is brilliant. He (and Sandra Bullock, of course) brought tears to the eyes of several in the audience just with him speaking...what language was it? Greenlandic? And his dogs barking, and baby crying...it was a rare quiet break in the action and it was positively heartbreaking.

The experience is immersive, and that's the whole point. It's also an emotional journey for rookie astronaut Dr. Stone to find the courage to survive, to press on through adversity and anguish. Kowalski, on the other hand, is cool as a cucumber. While he hasn't been in this exact situation before, he's obviously been through a lot, gathered a lot of stories in his days, and will either have another amazing story to tell or he'll die trying. The emotional arc is for Dr. Stone to get to that same state.

Can I sing the praises of Sandra Bullock for a minute? Does anyone remember when she was just the epitome of spunky-cute romantic action-comedy lead? Remember getting tired of that? (okay, maybe some people didn't, but I did.) I never saw THE BLIND SIDE in no small part because I wasn't that interested in a Sandra Bullock starring role. I apologize, profusely! She is a brilliant actress and she is put through the emotional and physical wringer here. Maybe it's early (and always pointless) to talk Oscars, but she shouldn't just be given the Oscar, she should be given one of those massive Oscar statues they display outside during the awards. That's how much more amazing her performance is than...anything. Okay, is that enough hyperbole?

Let me get back to that immersion again. That's why you'll hear so many people tell you that you have to see it in IMAX, and in 3-D, or whatever your favorite method is for cinematic immersion. And they're all right. I saw it first in IMAX 3-D. I know there are plenty of 3-D haters out there, and for the record in one scene that violates Jason's rule that 3-D should be used to put depth into the screen, not throw stuff out of it (and if you see it you'll know what scene it is.) Well, if you don't like 3-D then don't see it in 3-D. I'm confident the film itself is immersive enough that it will work in 2-D. But if you have any inkling at all that 3-D could work with the right movie, then see this in 3-D. Same goes for IMAX. The only objection I know to IMAX is paying the extra price for it. But it's absolutely worth it. Take a road trip to you nearest IMAX theater if you have to.

Then after seeing it in IMAX 3-D, and thinking about it all the next day, it struck me that I wanted to see it in a D-box seat. I know D-box is controversial, and it's anathema to cinema purists. I've only experienced D-box once and while it was fun, it wasn't something I cared to go back to. I have my way of immersing myself in a movie--sitting in the front row. My one D-box experience was 2 years ago, and I finally found a movie where I wanted to try it again. And at first, I wondered if I might regret it. Sitting so far back the screen looked small to me, at least smaller than it should have. But soon enough I was lost in the movie. And some of the best D-box effects were also the most subtle--very slight, slow floating motions during the quiet scenes. The thrill ride action scenes were also pretty cool, but D-box only move a few inches at most, it can't really throw you around as hard as the action on screen (there would be liability issues if it did.) So my take on D-box. If it's sounds like something you would just hate, avoid it. If you're at all curious, this is the movie to try it out with. If your choice is between IMAX and D-box...I'd recommend IMAX. Now if anyone knows of any theater in the world with IMAX and D-box, I'm up for a little road trip.

Running Time: 90 minutes x 2 = 180 minutes
My Total Minutes: 338,642

Jason watches PACIFIC RIM in 3D

What the shit was that crap?! I don't mean the giant robots fighting sea monsters--that was the whole point, and was cheesy, stupid fun. I don't mean the gobbledygook about "drifting" (i.e., mind-melding) or the trans-dimensional breach, that at least was pseudo-science nonsense that served the plot (what little there was.) And I don't mind the 3-D, which alternated between unnecessary and annoying violations of Jason's rule. I mean what the shit was up with Anchorage being a city of 2 million people?!

Okay, this takes place in the near-ish future. I forget the exact years, but within this century. Giant monsters rise up from a trans-dimensional breach in the Pacific. Cities on the Pacific Rim are decimated, starting with San Francisco (before the opening credits.) So as the population of Pacific coast cities are destroyed either through monster attacks or through the completely rational act of fleeing the areas that are prone to giant monster attacks. And yet, in all of that, Anchorage's population increases by an order of magnitude?

