3-D movies suck, there’s no other way to say it. The recent 3-D movie craze is one of the worst things that has happened to the film industry in quite some time.
Studios see 3-D technology as a tool to make a movie more commercially viable and appealing to a mass audience. They think that if people and objects pop out at you from the screen, a movie will make more money, and the worst part is that they’re right.
Look at Avatar; it’s made over $760 million dollars in the U.S. and over $2 billion overseas. Plus, the esteemed Academy Awards committee decided in its infinite wisdom to give the film a Best Picture nomination. So apparently a mindless derivative summer blockbuster that took the elements of its plot from Dances With Wolves, The Matrix, and Pocahontas can garner critical acclaim simply because it looks cool.
I give credit to James Cameron for continuing to make films that appeal to a huge demographic around the world, and thus making tons of money, but isn’t that enough? He already has our money; he can do without the hoards of 3-D zombies praising Avatar as a masterpiece of American cinema.
Avatar aside, the problem I have with a lot of 3-D films is that the cheap parlor tricks created by a pair of funny glasses often detract from the aesthetics of the film. Audiences aren’t paying as much attention to the painstaking detail taken in set and costume design, lighting, and cinematography because they’re distracted by some asinine hologram staring them in the face.
Take a film like Alice in Wonderland; while the film’s plot was a boring rehash of the famous children's story, the film was visually stunning. In my opinion, the world Tim Burton created was diminished by the use of 3-D. The film’s color scheme and computer-generated images were dazzling to the eye and created an elaborate fantasy world for the audience to get lost in, but most were too busy admiring the caterpillar or the bunny rabbit hopping around in front of their seats to fully appreciate it.
Another thing that bothers me about 3-D movies is that half the time the films aren’t even shot in 3-D, but converted in post-production because the studio knows that they’ve made an awful film and they want to dupe the audience with 3-D additions that are applied clumsily, simply to add some shock value to an action sequence. A glaring example of this practice is Clash of the Titans, a brutish unintelligent mess of a film that relies on many action sequences juxtaposed with 3-D graphics to entertain its audience. The Last Airbender and Saw 3D are also poor excuses for films that the studios knew were bad and added the 3-D to try to compensate.
There are some instances in which I don’t necessarily mind 3-D, but it still doesn’t particularly help make the film a better viewing experience. In the case of animated films such as Despicable Me, Megamind, or How to Train Your Dragon, the 3-D is useful in amusing the children in the audience. With films like that if your goal is to create the most fun experience possible for a child, 3-D is acceptable although it shouldn’t have any enhanced effect on the refined viewing experiences of the children’s parents in the theater.
The other scenario in which 3-D is acceptable is with films that know and acknowledge just how ridiculous they are, and in that understanding choose to encompass a 3-D element. The pulpy gratuitous raucous that was Piranha 3D falls into this category, because it was just so much fun to watch and the 3-D was there as a self-deprecating mechanism as the film made fun of itself. Jackass 3D is another movie I’d add to this list because of the same principle and its documentary-style realism, although I think it would’ve been just as funny without 3-D.
The bottom line is that 3-D is just unnecessary, plain and simple. Films that present a unique and captivating visual spectacle don’t need to rely on 3-D enhancement.
Recent films like Inception and Scott Pilgrim vs. the World are shining examples of what can be accomplished just by the hard work of a director, cinematographer, and crew. They’re masters of their craft because they can show the audience something original or create an extraordinary atmosphere for the plot to unfold, without using the modern-day cinematic crutch of 3-D technology.
Zack Snyder, director of a slew of 2D films with fantastic visuals such as 300, Watchmen, and the upcoming action fantasy film Sucker Punch, had a similar thought. When asked about converting Sucker Punch into 3-D during post-production, he said:
“It’s such an awesome piece of work and everyone’s worked so hard to make it awesome, so I don’t want to screw it up with bad 3-D.”
Unfortunately, many filmmakers don’t share Snyder’s sentiment. The next batch of superhero films: Green Lantern, Thor, and Captain America, will all be released in 3-D in 2011. Other fan favorites like the upcoming Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part II, and even Martin Scorsese’s new film Hugo Cabret, will all be either shot or converted into 3-D.
Hopefully, this December’s Tron: Legacy will prove me wrong and be the epic viewing experience that has been promised, despite being released in 3-D.
So please Hollywood, I implore you to stop ruining perfectly good films and trying to make crappy films better with your exorbitant and unnecessary 3-D technology. Seriously, it’s enough already.
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