My best IMAX Experience
Wednesday, November 8, 2023 at 6:00PM 
As a last hurrah, Oppenheimer has been back on IMAX screens since last week, allowing interested audiences to revisit it in the format before the film comes to streaming on November 21st. Enjoy your last chance to see Cillian Murphy's bronzed pores projected sky high, closeups galore for titanic portraiture, faces the size of monuments. Indeed, this year, because of Nolan's blockbuster biopic, it seems like big screen superiority has been more discussed than usual, with cyclical discourse about the latest pictures to shine bright on IMAX. So much so that it got me thinking about my best experiences with the giant screens…
Well, if you're a purist, there's no "true" IMAX screen in Portugal. The dimensions aren't technically right for the Lisbon theater in question, and it's digital rather than film, even if the branding and sound technology meet standards. Indeed, if you're based in Europe, "true" IMAX can be found in Prague and London, nowhere else. Still, I feel I'm not misrepresenting my experiences by calling it IMAX, and hope you agree. It's been available since the summer of 2013, and my first trip there was to watch Man of Steel, an inauspicious start to what would prove a long-lasting relationship.
From DC Comic cacophony, I went on to watch a myriad of other pictures on that screen, including many a Nolan and Chazelle's First Man with a nausea-inducing shaky cam, the animated wonder of Suzume, and the epic sprawl of Scorsese's latest. Of all those moviegoing adventures, none felt so visceral as Alfonso Cuarón's Gravity during that first year of the Lisbon screening room. Outer-space-set movies do particularly well in the format, for their visions of infinite emptiness become consuming voids, the screen a gaping maw ready to devour the audience.
The 3D helped feel thoroughly lost in the darkness, Sandra Bullock's body floating over an expanse of bottomless black when she's not backed by the faraway sun or the blue marble of Earth. Inconceivable distances became near-palpable within that room, the screen a window into the abyss. In the end, with a swelling score and bare skin on the ground, the euphoria of salvation was more than just relief for her character. It was a chance to breathe, for the screen to fill up and welcome the viewer back to reality, catharsis you feel in the gut. For me, it was peak immersion.
More recently, while covering TIFF, I had the pleasure of seeing some unusual titles at Toronto's Scotiabank Theater, on the (true) IMAX screen. I say unusual because one isn't accustomed to seeing the likes of Mambar Pierrette, Banel & Adama, and Bonello's Beast on such a massive scale. Like a dream, Rosine Mbakam's masterpiece exploded beyond its modest scope, Ramata-Toulaye Sy's mythic film became the mountainous mural it deserves to be, while Léa Seydoux's face gained a near-celestial quality, a titan of beautiful ardor peering down on the unsuspecting viewer. In Marcia Gay Harden's immortal words - what a thrill.
Now it's your time to share, dear reader. What's your best IMAX experience?
3D, Alfonso Cuarón, Christopher Nolan, Gravity, IMAX, Oppenheimer, TIFF
Reader Comments (9)
I've only had one so far as it was a documentary short from the 1990s at a science museum that I went to when I was in middle school. I have no memory of the film other than how big the screen was.
Inception and Gravity are the two that I remember most vividly. Both left me walking out of the theater feeling dizzy in the best way possible.
Avatar, Dunkirk, Dune, nature docs, Moonage Daydream.... if something is shot for IMAX then that's an immediate gateway into the movie for me. My city has a real IMAX, not just a large screen, and its huge, so it's extremely awe-inspiring.
The one I remember the most was my first one: Happy Feet. The camera movements were dizzying.
Gravity's first act is so good in IMAX, but across the totality of the film I'd go with Dunkirk.
The Dark Knight.
Titanic.
Yes, it was unforgettable!
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