Fox announces on Facebook today: “Pandora comes to life like never before with the ultimate home video viewing experience.” For the first time ever, a deluxe 3-disc 3D edition of Avatar can be seen on your home screen. October 16th — a month after 3D Titanic’s re-release on Blu, Sept 10.
Event films like Jaws, Titanic and Avatar are a class of movies unto themselves Their impact on popular culture goes beyond thei aesthetic value to become part of our collective psyche. They occupy an oversized place in the hearts of many moviegoers because the excitement of the matinee imprints the theater experience as deeply as any historical milestone with vivid memories of “Where were you when…” Directors like D.W. Griffith and Cecil B DeMille understood that the spectacle splashed onscreen was its own subject, and they sometimes seemed chose a story just because it was Bigger Than Life. This might help explain how the presentation of The Greatest Show on Earth (“”n Glorious Technicolor!”) made critics and Academy members swoon despite its relatively rickety melodrama. This summer, the AMPAS has been conducting special screenings of films shot in 70mm, confirming that a technology can become its own genre.
We’re giving away 3 copies of Avatar in honor of these technical advancements. You can enter to win one by sharing a theater experience when the science in Arts and Sciences hit you as hard as the art. When buying a ticket to be blown away was an Event that perhaps exceeded the merit of the movie itself but needs no apology because the thrill you felt was so memorable.
The Fox press release for Avatar 3D Blu-ray, after the cut.
LOS ANGELES, CA. (August 14, 2012) – The world of Pandora has never looked better as over 33 million AVATAR Facebook fans were the first to learn of the upcoming release of the AVATAR Blu-ray 3D Collector’s Edition, debuting globally beginning October 15, releasing in North America October 16, from Twentieth Century Fox Home Entertainment. A home entertainment experience like no other, for the first time ever, fans will be able to welcome James Cameron’s global box office sensation into their homes in stunning 3D high-definition.
“3D television is the future of home entertainment,” said James Cameron, the Oscar® winning Director. “I’m a huge proponent of the technology and very pleased that AVATAR can be viewed in the living room the way it is meant to be seen.”
“As the number of homes with 3D televisions continues to grow, we thought it was important to bring the biggest 3D film ever right into your living room,” continued Jon Landau, Academy Award® winning Producer of Avatar. “This is the only way fans should experience the world of Pandora and this release offers the highest picture quality possible. ”Previously only available to consumers through an exclusive deal with Panasonic, the two-disc AVATAR 3D Blu-ray Collector’s Edition will feature the original theatrical release and be available in all-new collectible packaging. Seen by more than 310 million people worldwide, the Oscar and Golden Globe winning epic is the highest grossing film of all time, taking in more than $2.7 billion in worldwide box office. It is also top-selling Blu-ray disc of all time.
Titanic was the big moment for me …it felt like I was there.
OK – all the unkind things I’ve said about Spielberg are about to come home to roost.
Since I was a kid, I’d had an obsession with dinosaurs which has waned but remained with me into adulthood. I would hit every dino movie until my late teens, judging how fake were the movements and sounds. (I saw Journey to the Center of the Earth at every matinee in ’59, Denni, as well as the dressed up lizards in The Lost World). I’d still go to later movies, just to monitor how the technology was improving, which it wasn’t.
When Jurassic Park came out, I had to get to the first showing. I had seen no clips up to that point and was expecting little more than the usual stop action silliness, but what the hell, Spielberg pulled off Jaws so there would be something redeeming.
Well, the first dino scene, with the brachiosaurus that ends with the longshot of several creatures plodding to John William’s stately march, did it to me in spades, from the goosebumps to the wet eyes. Then the glass of water that signals one of SS’s best action sequences with the T-Rex. Finally – I had my fix.
I was truly amazed by Titanic and how they “rebuilt” the ship on a smaller scale! It just looked like such a real experience and you felt like you were on the boat. James Cameron is a genius and I can’t wait to see both of these movies in 3D when they come out on blu ray! Thanks!
