That was probably the weakest argument of my three, but I still think it holds up. Batman and the DA are trying to take down the mob, not the Joker. He just keeps getting in the way.

How about this:

Best Actor nominees influence the plot
Best Supporting Actors influence the characters

Silence of the Lamb up and moves to Lecter's jail cell so Foster can talk to him, just as Dark Knight follows Batman all the way to Hong Kong.

The Joker is never in control of the plot, he just shows up from time to time to distract Batman from his true goal.

No one's saying that Supporting Actors aren't important to the plot, or could exist without them: in good screenwriting, there should be nothing that's not essential. But there's a marked difference between someone that the movie is about, and someone that does something in relation to that person.

Because the best way to get the facts of a story is to believe everything the subject tells you.

That's why 'Nixon' is based on interviews Oliver Stone did with the ex-president.

Actually, the Watergate articles were based on late-night cigar sessions with the guy.

Also: Hitler was quite misunderstood, just no one wanted to interview him to get the real story.

Not everyone on this forum went to film school, Brian. And not everyone on this forum is aware of what misconceptions exist in the world at large. So, yeah, actually, it is a little helpful to spell out what the problem is. If the title were changed to something like 'sequencer,' we'd end up with a lot fewer people making stupid jokes about how can you win an Oscar for editing on a movie that's three hours long.

I'm not assuming they're going to 'drag and drop.' I said it would be a difficult and lengthy process.  Here's my exact point: Pixar did it. Why would I assume LFL wouldn't?

Totally, totally. I added the '8' into my post in a particularly hopeful edit. It's much more likely to be 4K, at least for the OT. If they don't take the time to remaster, then they're missing out on the most important reason for doing this.

The fact that AOTC and ROTS were shot at 1080p still pains me to this day, but, thanks for bringing it up. Ow. So painful.

Avatar was shot at 1080p because he just didn't have any other options. The tech just wasn't there to do the live image-processing he needed. But that's not an argument that 1080p is 'optimal.' Avatar 2 will almost certainly be shot in 3D 4K.

Why wouldn't ILM, if they're going to be re-rendering the prequels' effects anyway, just render them at 4K? It's not like the detail isn't there in most shots.

I completely agree.

Fox paid for the SEs, I expect they're paying for this conversion as well. Lucas may be frugal, but—remember that this is the guy that REDID Jabba for the DVD release of ANH—he spends money when he needs to make it look right. I'm saying, Fox isn't going to say 'no, George, that's two million more than you need.'

Tell that to Sam Worthington's stubble.

I don't know, I can imagine quite a bit.

Maybe I am deluded, but I figured they'd just go ahead and redo all of the effects. According to Secret History, the SE was done at 2K, which is barely good enough for the Blurry release. Assuming they have the project files for the SEs locked in a vault, it'll be an easy enough (if time consuming: notice how they're doing the OT last, and haven't announced a release date) process to re-render in 'true 3D,' in 4 or 8K, like, say, a Pixar movie.

Again to look at Secret History, the SEs cost $10 million, and that's not just the new Trench Run, that's the full restoration and sound remix as well. Do we have any reason to suspect that Fox, which just made a ton of money off of Avatar, isn't going to put as much if not more money into the 3D versions of Star Wars, especially considering that if reviews say the same thing that Airbender's reviews said, no one is ever going to watch them?

Here's my expectation, and call me deluded if you want, but let's wait for 2012 to roll around and see what they did: LFL is going to re-render every 3D sequence that it makes sense to (we already know they're doing a CG Yoda in TPM). For live action: ILM already has basic CG models of the prequel actors for digital stunt work, and so it'd be an easy enough—if time-consuming—process to wire-frame roto live action footage and apply an ACTUAL 'bump map,' rather than just masking and applying gradients.

If TPM were announced for this Christmas, or even next summer, or if the movies were announced to be coming out every two months in 2012, then I'd assume they were just doing the same tired conversion process. But the fact that they're taking their time with it (don't forget that we've known this has been in the works for a while) says to me that they're really working to make it right.

And this is my point: that if done RIGHT, I welcome 3D Star Wars with open arms. Yeah, if it's a crappy rushed conversion that's muddy and ugly, I just won't go see it. But I don't see why, in 2010, with the release of the first one still two years away, that I have to assume the worst.

EDIT: and it turns out you said exactly what I said in and edit you made while I was typing this up. Good to know we're in agreement.

(Side note: remember how the SEs were practice making a CGI Star Wars so that ILM and Lucas could be ready to make the prequels? If this goes well, expect the new live action series to be shot and released in 3D as well.)

http://popwatch.ew.com/2010/08/18/camer … -3d-dante/

Going to IMDB for serious film facts is like going to Stephen Colbert's Wikipedia page for information about bears.

Was Piranha's 3D conversion better or worse than Avatar: The Last Airbender's? The producer of Clash of the Titans even admitted that they rushed the conversion.

These are things that matter: time and money. LFL has both on their side. That's why I'm confident that the conversion will be done well.

(And—by the way—Cameron wasn't attacking the quality of Piranha's conversion (he hadn't seen it), he was complaining about the concept of the gimmicky, 50's-style horror film that he feels cheapens 3D for serious films.)

To be fair, those conversions were rushed, and you know that LucasFilm isn't going to rush the conversion of the Star Wars films. Even James Cameron is a fan of the in-depth, lengthy conversion processes they're using on his older films like Titanic. It's why Star Wars isn't in 3D *this* year, which is what would happen if they gave it to the company you did the aforementioned movies at.

Asian people are not white. Asian people are yellow.

I don't expect you to know *why* it matters that they're Chinese and not Japanese, I just expect you to know *that* it matters.

Edit: just got the 'prove you're not a bot' thing. Post still worked, though (on iPad).

I'm glad at least Eddie knows what I'm talking about.

So this episode convinced me to watch Fifth Element for the first time. Somehow the episode managed to not spoil me at all. Still completely unsure of what I thought. It certainly had some amazing moments, but I think it flew between comedy and serious a BIT too much.

BTW:

Those 'Japanese schoolgirls' were, clearly, Chinese.

I believe my new drinking game will involve DIFF's Asian cultural insensitivity.