The Transient Mania of 3D

The novelty of 3D has always been a great excitement to me, be it from a 3D cartoon using cardboard red and blue glasses, to a multi-million dollar blockbuster using polarized glasses. Nevertheless it has always seemed nothing more than a novelty, but perhaps now it all changes for good. With recent release of HTC’s Evo 3D, LG’s Optimus 3D and the Nintendo 3Ds along with 3D films such as The Smurfs 3D and countless 3D TVs being sold it you would think it was safe to say that 3D is here to stay. But history tells us that it probably isn’t. Since its birth in the 1800s 3D has experienced three waves of mainstream recognition, the 1950s, 1980s and 2007-present. The 3D fads of the 1950s and 1980s lasted less than five years, three and four years respectively, and died away seemingly overnight. So what does this mean for our current penchant for all things 3D?

The 1950s, which many refer to as the golden era of 3D, really saw 3D hit the mainstream with films such as Bwana Devil (1952), Man in the Dark (1953), House of Wax (1953), and It Came from Outer Space (1953) becoming incredibly popular films of the time, especially in America. Despite the popularity of these films the 3D fad was unsustainable and with widescreen formats becoming popular it was all but over by 1955. It was not until the 1980s that 3D returned to favour with audiences but it didn’t come close to the popularity of the 1950s. 3D in the early 1980s was dominated by re-releases of classic 1950s 3D films and horror films, such as Jaws 3-D (1983) and Amityville 3-D (1983), which went as far as to bring effects, like shining bright lights into the audience, into the cinemas during the film showings. Towards the mid-1980s non-Fiction IMAX films started to become popular, not least because IMAX had developed their 3D productions so, unlike many previous, they did not cause eye strain and headaches. However, aside from these IMAX films the 3D fad had once again stalled and fallen by the wayside with very few 3D feature films being made again until the 200s. As a testament to their work with 3D IMAX are the only sturdy bridge between the 3D of the 1980s and contemporary 3D with numerous IMAX cinemas across the world having regular shown, mostly non-fiction, 3D films across that period.

It could be said that the tipping point for the modern wave of all things 3D came with the release of James Cameron’s Avatar in 2009. It was an instant hit with audiences flocking to see it, in 3D of course, helping it become the worldwide top grossing film of all time by a significant margin, although significantly it didn’t win the Best Film Oscar. Having seen the huge returns made by Avatar the rest of the film industry weren’t slow to jump aboard the 3D bandwagon and before long cinemas were awash with 3D films. We have now reached a point where a film being in 3D is commonly nothing more than a gimmick. Films such as Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides, and Final Destination 5 would simply not have been made if they had not been in 3D; whilst other films that would otherwise be 2D productions are being made in 3D just for the sake of it. Often these sorts of films are made with the 3D experience in mind and are therefore made to maximise the effect. This usually leads to films that don’t quite stand up if watched in regular 2D; a pirate pointing his sword directly into camera becomes a somewhat pointless shot when it doesn’t fly out at you in the cinema. It seems to be incredibly difficult, verging on the impossible, to make a genuinely great 2D film that is as good, if not better, in 3D, with Dial M for Murder and Avatar being two possible examples. Perhaps this difficulty is a clue to the transience of 3D film’s bursts of popularity. In so many cases the perceived third dimension detracts from how good or bad a film really is. It is used to add an extra something to poor and average films, of course this is no great loss to anyone but to diminish the virtues of a potentially wonderful film by pointlessly producing it in 3D verges on the criminal. It begs the question, if the ’3D experience’ doesn’t add to your enjoyment of the film then why pay the extra money for it? Once the ever increasing number of gimmicky 3D films helps the general public to realise this then the journey will surely be over once again.