Also, just to clarify why I said I watched “Journey to the center of the earth” on Betamax instead of a theater experience because There were no Theaters in the little province I grew up in the Philippines back then, and the only way we saw movies is to either travel to Manila which is the Philippines’ capital to watch in the theater, or buy a Betamax or VHS player and rent the movies at a local movie renter store. Thanks!
When I first saw the original “Journey to the center of the earth” when I was still 6-7 years old. It’s the first movie that I ever sat through without being distracted by toys, dinner, or anything a little kid would get distracted by. Whenever my parents rent and watch betamax cassette tapes (yes it was betamax then), I would either fall asleep or not care at all. But the 1959 Henry Levin movie captivated me. It made me believe about life underneath the core of the earth. It made me believe about dinosaurs, about magic mushrooms, about monsters lurking underneath the earth…. Although I was scared on some parts, I had a feeling like I wanted to be inside the screen and experience what Pat Boone, James Mason and Arlene Dahl was experiencing. After the movie, I remember playing by the beach and imagining that if I swim deep I’ll find a crack that would lead me to the Center of the earth. I’ve never read Jules Verne’s novel which the movie was based on, but the moviemaking and experience left me to really believe about the make-believe. Although if you watch it now, it’s not even up to par with technology and the science of movies nowadays, but it had a big impact on me that I consider it as my The Science in the Art and Sciences movie!
A theater experience when the science in Arts and Sciences hit me as hard as the art was watching Splice. It was one of the most mind-boggling science-fiction movie I’ve ever watched. The idea of creating a hybrid with human DNA is terrifying to me. However, Delphine Chanéac’s stellar performance really deserves a standing ovation. The movie itself is interesting in many ways, but it is slightly lacking in terms of answering the viewer’s questions. Splice created a thought-provoking character based on a real-world concept, but I personally feel that it could have been better. Nonetheless, the scientific aspects of the movie (i.e. creating a human-animal hybrid) is one of the best I’ve seen.
I would say Avatar but I don’t want to seem like I am only saying that to score a free Blu-Ray. (But did go see it 4 times in 3D and once in 2D) So I will say District 9. That was really the first that I had my jaw dropped the entire film. The aliens were spectacular (and looked 100% real) and the visuals with the spaceship, the robots and even the make-up/practical effects were stunning. I wasn’t expecting any of that at all to be honest. The main thing that shocked me were all the exploding people. That was a major shock and just . . . well . . . fantastic! And all of this with only a $30 Mil budget.
If anybody is running out of things to say about Avatar — you know my throwing open this giveaway by asking about Big Event technological Game-Changers was just a springboard, right?
You can write about anything that made an impression on you. Tell us about your favorite movies in 3D — I’ve only seen a handful. 5, I think. So I’d be curious to know what I’ve missed that’s good in 3D other than Coraline, Avatar, Hugo, Tintin and Prometheus.
Like Zach says : “It’s an experience I don’t believe I’ll ever forget; I make no apologies for thoroughly enjoying Avatar.”
I totally agree with that. I was wowed too. Blown away. Saw it twice opening week. I realized a few days later than it was evaporating in my head and didn’t stick with me. But I can’t deny that first experience with lavish 3D was astonishing.
Anyway, feel free to write about anything you want. Anything epic and breathtaking. If you’re concerned about too much repetition about Avatar — you can ignore the suggested assignment altogether, alright?
The first time technical movie magic wowed me in a theater was E.T. I was seven years old and I thought that it was real even though I knew in my head it was just a movie. I kept wondering how they got an alien to be in the movie if aliens weren’t real. I gasped when the bicycles flew through the air and really thought I was witnessing magic and I guess I was. I don’t know if ET was considered an event film at the time, but it was definitely an event in my life and only the second movie I can remember seeing in a theater as a child (the first was The Fox and The Hound which made me cry so hard my Mom had to take me home before it was over). All I could talk about for ages was if ET was real. My Dad played along and said he might be and bought me a stuffed ET doll that I kept on my bed until I left for college. I think I was 12 or 13 before I stopped pretending I was about to take flight when riding my bike around the neighborhood.
