Comment by ozim
7 hours ago
With current TV setups or projector technology I basically have cinema in my living room.
As a kid who grew up in 90’s I would say it is easily better than what cinema had back then.
I don’t have that high expectations of sound/video as many people will point out that streaming kills the quality but for all its worth still much better than what I need to enjoy a movie.
One of the criteria for me to go to the theater was the big screen and big sound would really add to the experience. The last film I saw in the theater was was so loud that it physically hurt and ruined the experience.
As you say with the image quality being as high at home now plus a decent surround system really makes the theater experience at home very enjoyable.
If you got a house of your own, yes.
If you are in an urban area and are not a millionaire, you probably live in some kind of apartment or studio. And yes, you can stick up a projector and a good surround system... but it might be that the builder cut corners on the floors and your neighbors already come knocking when you are talking, much less turn up the audio system to a tenth of the sound pressure a good cinema sound system provides.
I do live in an apartment and I am far from a millionaire.
I don't have any of the problem - but I don't have "cinema sound system" as I mentioned whatever I have must have just clear sound and clear doesn't mean loud. I don't need "sound experience" to enjoy a movie.
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Back pre digital I was once lucky enough to see Aliens on one of the private cinemas at Fox, and it was astounding. I think people underestimate how poorly operated most normal cinemas used to be, combined with maybe not the best prints etc.
I remember seeing In the Mood for Love on the big screen in my local arthouse cinema back around 2000. It was shot with analogue film and projected as such, and the sheer details of the textures were astounding. It's not a bad film on my 4k monitor, but I don't feel the same awe.
Blame lossy compression to save bandwidth. There's no way to legally stream in Blu-ray quality.
I’ve only seen that movie on an old MacBook about a decade ago, but I can certainly believe it’d be a treat seeing it the way you mention.
Funny enough, I want to see a version of Chungking Express that feels processed to look like an early-2000s digital camera.
IIRC in the film era there was one "master" of the movie, it was duplicated multiple times to make negative versions of the film, then those negatives are used to make the positive copies that are sent to theaters. So you're watching something that has been copied at least twice.
Commercial theaters are all digital now. They don't even have film projectors anymore. Some independent or "revival" cinemas might still have them.
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As a huge film buff, I sadly agree. And theaters in my area aren’t doing a good job keeping their projection technology current. When we went to see “Wicked”, my wife leaned over and whispered that it would probably look better on our 77” OLED, and she was absolutely right. The theater image was dark and lacked vibrant color.