I repeat--what the shit was that crap!?

Running Time: 131 minutes
My Total Minutes: 334,929

Jason Watches IRON MAN 3 in 3-D

A wacky self-referential meta-comedy about a billionaire playboy superhero who is having a nervous breakdown about  the "events" of New York (ostensibly about the fight in THE AVENGERS, but designed to make you think 9/11). Adorable moppet sidekick, remote controlled suits (although he spends the bulk of the movie without a working suit), old girlfriend, old enemy, wacky and inexplicable twists, a flashback voice-over narration that director Shane Black used to much greater effect in KISS KISS BANG BANG.... And a hero who frequently freaks out--is reduced to a quivering lump--by any mention of New York or the events that happened there.

If this sounds schizophrenic, it is. But more than that, it's a movie about schizophrenia. In the opening scene, Tony Stark is at a 1999/2000 New Year's Eve party wearing a name tag that says, "You know who I am." The thing is, he doesn't. Or at least, once he becomes Iron Man the line between Tony Stark and the suit gets blurred. Multiple times the suit is walking (or flying) around for minutes before the big reveal that nobody is actually inside it. And as I've already mentioned, Tony spends a huge chunk of the movie without a working suit. In fact, in the end where he finally says, "I am Iron Man" he's not wearing a suit and (SPOILER, except that it was kinda revealed in the trailer) his entire inventory is destroyed. The only obvious conclusion--the Iron in Iron Man isn't the stuff of the suit, it's the stuff of his heart. Or...he's secretly building new suits so that there can be yet more Iron Man/Avengers sequels.

Oh, and as for the 3-D. I don't care. I've become so inured to it that it neither impresses nor annoys. It just looks like a movie. Of course, 2-D movies look just fine to me, too, so there's a big "what's the point" angle there. Now I've been told by a friend that THE GREAT GATSBY has some of the best 3-D he's seen, so I suppose I'll have to see that.

Running Time: 130 minutes
My Total Minutes: 327,940

Jason goes to Noir City--Day 8

Now this was something new. A night of 3-D Noir. That's right, kids, 3-D isn't a new thing, it's been around since the 50's. In fact, it's been around a lot longer than that (although sometimes unintentionally.) And last night (Friday) was just a night of pure, good-ol' fun.

MAN IN THE DARK (1953):Steve Rawley (Edmond O'brien) is in jail for stealing $130,000. He undergoes an experimental procedure to remove the evil part of his brain in exchange for parole. It also removes his memory. Which is fine, in his new persona he's actually a nice guy. But it isn't fine when his old gang grabs him and whisks him away from the hospital. See, they want the loot, he's the only one who knows where he stashed it, and memory loss is a bad thing now. A fun caper with some charmingly old-school 3-D effects--spooky dangling spiders, punches thrown at the camera, a P.O.V. shot of surgeons going in to operate on your brain. Nice!

As an aside, all the 3-D effects last night pretty much break Jason's Rule of 3-D. But I actually found them pretty enjoyable instead of distracting (like most modern 3-D movies.) This was a different time and a different attitude with the effects. First, the story was still paramount and the effects were a fun little bonus. Second, they were playing around with the 3-D effects and seeing what they could do. They weren't throwing tons of CGI junk at the screen and trying to overwhelm you. A spider dangling in front of your eyes was impressive enough, so they just did that really well instead of bashing you over the head with the effect. I liked that a lot.

