Avatar: The Way of the Water Is Crashing Movie Projectors In Japan
Avatar: The Way of the Water is a revolution in movie making; however, this revolutionary piece of art is also breaking projection systems in Japan, according to a report by Bloomberg.
Theatres were reporting technical problems with one being forced to reduce the 48fps frame rate this movie plays at, down to the conventional 24fps. Many fans were turned away from screenings with theatres being forced to issue refunds.
The issue affected major cinema chains in Japan including United Cinemas Co. Toho Col, and Tokyu Corp, according to movie fans. The chains haven’t released any official statements regarding the situation as of now.
To the uninitiated, the recent Avatar movie is playing on high-frame-rate (HFR) playback, which requires state-of-the-art projection systems, or at least upgrades to the existing hardware at play.
The movie makes use of HFR in scenes that are fast-paced — mostly action sequences, whereas dialogue-based or slow-paced scenes play at the conventional 24fps using frame duplication.
Theatres are known to be wary of the format of movies that they can play, but HFR isn’t as popular, resulting to this kerfuffle.
These issues also surface at a time when the movie didn’t receive the response estimated earlier, in its opening weekend and is entering the disrupted holiday season which could see the numbers drop even further.
