Blog Archives
Blu-ray 3D Conversion Virtual Roundtable
This morning I sat in on a virtual roundtable hosted by the Blu-ray Disc Association’s chairperson Andy Parsons. He sat down with Ian Harvey who is the Senior Vice President, Advanced Technology for Twentieth Century Fox Home Entertainment about the technology behind converting a film to Blu-ray 3D. The film in question was Fox’s recently re-released i,Robot. Below is a transcript of the chat. Well, most of the chat. I forgot to turn on my recorder and missed most of Parsons’s opening greeting. Also, I took some screencaps so you could figure out what they’re talking about, but a few of the things he’s talking about I didn’t manage to cap, so it might be a little confusing. Whoops.
Guest Post: Disconnected – Public Opinion, Critical Acclaim, and The Academy
Nicola, who’s runs Uncultured Critic, has written a special guest feature for Cinema Fanatic about “the disconnect between public opinion, critical acclaim, and The Academy.” I hope you enjoy it! And while you’re at it, y’all should follower her on Twitter, too!
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The Economist recently released an article with the following title:
A World of Hits: Ever-increasing choice was supposed to mean the end of the blockbuster. It has had the opposite effect
Ever-increasing choice? Not anymore! Since the advent of the latest 3D boom (-and-hopefully-bust), choices have dwindled considerably.
2009 Academy Awards – Final Predictions
Alright you guys, I’m sorry I haven’t updated in awhile, life’s gotten a bit stressful. That being said THE OSCARS are tomorrow. This has been one of the most stressful awards seasons since I started following the Oscars all those years ago. These are my final predictions and, as always, I’ll be live-blogging the show on my tumblr. So here goes nothing.
Jeremy Renner and the Best Actor Race
I’ve yet to see A Single Man or Crazy Heart, mostly due to living in the middle of nowhere, and thus can only comment on the three performances I have seen. I enjoyed George Clooney in Up In The Air, but he was better in Michael Clayton. My opinion on Morgan Freeman in Invictus will come up later on in this post. That leaves Jeremy Renner in The Hurt Locker. And of the three I’ve seen, he has my vote. It’ll be a difficult race for him, but I think he has a chance of pulling it off. He had perhaps my favorite reaction to his nomination when interviewed on Good Morning America yesterday. When asked about his competition, he replied, “I’ve gotta break some serious legs.”
My Oscar Nominations Predictions
The Academy Award nominations will be announced at 5:30AM PST tomorrow, February 2nd. I’ve got predictions for 10 of the 24 categories. I’m also going to supply some alternates. I love being able to predict what the nominations will be, but at the same time, it would be nice for some surprises to sneak in there too!
Best Picture:
- (500) Days of Summer
- An Education
- Avatar
- District 9
- The Hangover
- The Hurt Locker
- Inglourious Basterds
- Precious
- Star Trek
- Up In The Air
(Alternates: Up, Invictus, A Serious Man)
Bigelow Wins DGA
KATHRYN WON YOU GUYS. SHE WON. I am so happy about this. SO HAPPY.
So what does this mean for Oscar? Well, the winner of the DGA has gone on to win Best Director at the Academy Awards 58 of the last 60 years. This is one of the few precursors that tend to accurately predict how Oscar will go.
Avatar – Visually Stunning, But Ultimately Boring and Predictable
I really did go into this film with an open mind. After about 30 minutes I was pretty sure I knew how I’d feel about the rest of the film. Why? Because I could see exactly how it was going to play out and all I really wanted was for it to end.
Avatar – The Matrix 2.0?
What I’m saying is Avatar is a special effects-driven film, like The Matrix, that is critically acclaimed and loved by audiences. Both films pushed boundaries of film visual effects and created new technologies.
Avatar Surpasses Titanic at Worldwide Box Office
This is a big feat and it’s taken a film 12 years do it. It’s no surprise, really, that James Cameron would be at the helm of the movie that finally surpasses Titanic–his last film.
This number is only going to go up as Titanic got to this number through a re-release after it won Best Picture. I remember seeing it when it first came out in December 1997 or maybe January 1998 and then seeing it again for my birthday in June. I don’t really see a re-release of Avatar in its future. Although, it could be a possibility since there still isn’t a home release technology that can preserve the film’s 3D self.
the diary of a film history fanatic 