INFERNO (1953): And then the second film of the night might just be my favorite of the entire festival. Which is kind of blasphemy for film noir because not only was it in 3-D it was in color! But heck, it stars Rhonda Fleming, and those lips need to be seen in color. She plays Geraldine Carson, wife of millionaire Donald Carson (Robert Ryan) and secret lover of Joseph Duncan (William Lundigan.) They've hatched the "perfect" plot. Take Donald out to the desert to explore an investment in a manganese mine, then leave him there. He's a notorious alcoholic who has a habit of running away for days on end, so he'll die of thirst before anyone even starts looking for him. For good measure, get his horse to throw him and break his leg. Tell him you're going for help, never come back. The only problem--although Donald may be a rich boy who has never done hard work in his life, he's got a spirit that can rise to the challenge. He's not a lay-back-in-the-sun-and-die-of-thirst kinda guy. The scenes of him struggling down the canyon to a plateau where he can light a signal fire are epic. And the transitions from him struggling to survive to them enjoying the high life in Los Angeles are brilliant. Just all around an excellently crafted story, with just enough 3-D gags to justify the use of 3-D. Honestly, while the 3-D effects were kinda cool, I loved this for the story and it would still be great without the 3-D.

Total Running Time: 153 minutes
My Total Minutes: 312,826

Jason watches DREDD 3-D

I...must...avoid...calling it, "Dredd-ful."

So while I was in the theater, and still had my 3-D glasses from FINDING NEMO, I went ahead and snuck into this. I want my money back.

Seriously, this is lacking in the subtlety, wit, and social relevance of the Sylvester Stallone version. And that's a sentence I thought would never be constructed unless I somehow got my shot-for-shot remake of the entire Rambo series starring a poop-flinging gorilla off the ground.  ("The threw first turd!")

Judge Dredd (Karl Urban, not that it matters since he never takes his helmet off) takes a rookie (Olivia Thirlby) on her first mission. The rookie actually scored a few points below a passing grade on her exams, but she was passed by special order because...she's a psychic. That's also a reason for her to not wear her helmet, because it interferes with her psychic powers. Anyway, they respond to a call about three guys who were skinned and thrown from the top of a 200-story apartment complex. There they find the whole complex is controlled by a ruthless ex-prostitute turned drug lord, Ma Ma. Then a lot of violence happens.

Oh yeah, and the drug is called "slo-mo." Which is really an excuse to use ridiculously slow motion 3-D shots to show the effect of the drug. It's all an unpleasant exercise in overly stylized, beautiful, violent gore. Now, I'm a fan of beautiful gore, but call me an old fuddy-duddy because I like my violent gore to have brains that aren't just smeared across the ground (and wall, and stairs, and everywhere.)

This movie takes place in a dystopian world where America is an irradiated wasteland except for Mega-cities behind (presumably radiation shielded) walls. Mega-City 1 stretches from Boston to New York. It's full of crime, poverty, desperation, and the judges of the League of Justice keep order. But if you really wanted to depict a dystopia, create a world where the only movie you can watch is DREDD 3-D.

Running Time: 95 minutes
My Total Minutes: 298,392

Jason watches FINDING NEMO 3-D

So I've been mostly away from the movies for a while. I'll fix that tonight when I go to the opening night of Berlin and Beyond. I've just been a little busy going to Burning Man at the last minute, moving to a new place in San Jose (moving in with a couple of friends to save money on rent,) then traveling halfway across the country and helping friends move from Houston, TX to Bakersfield, CA. But now I'm back in the swing of things, and while I've barely started unpacking stuff into my new room, that doesn't stop me from seeing some movies.

So before the main feature, there was a new Pixar short, PARTYSAURUS REX. The timid, vervous T-Rex (voice of Wallace Shawn) is generally a party-pooper who keeps the other toys from having fun. But when he's chosen as the toy for bathtime, he suddenly has a new lease on being the life of the part--Partysaurus Rex. Cute and fun.

Then the feature, the recent classic FINDING NEMO. Damn, I forgot how good of a movie it is. My eyes still get a little watery in the beginning when Coral and all but one of the eggs (NEMO, of course) are devoured. And the emotional journey of Marlin (Albert Brooks) as a timid fish afraid of everything battling the whole darn ocean to find his son--damn that's powerful.

