Batman: The Dark Knight: IMAX

For those who have seen The Dark Knight, which seems like the entire world, Batman and Joker provided two-and-a-half hours of cinematic goodness. So good, that it threatens the likes of Kate and Jack from Titanic in box office revenue. Ah, so how does a movie in this day and age generate $500 million in ticket sales? Repeat viewings of course. And what better way to take in the Batman experience again than with a gignator screen - enter IMAX! Quick hit: the short of it, still an awesome movie even if the IMAXian experience is all that grand.

If you don't know what IMAX is imagine a gigantic screen, something that is actually taller than it is wide. Now, imagine the Batmobile cruising along that thing and you might begin to realize the potential of an IMAX Dark Knight. Director Christopher Nolan actually filmed some of the biggest action sequences with the special IMAX camera for this specific opportunity, and the results are grand, sweeping shots of Gotham more massive than you might comprehend. Take the opening bank robber sequence. When the thugs are swinging across the Gotham skyline on a single cable, the sweeping camera captures the immense distance, it captures the tiny men gliding through the sky, and it even captures the duffel bag of tools that barely makes the scene in the standard print.

So you might ask, what's the big deal about seeing a duffel bag? Good question. And the answer is...nothing. It's not a big deal. It is cool to see how grand some of these shots really are. It's an awesome sight to see the sweeping scope of Hong Kong as Batman stands atop a skyscraper in the middle of the night. The dark night. Ahem, but yes, it you don't really care about how small everything looks in comparison to big, big things, well then you might not be as impressed.

In addition, the action sequences actually take on a smaller, less thrilling feel. How is that possible? Because with how big the scenes become, the action actually seems smaller, the compact, claustrophobic feel disappears in something like the car chase scene. Weird as it may sound, smaller could be better in this case.

That's not to say the IMAX experience is a failure. Rather, having to shoot a scene with both IMAX and standard screen considerations in mind make it difficult to take advantage of the technology. It's almost like HD television on a widescreen, flatscreen TV. To get the full experience, you get a nice TV and jack that bad boy in. If you're poor like me, you stick with what you got and just live with the standard stuff. But, for programs being filmed for both, sometimes you get really close shots that look weird, other times the centering of the shot isn't optimized for a standard 3:4 ratio. In the end, both look fine, but if you had only one of the other, you figure new things might look really sweet.

And that's how it is for Batman. Yes, the grand scope of some of these shots is amazing. It really is fun to see how big Gotham is as Batman stands atop a single corner of a single skyscraper. But, if we were at a point where IMAX was the standard, than scenes would have been shot to fully take advantage of it, rather than play both sides of the coin.

In the end, it's kinda cool to see some of the scenes like this. Is it worth $15? On a second viewing? Questionable. If you loved the flick and were gonna see it again anyways, maybe $15 isn't that bad versus $10.50. If you've never seen the flick, you might be better off with the standard size as you'll get better seats and you'll be saving a couple bucks. If you're rich, then rent out the whole showing and invite a couple hundred of your friends to have a private screening on IMAX. And if that's you, please feel free to contact me, I'm always looking for new friends. No final rating on this, as the full movie review is here. Instead, an advisory: go to IMAX if you really want to, don't go to IMAX just because it seems like a cool way to see Batman. It's decent, but not quite there yet.