I should note that this technically did not happen in a theater, we only went to the drive-in in the Summer when I was a little kid b/c it was cheaper. So ET still managed to make my heart jump from my chest with excitement on a far-away screen w/ the only audio being a fuzzy speaker hanging on the car window while I was being eaten alive by mosquitoes during a humid Indiana Summer.
I also feel like noting I have never even seen Avatar and really haven’t felt compelled to do so, so you don’t have to enter me in the contest. It was just fun to share my story.
I don’t want no stinkin’ Blu-ray.
I would have to say as awful as this wounds it was Star Wars Episode I. Now wait a minute before you dismiss my story there had been so much hype surrounding the film that everyone wanted to see it I don’t remember the first film to have the trailer attached to it I think it was “Something about Mary” or some other earlier Fox release anywho.
It was MEET JOE BLACK. I had gone to the first showing of the trailer at the Zeigfeld theater in NYC. It was so funny because the minute the trailer was over a bunch of guys in suits got up and went back to work. lol I sat through the film to see it again at the end. I also saw the special editions of the OT at the Zeigfeld which was probably my best event film moment. Everyone was insanely psyched. And the last trailer that played before A NEW HOPE started was the trailer for THE EMPIRE STRIKES BACK. Everyone was cheering like we’d just won the Superbowl or something. You could feel the Force in that theater. For realies.
Hmm…The Lord of the Rings would seem like the ideal go-to choice for me, as they were the first films I saw that really got me to start taking cinema and filmmaking seriously as artistic storytelling mediums, but I think I’m gonna have to go the easy route and say Avatar here.
The only reason I say this is because…it’s tough to put into words, but I think I was more consciously aware of the technological advancements and breakthroughs that went into Avatar movie than LOTR. A comment like that could be taken as a criticism of the film, but I don’t mean in in that sense. When I saw LOTR, I was still new to a lot of the inner-workings of how films are made (when Fellowship came out, I was 10), and in that way, I was able to insert myself seamlessly into Middle Earth without really considering the technological achievement (because it was so well-integrated with the tangible, live-action stuff).
That’s not to say I didn’t lose myself in Avatar; in fact, I think it may be the most immersive moviegoing experience I’ve ever had. By the time Avatar had come out, I had fully devoted myself to the study of film and film craft that I had already done a significant amount of researching and studying of Avatar’s technological breakthroughs prior to seeing it. So while watching the movie, I was constantly aware of the fact that most of what I was watching about 80-90% visual effects, and yet I was still able to completely lose myself in the world of Pandora and its inhabitants. For me, it was truly a perfect symbiosis of science and technology as an art form, and vice versa. By then, I had developed such a strong respect for the craft of filmmaking that instead of being turned away by the advent and pervasiveness of the film’s visual effects, I was interested to see how well they could be utilized, especially in the hands of a man like James Cameron, whose every film always seems to be on the cutting edge of filmmaking technology. I remember the feeling of my jaw dropping and being left agape at some sequences in the film; there are few films out there that have had that kind of impact on me in a theater. It’s an experience I don’t believe I’ll ever forget; I make no apologies for thoroughly enjoying Avatar.
Yes, Titanic was a touching, moving movie. But a film that really displayed the advancement in technology that humans have made is James Cameron’s Avatar, as shown above. When I watched this masterpiece in 3D, I was astonished. Before viewing this movie, I was one of those stereotypical “3D is basically the same thing” people. But an outing with my friends changed that.
We were not even planning to watch avatar. But the tickets for the other movie were sold out, so we (at the time) settled for avatar. We got there a few minutes before the movie was to start, so the seats that were available were spread throughout the theater. Luckily for me, this would let me doze off without my friends knowing.
When the movie started, I had reached down for my drink, missing the opening. But when I heard the 10 year old girl next to me “aww”, I quickly looked up. It was beautiful, something more dazzling than I had ever seen before.
Throughout the movie, I was more and more amazed at the realisticness of the movie. That movie changed my perspective of many facets of my life, the most significant being the appreciation for the strides mankind has made in technology. I finally understood the bridge between science and art.
Yes, maybe Avatar movie didn’t affect as many people as Titanic did, but it sure did to me.