But hey, we knew that nine years ago. The real difference this time is the 3-D. And...it's...good. Really, well done. Unnecessary, sure (the film was already made to be excellent in 2-D), but given that they did the 3-D, I'm glad they did it well. And, of course, it's just great to see it on the big screen again. So if you like 3-D, go see it in 3-D. If you just like a great animated movie, go ahead and see it in 2-D, you won't really lose anything.

Total Running Time: 107 minutes
My Total Minutes: 298,297

Jason actually watches THE AMAZING SPIDER-MAN

Well, I turned my frustration at missing the free preview screening into a bit of fun, but then I went and caught a midnight screening anyway.

As I predicted, it was actually kind of a mess, it's pretty much a rehash of Sam Raimi's 2002 SPIDER-MAN just with a different villain, and of course it violated Jason's Rule of 3-D all over the place. Really, it's 3-D crimes are the worst of any of the new crop of 3-D movies that I've seen.

I still don't want to give away spoilers, and after all how can you spoil 'Peter Parker gets spider powers, fights a villain, narrowly wins, and learns a life lesson?' But here are some interesting things that I actually did notice:

1. Uncle Ben is kind of a jerk. Martin Sheen plays him more in a stern tough-love mold than Cliff Robertson's kindly old man in the Sam Raimi version.
2. Aunt May doesn't have white hair. This shouldn't have bothered me as much as it did. Also, Sally Field should've been given more to do than look worried when Peter constantly comes home with cuts and bruises.
3. For all the buzz of this being a "darker" take on the story, it's also way more slapstick than even Sam Raimi's version, going so far as including a gag where a newly en-spider-powered Peter can't control his sticky hands and accidentally pulls a lady's shirt off. 
4. With that said, it is also a darker version of the story. Which easily earns it the label of "uneven tone."
5. There's a surprising amount of skateboarding in it.
6. Spidey carries a knapsack with him full of random tools to help him. The one he uses the most often is his cell phone.
7. This Spidey can't web-swing for shit. I know he's new to this and just learning, but it surprised me how many web-swinging mishaps he had. Tobey Maguire seemed to catch on to it right away.
8. There's no J. Jonah Jameson, and that's a shame. There is a scene of the Daily Bugle, offering a cash reward for photographic proof of the Lizard, and Peter does set up webbing and his camera to try to get such proof. But then...nothing (or rather, the Lizard finds the camera and the "property of Peter Parker" label.) It felt like there was a missing scene where Jameson criticizes Peter's photography skills but reluctantly pays him something like half the promised reward...but it was cut out for slowing down and sidetracking the plot.
9. The previews build up a big secret involving Peter's father Richard Parker. Don't expect that secret to be revealed. It's hinted at, but clearly it's left for a sequel.
10. Not that I ever expect any Spider-Man movie to deal with this, but there's still an obvious problem of a teenage boy making out with the girl he's had a crush on for years and then having to put on a skin-tight latex suit and swing around in public. 

Anyway...overall, it was okay, but I preferred Sam Raimi's SPIDER-MAN and SPIDER-MAN 2. Of course, there's a reason Sony decided to reboot the franchise, and that reason is SPIDER-MAN 3. At least THE AMAZING SPIDER-MAN is way better than that. There's still a part of me that wishes Sam Raimi had been given a chance to right the ship with a SPIDER-MAN 4, but I'll take what I can get here and look forward to the inevitable sequel.

Running Time: 136 minutes

My Total Minutes: 289,252

Jason watches BRAVE in 3-D

First, like nearly all Pixar films, it included a bonus short. The short was LA LUNA, which I had actually seen at SFIFF and loved (when it was 2-D. It neither gains nor loses anything in 3-D.) It's the story of a young apprentice learning the ropes and helping out the two men who are caretakers of the moon. And it's (in keeping with the feature) a story of finding your own way in life. And, as an aside, it's dialogue free. For all the attention THE ARTIST and HUGO got last year for popularizing silent films, I think Pixar has been heavily influenced by silent films at least ever since WALL-E (which is silent for nearly all of the first 40 minutes or so.) Heck, my favorite thing about UP was that the destination was pulled right out of THE LOST WORLD (1925.)

