Stetoscope

Yesterday, I have been to the “action christine“, a movie theater near Odeon’s place in Paris, to watch a rarity : the 3D version of “Dial M for murder” (the 1954 Hitchcock masterpiece). It is a great movie, I spent a great time there but my intention here is measure the added value of 3D for websites through the exemple of cinema.

In the early fifties, 3D movies movies had a short (2 or 3 years), but intense, period of fame… Movies like “Bwana Devil” or “House of max” were among the highest number of visitors. That is why the Warner Bros studios asked Hitch to do so. The way the master used 3D is very interesting…

François Truffaut’s interview of Hitchcock reveals how reluctant he was about new effects. As a former silent movie maker, he knew that technological effects were not of any help to tell a story. As to Hitchcock, the sound appearance offers too much liberty to movie makers so they do not invent how to tell a story with images only.

Of course, he also had this kind of reluctance with 3D effects… So he really used it, twice during a 2 hours movie and the most convincing one is when Grace Kelly is being strangled her hand goes toward the audience as she were asking directly for help. In fact, he used 3D, just when it is the most useful for the story. A twenty second sequence for two hours movie… 3D technics are no use anymore…

Since the success launch of Second life, everyweek, a 3D website is launched… Except for video games, as a user I have never been convinced by 3D websites and I do not believe that 3D will spread widely. In deed, as Sam my friend designer says : “a screen has 2D, let’s get the best of 2D!”