Oh Sam Worthington! How the f**k do you look so f*****g blue in Avatar? Oh! They used computers, Nolan! Why can’t we computer the suit onto my body? Nolan? ANSWER ME! CHRIS! F*****G ANSWER ME!
HAHA! Every time I see or read something about Avatar I think about Christian Bale’s “rant” on the set of The Dark Knight Rises.
For me it was several films…
Titanic was so amazing to watch in a theatre and when it went on to win 11 oscars I cried!
Avatar was so beautiful on the big screen, I saw it 5 times with three 3D screenings! The motion capture, art direction, and cinematography were so amaze balls I was completely blown away.
The lord of the rings trilogy was so grand in scale, so wonderfully acted, and just well stunnning!
Inception and The Dark Knight…omg..i don’t even know how to explain how I felt after seeing them in IMAX!
But really the film that completely changed my life forever was on tv, Quo Vadis was the movie that began my love of film! My head exploded several times during it and well I have been a movie fan ever since.
Wow! So many young people here! Awesome! Hearing “I saw Titanic when I was 4” and “Lord of the Rings when I was seven” makes my 34 year old ass feel really old! Oh, can’t wait to buy Avatar in 3D. As of now, other than Hugo, it’s the only 3D film I can stomach.
I’m trying real hard to think back, but I think it has to be “Avatar.” I’m too young to have caught the original Star Wars in theaters, and for me I hadn’t been really wowed by technology in a movie nearly as much as I was watching what Cameron was able to do with 3D in “Avatar.” It completely sold me on the technology and is still to this day probably the movie that has done it the best.
Second place may actually be “Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within.” On it’s own it may be just a very mediocre Sci-Fi effort, but even 11 years later it still looks better than many of the animated films being made today.
Oh I forgot to mention The Dark Knight, midnight show opening on IMAX at the AMC Lowes on 68th street. WOW!!!
Lawrence of Arabia at the Ziegfeld theater in 2006 NYC — 70mm print. As close to a cinematic religious experience if there ever was one for me. A close second is Blade Runner at Radio City Music Hall back in 1998. Words cannot do justice to the experience.
In 2009 I was chomping at the bit for any piece of information I could find. I checked this website and many others day In and out for any little bit on the film. When the trailer came out I probably watched it 100 times. I was so astounded by this world that Cameron had created. My lovely partner gave me an early Christmas card that year and in it was a pair of midnight screenings to the film. We got there two hours and waited in a long line and I was able to talk to so many people who were just genuinely excited to enter his world. When the movie started I’ve never experienced such awe in an audience. We were all there together and experiencing something revolutionary. It was a wonderful experience and one I will never forget. The 3D was used in the most creative way and made the film more crisp and added to the allure of the experience. I love this movie and what it has done for the history of cinema.
I would have to say as awful as this wounds it was Star Wars Episode I. Now wait a minute before you dismiss my story therehad been so much hype surrounding the film that everyone wanted to see it I don’t remember the first film to have the trailer attached to it I think it was “Something about Mary” or some other earlier Fox release anywho. I was 11 at the time and I knew this was going to be an event I was born and raised in Hollywood and West Hollywood so since I was about 8 I would walk to Chinese (before Hollywood and Highland) and to Lacama and The Egyptian, and the Galaxy to watch all my films. 2 months before the release of Phantom Menace the Chinese were selling advance tickets and I was in 6th grade I ditched school risked being given tickets grounded and waited in line 5 hours with the biggest and hardest of die hard Stars Wars fans who had to see the film where the originals all premiered.
They were all there in costume here I was this little 11 year old Gay Latino kid who had never only ever seen one Star Wars in his life and didn’t get it all the way. Any who I got tickets to the first showing in the Grumman’s 2 child’s tickets $4.25 each and then went come then walked home late around 5pm. Made some excuse. I got kicked out of my play at school cause I missed the second to last rehearsal doing that and almost didn’t get to go because of it. The day came I got my 10 year old little sister and my parents dropped us off that May they were scared all the news teams were there everyone was dressed in costumes and on time their was something magical in the air. My parents again almost didn’t let us stay cause the film would be done almost at 3am but it was fine cause they saw how important it was to me.