Okay, now for the actual feature. BRAVE has made some headlines for being the first Pixar feature (co-)directed by a woman and featuring a female protagonist. There's also been some critical reaction that while it's pretty good it's not really up to Pixar's normal (pre-CARS II) standards. And...I can see some of that, although I can't quite put my finger on it. I think it lacks..."epicness." The TOY STORY movies, although really about a roomful of toys, brought us to the level of toys so that leaving the house becomes an epic journey. Similarly with A BUG'S LIFE becoming epic on a bug's scale. In FINDING NEMO, a fish swims around the world to find his son--epic. And my favorite--WALL-E--took us into space--magnificently epic (even if in all those movies there was a human scale story at its heart.) The only Pixar feature I felt missed that epicness (admittedly, while stupid CARS II did have an epic scale) was RATATOUILLE, and that compensated just through sheer beauty (Paris certainly helps with that.) And BRAVE also has plenty of beauty, courtesy of Scotland. But the previews are misleadingly epic. Based on the intentionally vague previews you'd think this is a story of a head-strong brave young princess who charges into battle and saves her kingdom (after first putting it in peril through a spell that "changes her fate.") In fact, it's the story of a girl who fights with her mother, and through shenanigans related to a spell (that I can't describe because it's way too much of a spoiler) they both learn to treat each other better. A nice, human-scale story. Even a beautiful and touching one at times. But not epic, and I was at least implicitly promised epic. So go in expecting beauty and a surprisingly human-scale story--but not epicness--and you'll probably like it just fine.

Total Running Time: 100 minutes
My Total Minutes: 288,694

Jason watches PROMETHEUS in 3-D

And overall, I liked it. It's not exactly an ALIEN prequel. It takes place in the ALIEN universe, and does give some background about the "Space Jockey" ruins they find in that movie. Not the exact Space Jockey guy, but his race and how they're related to the origins of mankind. Oops, I've already gone to far.

Okay, first the stuff I liked. The look, the atmosphere--I think Ridley Scott is incapable of making a movie that isn't at least visually engaging. And I liked Michael Fassbender, and particularly his biggest laugh line in the movie (I think it's in the trailers, so you probably know what I mean.) And I liked (and this surprised me that I liked it) that they specifically avoided using the Xenomorph Aliens from the original series. They do use variants on them. And I kinda liked the mysteries of human origins the movie sets up.

Now the stuff that didn't work for me. First and foremost, some (most) of the characters are pretty shallow, annoying, and stupid. Insisting on not taking weapons because it's a scientific expedition was just too obvious. The guy laughing at his scheme of sneaking a smoke inside his spacesuit was kinda dumb. And, as much as I hate to say this, I couldn't care less for Charlize Theron's character or her secret agenda.

And most importantly, the thing I'm on the fence about--the ending. I'll try to keep it relatively spoiler-free, but proceed at your own risk. The ending...isn't really an ending at all. The mysteries raised in the movie aren't answered, and in the end the survivor(s) go off to search more for the answers. It's not an ending, but a setup for a sequel. And I'm just not sure if I want that sequel.

On a final note, the 3-D was unnecessary, but also mostly unoffensive. It mostly avoids violating Jason's Rule of 3-D by not throwing too much stuff out of the screen at the audience. But it also doesn't really use the depth into the screen. I'm pretty sure I would've gotten the same experience in 2-D.

As an aside, the 3-D trailer for THE AMAZING SPIDER-MAN looked annoying as hell. The movie might be great, but at least in the trailer the 3-D is used pretty much solely for the gimmicky effect of throwing stuff out of the screen and making the audience flinch. In over 2 hours, PROMETHEUS violated Jason's rule maybe a couple of times (and that was with bits of silica flying around in a storm). In about a minute, the trailer for THE AMAZING SPIDER-MAN violated Jason's Rule about 5 times.

