3D Movies are a Scam by Movie Companies and Cinemas

July 27, 2010 · Posted in Opinion

Let me start by saying I like 3D movies.
I remember as a kid when they showed Fort Ti (1953) in 1982 on ITV with free 3D glasses from the TV Times, the first film shown in 3D on British TV.
I even had a couple of 3D comics and Captain Eo at Universal Studios was great.

3D Cinema Audience

But I guess I was one of the few people who saw Avatar and thought nice tech demo but why is it 4 hours long? Anyway that’s a different post. The point today is I went and paid the extra ￥400 ($4) for the loan of the glasses as it was the event that was Avatar.

Last weekend I went to see Toy Story 3D and this is where the scam started to reveal itself.
Yet again I had to pay extra for the loan of the glasses. Two things bugged me about this.

1) Do I have to pay this everytime I see a 3D movie?

I know there is an argument for charging this as the cinemas have to get back the cost of converting their screens, etc to 3D but do you really think they’re gonna drop this charge when the costs are covered? I doubt it.

2) Also, when I went to see Toy Story 3D I had two choices.

Watch it in 3D.
Not watch it at all.

(Well, technically there was another choice, watch it dubbed in Japanese, but I decided against that).

There was no 2D screening – which apparently has brighter and more vivid colours.
Therefore if I wanted to see the movie I had to pay the extra money.

You might think that ￥400 ($4) isn’t much extra, but when this brings the total price of going to the cinema costs at least ￥2100 ($21)!, it’s a bit pricey.

Why can’t I say, pay $1000 ($10) for a pair of glasses I can take home and bring to any 3D movie and not have to pay the rental charge each time?
I mean how much do these glasses cost? Really?

Having said all that, although I was disappointed with Avatar and fairly unimpressed with the 3D, I loved Toy Story 3D and thought the 3D worked so much better and felt it added to the movie (or maybe I was distracted by the believable dialogue and characters?).