In Belfast, for such a small city, we are lucky to have a plethora of options for enjoying our movies. We have the Odyssey cinema and its VIP screens for luxury. The Movie House on the Dublin road for crazy Tuesdays and a good atmosphere for popcorn movies. The Odeon tends to run a Monday club where it will show an old movie (I was lucky enough to catch The Crow one week. It was like being transported back in time as 90% of the viewers had long hair, and even longer black leather coats). And then there's the QFT which allows you to catch lesser known movies and the finest in world cinema.
But why oh why do we not have an IMAX cinema? I'm sure we used to have one, unless all the banners in signs in the Odyssey are lying. It must have been ahead of its time and only showed 20 minute documentaries, which whilst impressive enough, are hardly the best showcase for the format. I never went to it, simply because it was easy to forget it was ever there.
A year or ago I was lucky enough to be living in Sydney, and at Darling Harbour there was an IMAX cinema, which boasted a banner declaring it to be 'THE BIGGEST IMAX SCREEN IN THE WORLD!' I had never seen a movie presented in the format before, and I was thanking the stars that they had The Dark Knight still playing. This was a full 6/7 months after the movie had first hit theatres. So I figured no problem, it'll be easy enough to get tickets. I was taking no chances though and I bought tickets two days in advance. We got there 30 mins before the film started, as it was seated on a first come first serve basis, and I sure as hell wasn't going to end up at the front, leaving the movie theatre with a sore neck.
It was lucky we did, as the queue was snaked back around and out the door 20 mins before it started. People brought papers, books, anything to pass the time. I got the sense that this was the norm for IMAX performances (A point proven when I caught Watchmen a few months later.)
So we took our seats and marvelled at the size of the screen. Having taken in everything Dark Knight that I could (This was indeed the fourth time I was gonna catch it in the cinema), I knew that Christopher Nolan had filmed 6 sequences specifically in IMAX HD. So I was salivating at the prospect of watching the movie on this screen which was around 30 metres high and 35 metres wide. Thats an area of over 1000 square metres!
The theatre was full to the brim. A testament to how great of a movie this is, but also of the demand to see it on the IMAX format. The screen went black and the WB logo came up, looking huge as hell. Ditto the DC logo. So I'm getting more psyched by the moment. Then the Bat symbol disintegrates on the screen and the opening cityscape image hits. The entire theatre gasped, literally. This was a truly groundbreaking image. I didn't know where to look as the entire opening 6 minutes were like this. As was the arrival in Hong Kong, the break in at the Hong Kong office, the unbelievable Batmobile / Batpod chase sequence, the tense scene involving the two boats and finally the final confrontation between the Joker and Batman.
I have no hesitation in telling you this was the greatest cinematic experience of my life (so far). I took in every IMAX movie I could after that - Watchmen, Star Trek. But none of them had any dedicated IMAX sequences and therefore were not as impressive.
But then came Avatar. Surely the perfect movie to relaunch the format in Belfast. Have some retro showings of The Dark Knight (Ironic calling a 2 year old movie retro but hey the world moves fast these days.....). Bulk it out with some documentaries and 3D movies like Toy Story 3. And this would all lead to Inception. That's it, give me the money now, I clearly have a foolproof business plan. I'll save the IMAX format for Belfast. If only.
I do know one thing though. Should Wally Pfister, Christopher Nolan's Director of Photography on all of his movies since Memento, get his wish to shoot all of Batman 3 in IMAX, I think flights to London will be a definite. Who knows, if it's anywhere as near as good as The Dark Knight was maybe even flights to Sydney would be a bargain..............
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