Running Time: 124 minutes
My Total Minutes: 287,199

Jason watches THE AVENGERS in 3-D

Well, it's about as much fun and excitement as you'd expect. The heroes from some of the best superhero movies ever made, plus the Hulk, first fight each other and then eventually team up to fight Loki and his army of invaders from the other side of the universe (brought courtesy of the Tesseract/Cosmic Cube, aka the world's most powerful macguffin.) Joss Whedon is pretty darn good at ensemble action, and I never really felt that anyone was short-changed on screen time. Ultimately, things get nice and blowy-uppy, and, of course, smashy-smashy. It's kind of interesting that Hulk, the one character who had the weakest setup movie, and the one character where they didn't manage to hang on to the original actor, ended up being my favorite in the movie.

Now, as for the 3-D, really don't bother. It of course violates Jason's Rule (as a refresher, the rule states that 3-D should be used to create depth into the screen, not throw crap out of the screen) plenty. But more importantly, I don't think there was a single scene that was really designed to use the 3-D effect at all (for good or for bad.) Now you can take that as you will, fans should take it as the movie relies on storytelling instead of 3-D gimmicks. Haters can scoff at the ridiculous extra charge for 3-D and call it a ripoff. They're both kind of right.

Running Time: 142 minutes

My Total Minutes: 283,452

Jason watches PINA in 3-D

Shhh...don't tell anyone, but I snuck away from SFIFF and cheated on it with this movie. But I think it's a fair rule to say you're allowed to cheat as long is it's with someone hot as this.So about a year ago I saw (actually at SFIFF) Werner Herzog's CAVE OF FORGOTTEN DREAMS in 3-D, and it completely reinvented in my mind how 3-D movies should work (note: I never actually got a chance to check it out in 2-D.) I realized a rule (which I shall call Jason's Rule of 3-D)--that when 3-D works, it works because it's putting depth into the screen, not throwing stuff out of the screen at you. The screen forms a box that is a view to another world, but the theater, audience, etc. are not a part of that world. So when 3-D tries to jump out of the screen, it breaks the illusion of the box creating a separate world, and it's revealed to be nothing but gimmicky bullshit. The key is action into the screen, not out of it. And looking back, the best scenes of great 3-D movies follow this rule, and the scenes that bug me break it. Well, about a year later I finally saw Wim Wenders' entry into the 3-D field, his homage to famed dancer/choreographer Pina Bausch. And he has made me reexamine the Jason Rule.

Wenders uses into and towards the screen in pretty much equal parts, but 99% of the time the action towards the screen stops just short of action out of the screen. There are two bits--one with kicking around leaves, one with splashing around water--where the action actually flies out of the screen. And in those moments I admit the words "gimmicky bullshit" flashed through my mind ever so briefly. But the movie is so beautiful, and the 3-D so effective in the rest of it, that the words left my mind as quickly as they appeared.

Now, why was the 3-D so effective in PINA? Two reasons I could see, both relying on the fact that it's all about dancing. First of all, dance is all about the exploration and discovery of the space around you. So, in fact, the movie paradoxically gives us more of a 3-D sense of that space than watching live dance. It kind of becomes artificial how hyper-real the sense of space is. In any other context, this would actually be a bad thing, but since dance explores space, exploring that space cinematically complements it well. Secondly, the world inside the screen is a world of performance, while the world outside the screen is the world of people watching a performance. So a bit of judicious intrusion between worlds actually works very, very well. In some scenes, it actually includes a view of the first few rows of a theater, which meant I wasn't really in my customary front row center seat. Some friends warned me about this before and jokes I might be upset I'm not front row center. But I was more pleased to be inside the world of the movie anyway.

As for the movie as a whole--it's about dance. It's visual, exciting, beautiful...graceful, inventive, funny. I'm pretty sure those are all qualities that could also be captured in 2-D. I'm not sure if I'm ready to declare 3-D necessary for this movie, but I'm easily certain that 3-D improves it greatly.

