As James Cameron’s billion-dollar baby Avatar rolls toward the top of the all-time box office charts, Hollywood is looking to retool movies like Star Wars, “retrofitting” them into 3-D.
From a bean-counter’s perspective, it’s an obvious move to milk fan-favorite franchises with secondary theatrical runs at the higher ticket prices 3-D showings typically command.
Whether such cinematic re-engineering will result in the same sort of negative reactions as did film colorization remains to be seen. (Orson Welles reportedly did not want his black-and-white masterpiece Citizen Kane colorized, saying: “Don’t let Ted Turner deface my movie with his crayons.”)
With the continuing success of Cameron’s sci-fi epic and the growing push to add 3-D capabilities to television sets, it seems like just a matter of time before we witness a 3-D renaissance. Still, some classics might be better suited to such an upgrade than others. Here are a handful of films we’d like to see in 3-D.
With its visual displays of flowing data (pictured above, left), The Matrix would be a prime candidate for 3-D. It almost seems like the movie was shot with that in mind, with its bullets flying toward the camera and freeze-frame action shots that rotate at crazy angles. The Wachowski brothers’ mind-warping meditation on reality, technology and environmental devastation could seriously pop with a 3-D upgrade. Its bullet-time velocity could be significantly enhanced. Plus, the distractions that come with 3-D could go a long way to hiding the last film’s uninspired conclusion. –Keith Axline and Scott Thill
Bring on the “Prawns” and make ’em pop. Neill Blomkamp’s dog-limbed, crustaceanlike aliens (pictured above right) look freaky enough as it is, skittering around the refugee camp outside Johannesburg. They’d gain even more extraterrestrial menace in a stereoscopic view. (Spoiler alert:) We’d love to see alien body parts bursting out of our hero’s skin in 3-D. And, uncannily similar to the AMP (Amplified Mobility Platform) Suit worn by Col. Miles Quaritch in Avatar ‘s final battle scene, District 9 also culminated in a man-inside-robot showdown that would attack the screen as a spinning, swiveling, cannon-firing marvel in 3-D. –Hugh Hart
There is so much stifling atmosphere in Ridley Scott’s adaptation of Philip K. Dick’s novel Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? that a full-blown 3-D transformation could smother the audience. Plus, it’s continually been resuscitated for further capitalization in the guise of director’s cuts and so forth. Why not 3-D? –Scott Thill
This jawdroppingly campy 1968 flick, based on a softcore European sci-fi comic, is pretty silly. But it boasts some awesome psychedelic visual effects and groovy set design that would look even more eye-popping in 3-D. Honest, that’s why we want to see it get another dimension. Jane Fonda’s indelible performance as an interstellar sex kitten with an aversion to clothes has nothing to do with it. –Chris Baker
If this woman belting out the diva anthem doesn’t bring about 3-D fantasies for Luc Besson’s classic, maybe recalling the hysterical exploits of Korben Dallas and Leeloo “Dallas Multipass” will. Picture it: A scantily clad Milla Jovovich swan-dives off a skyscraper in a fantastically realized future. Ruby Rhod and Dallas battle a bevy of shape-shifters. Luke Perry. This has the goods to be experienced in multiple dimensions. If converted to 3-D, when Jovovich jumps, you’ll really fall with her. –Scott Pierce
Plots where characters are made microscopic or colossal rely on making the familiar foreign. While 1950s flicks like Attack of the 50 Foot Woman or Them! could only be improved by distractions from wooden acting and insipid scripts, the cheap original effects and ragged film stock could never survive conversion. Honey I Shrunk the Kids, however, features vibrant fun house sets begging to be made an immersive environment. Robert Oliveri’s desperate, milk-logged floundering amidst Cheerio icebergs, dodging Rick Moranis’ aimless grazing, invite the audience to swim along. Epic journeys through a forest of grass, violent duels between giant scorpions and ants, and a breathtaking sequence clinging to survival beneath the relentless blades of a lawnmower, if re-shot in glorious 3-D, would swallow viewers whole. The most thrilling ride this side of a roller coaster. –Brendan Seibel
Michel Gondry’s analog special effects would be even more vivid if they popped out of the screen in 3-D. –Keith Axline
If you learned anything from Tremors, it’s probably that fishing for Graboids consists of a good rope, a little bit of intelligence and a whole lot of dynamite. If only the movie were converted to 3-D, Graboid smithereens would really hit the rocks. Hey, you reap what you sow. Additionally, pole-vaulting would seem that much more dangerous. You’d also get an extra dose of Reba McEntire and the elephant gun. –Scott Pierce
J.J. Abrams’ franchise reboot boasts three 3-D must-sees. Since 3-D excels at inducing vertigo, we’d love to see the plummeting-through-space shot where James T. Kirk and his Federation pals jump onto a drilling platform to battle Romulans (video embedded above). Spaceships passing through the galaxies would also gain epic sprawl. And the 2008 film’s scariest chase scene, when a monstrous beast races after Kirk across a snow-blasted planet, would only gain ferocity with a 3-D closeup. –Hugh Hart
A scary, surreal fable from directors Jean Pierre-Jeunet and Marc Caro, City of Lost Children featured stunning visuals and dark humor. Adding an element of dimension to both could perhaps intensify the film’s destabilizing dream logic. It could also bring the criminally underrated film back into popular consciousness. –Scott Thill
The coolest thing about Avatar ‘s 3-D is that the movie includes very few “stick in the eye” moments where random objects pop out of the screen to give you a cheap thrill. Instead, the stereoscopic 3-D gives the movie heft and impressively immersive depth. Imagine the same sort of effect in Ridley Scott’s 1979 sci-fi/horror masterpiece Alien, with the dark halls of the Nostromo stretching off into the distance and a sense of dread becoming even more unbearable. H.R. Giger-designed creatures would look even more awesome. And that eye-popping chestburster scene? A 3-D slam dunk. –Lewis Wallace
The film’s fantastic vistas of Victorian-era London would look even more epic in 3-D. Rachel McAdams’ damsel-in-distress scene, where Irene Adler is about to be sliced by a pig butcher’s buzz saw, would be even more cartoony-scary in 3-D. And the bare-knuckles boxing match, where Robert Downey Jr., as Holmes, deconstructs his moves in slow-mo, would surely land an extra punch. –Hugh Hart
Ralph Bakshi’s terribly under-recognized 1977 animated adaptation of J.R.R. Tolkien’s classic never got the love it deserved, even though Peter Jackson swiped scores of its shots and sequences for his live-action movies. Its psychedelic violence would probably work brilliantly with a 3-D makeover, especially the rotoscoped chase and battle scenes. It’s a long-shot, but it’s worth it. –Scott Thill
