Guest Column

By Shelly Olesen
Vice President, Sales & Marketing
C. Cretors & Company

When you’re spread out in your chair at the megaplex, popcorn in hand and 3D glasses at the ready, watching a Hollywood blockbuster can feel like the most modern form of entertainment out there.  So it might surprise you that the first feature-length film made in America was screened a full century ago. This silent, five-reel rendition of Oliver Twist had been filmed on a simple, indoor stage, more like a recording of a theatrical performance than a made-for-the-screen feature, and it ran a little over an hour. Only eight other feature-length films were released that year, including Richard III, The Count of Monte Cristo, and a Jesus Christ biography entitled From the Manger to the Cross. In contrast, more than 200 feature-length films were released in 2011, and the titles topping the box office included Harry Potter, Transformers, and The Hangover: Part II—not exactly the Shakespeare and Bible stories of 1912. Many films were nearly three hours long, and most were close to two. Filming locations included Thailand, Bavaria, and a host of California studios, but no indoor stages. The business of making movies has clearly expanded in scope and cost in the last hundred years, but what about the business of watching them?

By Sara Dager

“When I’m 80 years old and sitting in my rocking chair, I’ll be reading Harry Potter. And my family will say to me, ‘After all this time?’ And I will say, ‘Always’. ” – Alan Rickman

By Jay Spencer
Managing Director
Supernal Entertainment

When a studio decides to convert a 2D motion picture into 3D, they have really launched into making a 2,000-shot visual effects picture. An ambitious release schedule, a project team of hundreds of people around the world, limited time availability of key decision makers and the director and producer working on another feature 2,000 miles from Hollywood all add to the challenge. This was the case with Wes Cravenʼs My Soul To Take, produced by Relativity Mediaʼs Rogue Pictures and distributed by Universal.

By Michael Karagosian

Exhibitors have every reason to be concerned about when it will be no longer economical to distribute film.  There are several factors that will contribute to the decision, and it is likely that no one factor will dominate.  This article takes a look at some of the decision points.

By James Mathers
Cinematographer and Co-Founder
The Digital Cinema Society

Use Special Care, So the Customer Returns Instead of The Product. This is the rough translation of a sign in German that hangs on the wall inside the camera manufacturing test room at the ARRI factory in Munich. It is the final quality control checkpoint at the location where all ARRI cameras have, and continue to be pretty much hand assembled. This includes their latest Digital Cinema camera, the Alexa. I had a chance to visit the ARRI factory, and several other facilities as part of a little “Tech Tour” after a recent European shoot. It included stops in Romania, Hungary, Austria, and several locations in Germany before attending IBC and then heading home to Los Angeles.