Running Time: 103 minutes

My Total Minutes: 282,640

Jason watches THE ADVENTURE OF TINTIN in 3D

I'll start by confessing to knowing next to nothing about the original Tintin comics. I have seen the character before, but never read a single story. But this was an engaging caper with good guys, bad guys, humor, and adventure.

Tintin (Jamie Bell) is a journalist, and judging by the clippings on his wall, he's had quite a few adventures. He buys a model boat at a flea market, and that immediately enters into an adventure surrounding a hidden message and sunken treasure. Along the way he meets Captain Haddock (Andy Serkis), who is drunk enough to power an airplane engine with his breath (BTW, I have to give kudos to an ostensible kids movie that isn't afraid to show drinking or have the young hero use a gun). The action rarely lets up and the caper is smart as well as fun (a "sword fight" with giant cranes is particularly amusing). Beyond that, I can't really comment further. As I said at the start, I'm not a Tintin expert.

Oh, and as one final point, the 3-D was very well done, but not really necessary. If you're a fan of 3-D, it's worth it. If not, you lose nothing by seeing it in 2-D.

Running Time: 107 minutes

My Total Minutes: 261045

Jason watches HUGO

And it's very, very cute. And the 3-D is well done, although I'll still maintain it's not necessary. It struck me while watching the swooping, kinetic shots that the depth would still be very clear even projected in 2-D. If you can't communicate three dimensional space in two dimensions, then you don't know how to make a movie to begin with, and should just give up.

But, to get away from that tangent, yes, HUGO is a beautiful movie, with heart and whimsy and love and all those things you just wouldn't expect from Scorsese. Ostensibly it's about a kid--Hugo Cabret (Asa Butterfield)--an orphan who lives in the walls and the clocks of the Paris train station. He steals gears from a local toy shop in order to fix an automaton that his father (Jude Law) was fixing when he passed away. And the grumpy old toy shop owner (Ben Kingsley) turns out to be the temporarily forgotten master filmmaker Georges Méliès, the inventor of special effects and the first to really see the potential of movies as dream-like entertainment. And that's the thing for a cinemaniac like me--I want to see Méliès and all the other films of the time. When Hugo and his friend Isabelle sneak off to the movies and see Harold Lloyd's SAFETY LAST, it's quite a treat. And seeing Méliès' studio recreated was also pretty awesome. I want to see them so much that I stopped caring about Hugo's story and was waiting for the next silent film treat. That's definitely a limitation I bring to the movie, and shouldn't reflect on its inherent quality. Still, that's just the way I reacted, and I can't do anything about it.

Running Time: 127 minutes

My Total Minutes: 257,419

Jason sees DARK COUNTRY in 3-D and then Eddie Muller interview director Thomas Jane

Normally, at the top of the list of things you don't associate with film noir would be "digital cinema" and "3-D." Perhaps shortly behind would be "comic book," but there are plenty of good noir-inspired comics. But when the Czar of Noir Eddie Muller blesses a film, you can bet it's noir.

Back in 2009 Thomas Jane made his directorial debut with this low budget (only a few million dollars) flick that sadly went straight to video in 2-D. But it was always meant for the big screen and 3-D, and last Friday night the Castro Theater gave it a proper showing, with Thomas Jane there to take questions first from Eddie Muller and then the audience.

The flick is set up as simple as can be--newlyweds (Thomas Jane and Lauren German) alone in a car driving through the desert at night. And then weird shit happens. And then things get weird. They get lost, roads dead end, double back on each other. It's all very Twilight Zone-ish, especially when they meet (and nearly run over) a survivor of a car crash. And, in fact, saying much more would be too much of a spoiler. The surprises were all the fun. In fact, you should find this movie but don't even read the credits in IMDb, there's too much of a spoiler there.

