New Star Wars and Old Filmmaking in New England Theaters

On screens across New England and in theaters around the country, December 18, 2015 will bring the release of the seventh film in the Star Wars franchise, Star Wars: The Force Awakens. With digital cinema gaining footing more and more often the big screens are projecting the films in high definition 4K digital. It may come as a surprise, then, to learn that the newest movie was actually not shot in a digital format.

Director and creator George Lucas made sure from the start that his Star Wars films were at the cutting edge of technological advances. Lucas went so far as to found his own special effects company, Industrial Light and Magic (ILM), to ensure that his vision would be met. ILM has been able, from that time, to keep at the forefront of video and audio special effects.

Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones became the first major motion picture release to be shot entirely on digital film in 2002. While Lucas was able to foresee that digital cinema was the way of the future, this early film suffered from being so experimental at the time. Digital offered Luas the chance to be more creative in the process of shooting the film but the image quality generally didn't stand up to film being shot on 35mm. Both Attack of the Clones and its follow-up, Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith, were shot on 1920x1080 resolution at 24 frames per second, well below the resolution found in most 35mm film recordings. This meant, as time went on, that the theaters were able to display pictures with a higher quality than the original recording was capable of showing.

Faced with a similar decision of going digital, The Force Awakens director J. J. Abrams opted instead to return to the 35mm format. Sure to be appreciated by fans, the decision for the newest film helps maintain the look and feel of the original Star Ward trilogy.

Abrams has not kept it a secret that his preference is against digital and neither has fellow director Christopher Nolan. As with The Force Awakens, Nolan's Interstellar was shot entirely on traditional film, except for a brief scene filmed on IMAX. Other directors to recently side with a return to the traditional include Sam Mendes (Spectre), Colin Trevorrow (Jurassic World) and Quentin Tarantino. Opening the week after The Force Awakens, Tarantino's The Hateful Eight was shot entirely on 65mm cameras and will be shown in select theaters in 70mm Ultra Panavision, a format unused since the 1960s.

The decision to stray from digital while audiences are embracing the format is not as contradictory as it may seem with the image quality often being projected in 4K digital. Tarantino's new film is only being shown in 70mm in 100 theaters, largely because most modern theaters, including theaters in New Hampshire, have converted to projecting solely digital films. So, as it turns out, most of us will be seeing these films in digital even if they were not intended to be presented that way.

Star Wars Brings Fight Over Digital to New England Theaters Movie Theaters Near Portsmouth NH Part Of Long Tradition