The the room was filled with every character from lucas’s world my little sister Melissa was a bit scared Lucas came on down into and the room was lite with light-sabers they were turned off when the theater went Dark, the drums started and the Fox sign then the Letters I have never seen a reaction like that in any theater ever in my life. I always new the power of cinema but never saw it’s culture so strong before. It send chills down my spine still thinking about that screening at the spectacle that followed the film was so Grand for an 11 year old. Truly a movie going experience of a lifetime, haven’t felt like that since Avatar when the whole Dome would gasp in parts…….
I saw a 70mm screening of “Earthquake” in Sensurround at the Eqyptian in Los Angeles. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zwc95zxfjjQ). You can imagine the Sunsurround as a GIANT subwoofer that is installed in the theater and during the earthquake scenes emits such a loud and deep base, that the theater seats shook, making this a truly scary experience.
I was 10 I think when Titanic came out, I remember seeing it with my grandmother (whose Uncle died on the Titanic in real life) and I was just blown away when they made the ship sink, it looked so incredibly real (to the point where I still dont’ know how they did some of those effects, and I don’t think I want to) Just this mixture of live action, of CG, of models, miniatures, real sets, costumes, etc. was all blended in pretty seamlessly, and even when it was back in 3D earlier this year, there’s a scope to the film I’ve never felt since the first time I saw it in theatres. It was just a powerful movie experience for me as a kid, and one that just in terms of epicness hasn’t been broken (although Dark Knight Rises in IMAX came close)
I’m gonna have to go with Avatar. The detail put into the world of Pandora was mindblowing. I was also impressed with the motion-capture, as it really managed to capture that deep human emotion. Certainly a landmark film.
I remember seeing Inception for the first time and being moved to tears during the spinning hallway sequence. I felt such a deep, visceral admiration for the use of practical effects, rather than relying on CGI. It’s probably my favorite action scene in any movie.
Watching Disney’s Beauty and The Beast back in second grade was the first time I remember noticing something different in movies in a big way. The ballroom scene presented with the CG background was absolutely breathtaking at the time.
I would have started reading The Fellowship of the Ring when I was about seven, in second grade, a year before the film came out. It took me a while to remember whether I’d seen the movie or read the book first, but I know I read it first because after my father took us to see the movie, I remember him commenting on how faithful the adaptation was – right down to Bilbo’s interrupted Birthday speech “Brockhouses and Proudfoots. — “PROUDFEET!” and I remember those lines from the novel very well. Reading the book itself was an initiation of sorts: I’d fallen in love with books earlier (though of course, at that age I didn’t consider myself a “book lover” I just wanted to read), and by that age was skimming my dad’s massive bookshelf for more. And one day I pulled out his paperback copies of the Lord of the Rings from his high school days – 1960s, about fifty cents each, the edges dark yellow. To my mind those books could have existed on that shelf for a century, and it was something almost mystical. I had no idea what Lord of the Rings was. It was an accidental, and all the more meaningful for that, discovery. To be reading the same book my dad had read when he was a kid – wow! There was so little I could relate to my father with when it came to his childhood, especially since he didn’t move to Miami from Cuba until he was 11 in 1961 – that’s eleven years that I could never, and still won’t ever be able to, flesh out. So reading the Lord of the Rings tapped into my psyche in a way no other book (not even Harry Potter!) ever could have: I needed to read the book in his office, while he was there at his desk, because it was the only place it felt RIGHT to read it. Like accidentally discovering a small portal into the past, one that I could share with my dad. There had always been, since I could remember, a small etching of a tall man in a pointed hat, carrying a ring and a horn around his neck, and a staff in his hand, hanging in the unused bathroom in my room: you can’t imagine the thrill when I realized that it was the same man in the book I was reading from my father’s bookshelf. It was like I had made a discovery; like all the little pieces of my upbringing were falling in to place. There’s not a lot of “history” in a young city like Miami, much less for the children of immigrants, but at moments like those, I felt I was discovering a past untold.