Afterwards, Eddie interviewed Thomas, and it's weird to remember that 2009 was really the infancy of digital 3-D. His team actually had to invent their own camera rig to shoot this, and they claimed (I can't confirm this, and it doesn't sound right to me) that this was the first 3-D film shot entirely on digital. Really interesting stuff.

And oh yeah, I made a reference above about this being a "comic book" film. Well, it's not based on an actual comic book, but on Thomas Jane's love of old noir comics. And, in fact, the comic book adaptation of the film will be coming out sometime soon.

Running Time: 88 minutes

My Total Minutes: 256,756

Jason watches A VERY HAROLD & KUMAR 3D CHRISTMAS

And it's as funny as it is unnecessary. Two years after their escape from Guantanamo Bay, Harold and Kumar are no longer friends. Harold has moved on--he's married, with a big house, a scary father-in-law (Danny Trejo), and a new best friend (a milquetoast Tom Lennon.) Kumar is still in the apartment, which is now a total mess, and he has grown a beard. They've made a clean split, but when a package is delivered to Kumar's apartment with Harold's name on it, he has to make at least an obligatory visit. And that sets in motion the wacky adventure with a burnt tree, Ukrainian gangsters, a high baby, Santa Claus, and of course Neil Patrick Harris as "Neil Patrick Harris" (oh yeah, he's back, after going to heaven and being cock-blocked by Jesus himself.) Oh yeah, and it's in 3-D, and they make a few cheesy meta jokes about that. I'm so over 3-D, and I'm so over Harold and Kumar...except that I really enjoyed this. Almost enough to actually care if they make a fourth movie.

Running Time: 90 minutes

My Total Minutes: 254,584

Jason watches THE LION KING in 3D

There's something about Disney bastardizing one of its greatest classics and trying to capitalize on the 3-D bandwagon that feels a little slimy. Slimy, but satisfying.

THE LION KING is arguably the apex of Disney's traditional (i.e., pre-Pixar) animation. I love this movie. So just seeing it again on the big screen was a treat. 'Nuf said.

The 3-D ranged from seamless to pointless. Yeah, it's well done. No, it doesn't add anything. And it often feels out of place with the inherently 2-D traditional animation. Yeah, I was curious to see how the 3-D would work, and I don't regret seeing it in 3-D. But I would've preferred seeing it in 2-D (but I think I knew that going in).

Running Time: 89 minutes

My Total Minutes: 249,704

Jason watches GREEN LANTERN in 3-D

The 3-D adds very little, but on the other hand I think my eyes have grown accustomed to it to the point that it's also not distracting.

As for the movie, it's prime fodder for Bad Movie Night. Not that you can't turn off your brain and enjoy a nearly-lifelike simulation of an enjoyable movie. I confess I never read the comic books, so I don't know the mythology, but the premise is laughably ridiculous. A corps of intergalactic peace-keepers, armed with green rings that harness the power of the will--anything you can imagine you can create a shiny green version of. There are 3600 warriors in the Green Lantern Corps, each in charge of a sector containing several galaxies (although the edge of the Milky Way is somehow in a different sector from Earth). Their greatest enemy Parallax, a creature of yellow fear, has escaped from the Lost Sector and is running rampant. Meanwhile a Lantern wounded in battle crash lands on Earth and the ring chooses brash man-child test pilot Hal Jordan to be the new Green Lantern (and the first human chosen for that honor). And there's a crazy plot where Parallax infects a scientist (who works in the Science Building because "laboratory" is too big of a word for this movie) and there are lots of battles before Hal shows everyone that courage isn't living without fear, it's overcoming your fear (and other grade school level pop psychology).

The thing about the movie is, it could have been just a silly superhero fantasy for children, except that it's PG-13 with some unnecessary swears and sexual situations. It's like it wanted to have it both ways--dumb enough for children but with a few token adult elements. Which in the end appeals only to grown up irresponsible man-children, like Hal Jordan.

Running Time: 105 minutes

My Total Minutes: 240,513