So, the theatre. Fast forward one year and I’m in the movies watching it with my dad and sisters. I knew the story, I knew the characters, I knew the dialogue. But nothing could prepare me for Gandalf’s fireworks. For the towering, haunting Mines of Moria. For Bilbo’s face when he sees the ring again. For Galadriel in Lothlorien – I will NEVER forget Blanchett in that role. And the image that has stuck the most: the fellowship gliding on the river through the gates of Argonath, Isildur and Anarion standing guard, so much more than just “larger” than life – the guardians of something so deep in my mind I couldn’t even begin to think what was past the threshold. It was a feeling no words in the book could have imbued in me – perhaps if I had read the book at an older age, maybe, but at eight nothing could have made a bigger impression than those two statues on that massive screen.
That movie was a realization of so many childhood desires. It was something my father was seeing for the first time as well. There was no “artistry” to “understand”, and we both had the stories and characters already in our heads, but seeing it- actually SEEING it in all it’s grandeur, like a massive monolith on the screen – THAT was something we could share with equal awe, two people ages eight and fifty one, sharing that same realization. Jackson did not just put words from the novel onto the screen, anyone could stand a pair of actors and have them recite dialogue: in many ways he transformed it. To give the same and at times much greater impressions than could ever the spoken or even the printed word, he used science and technology, to beautiful and astounding effect. An absolute perfect companion to the already perfect novel. He understood his medium, as Tolkien did his. The science didn’t hit me harder than the art because the science WAS the art.
I’ve been a supporter of 3D in the use of modern films since I first saw “A Christmas Carol”, but it wasn’t until last year at my local film festival when I truly saw something that proved to me that there was a place in cinema for 3D aside from entertainment. That was when I watched “Cave of Forgotten Dreams”. Leave it to Werner Herzog to turn what is often referred to as a gimmick into a real, practically indispensable element of a film’s success. The textures and the environments of the caves reallly stood out and felt real when they were shot in 3D, while a more straightforward documentary would have felt more like an educational piece or travelogue, which wouldn’t have fit Herzog’s vision at all.
Actually, for me, seeing Avatar on the big screen for the first time in 3D, blew me away! I mean, I have seen alot of lesser quality 3D movies over the years. But none of them could come close to the clarity, detail and crispness of the TRUE 3D in Avatar. I recall seeing in Avatar, a close up scene of a photograph in a picture frame, and that too, was in 100% TRUE 3D! Avatar has become one of my all-time favorite movies. And not just because of the spectacular 3D effect. But because I thought the story, the acting, the action, the CGI…you name it, was genuinely top notch! I feel that Avatar certainly raised the bar in the filming industry in regards to 3D technology. And most definitely set the new standard in 3D cinema. And since seeing Avatar in brilliant, TRUE 3D. I have become spoiled, because it’s the one (and only) film that I guage all other 3D movies. And sadly, most of which have all failed to rival the 3D quality as seen in Avatar. So in closing, Avatar has been a very rewarding cinematic experience for me, and was definitely worth the price of admission!
I’ve seen thousands of films. I’d guess that I’ve seen more movies than a lot of directors working today. For me, though, I will always go back to the very first film I ever remember seeing: Titanic.
I would have been four years old when Titanic came out (1997). I saw it with my three brothers and parents at a drive-in movie theatre in Missouri, and I remember that day extremely well. First, I was picked up by my parents from our babysitter. It was a friendly get together (Titanic was an event movie by this point), and we went out to Aurora, Missouri to see the movie. I remember getting up on the windshield of the car and snuggling up to my mom with a blanket. I’ll never forget the ship’s grand size on the screen and the tears rolling down everyone’s faces by the end (I also remember my mom moving my head away as Kate Winslet was getting her picture drawn).
The significance of Titanic on me was astounding. It is the film that made me love movies, and my life has never been the same. I’ve learned so much from cinema (compassion towards the human condition, grace under tragic circumstances, the power of understanding and the madness of ignorance), and I’d love nothing more than to spend the rest of my life making films and acting in movies that enlighten the world and provide me with joy and happiness.
James Cameron’s Titanic made me love movies.