John Carter reviews!

1) Was it at least shot with 3D in mind?

A: No it was not.

2) Was the director on board?

A: "I have no say over whether it's in 3D in the release of it."

If you're fine with seeing a lot of lackluster 3D in between the occasional good looking shots, and you just can't get enough 3D, then you might like it. But if you very strongly prefer consistent high quality 3D from beginning to end and can resist the urge to buy a 3D ticket, then go for the 2D version.

Saw it yesterday in digital 3D (not IMAX). Liked the story; especially the alien race. Not a lot of 3D pop-out but decent depth. May be a sequel in the offering.

I was hoping it was going to be the "next star wars" but have to see it again before I can comment.

Will probably purchase when it becomes available in 3D.

Watched in Real3D, good movie, liked the story race and the pet ... I'll pre-order when available for sure.

I saw John Carter at a Cinemark XD showing yesterday afternoon and loved every minute! I used two Disney Magic Reward coupons to get a serious discount.

3D Previews (all in 1.85:1 aspect ratio):

• The Avengers
• Wrath of the Titans
• Men in Black III

2D-3D conversion quality is definitely improving. All three previews were conversions, and they all looked wonderful. This was the first time I'd seen The Avengers trailer in 3D, and it really surprised me by how great the 3D looks. The action seems on par with Transformers: Dark of the Moon, and the sense of depth and dimensionality was exceptional. Scenes were very layered thanks to lots of action and explosions, and part of the foreground was almost always in front of the screen. It was even better than John Carter's 3D. I can't wait to see it in RealD 3D and get a pair of those collector's item passive 3D glasses.

I won't divulge any of John Carter's plot. It's like a western crossed with Star Wars. There's a nice balance between exposition and cool action scenes. I'm a big sci-fi fan, and I thoroughly enjoyed the story. The eventual 3D blu-ray will certainly be a must-own for me, and I'm highly anticipating any sequels.

John Carter was presented in a 2.39:1 aspect ratio. The 3D wasn't impressive on the level of Avatar or Hugo, but it definitely added to the viewing experience. Others have complained that the 3D was too inconsistent. I never got that feeling, but maybe I was too wrapped up in the story to care. It's easier to forgive little 3D faults when your imagination is genuinely captured by the movie.

I only noticed one or two bits that looked unnatural. Of course there are large amounts of 3D CGI, but Cinesite should be commended for an awesome live-action 2D-3D conversion. My jaw dropped a little at how realistic the beginning scene of the rainy street filled with umbrellas looked. For a conversion, the parallax and sense of 3D depth are fantastic.

There are zero demo-worthy pop-out moments, but many scenes bring characters or large pieces of the foreground in front of the theater screen, which really boosted the sense of 3D during mundane conversations. In addition to just giving everything an added dimension, John Carter's most effective use of 3D was making you feel the vast expanse of Mars' deserts. In that regard, the 3D really excels and benefitted the movie. Overall, it was a very satisfying experience, and I recommend it to sci-fi fans and 3D addicts alike.

Movie - 4.5/5
Stereography - 2/5
Depth - 4/5
Pop-out - 0.5/5
Dimensionality - 4/5
Fun factor - 4.5/5

I will believe it when and IF I see it!

So far I have been less than impressed with ANY conversion. There is so much more to 3D that depth and sadly that is something that seems to go completely over the heads of the people doing them. Even respected Directors like JJ Abrams doesn't have a clue what decent 3D is, based on his comments about the last Harry Potter movie!

It is not simply a question of adding depth layers to an image. As James Cameron said recently, to convert properly you need to work out where everything in a shot is located relative to every other element. Then you have to apply a mesh to the frame, that means every single object, every feature on a characters face, every hair can be tweaked and manipulated. Then you have to pull, push and tweak this mesh to create a realistic 3D image.

It's a very complicated time consuming process to do this properly and the vast majority of conversions, in fact ALL that I have seen so far do not do anything like a good enough job.

I think James Cameron, being something of a perfectionist, is likely to pull off the VERY best conversion to date but many other just don't care about the quality of the finished product and see 3D as nothing more than a way to boost revenue. Until that mindset changes, I think 3D conversions are likely to continue being pretty poor affairs quite frankly.

John Carter, based on the trailer I saw this past winter, looks no better than any other afterthought conversion, including Harry Potter.

I'm very familiar with the look of native (have shot hundreds of videos and thousands of photos) and hate conversions with their mushy edges and disproportionate layers. The only conversion that has passed my quality standards is Titanic. Cameron knows that conversions need to strive for native quality. The rest of the greedy studio moron ceo's will never get that.

I haven't seen John Carter yet myself but James Verniere of the Boston Herald gave the 3D a glowing review, writing that it was the best looking 3D adventure since Avatar and even calling it better than Hugo. While I find that hard to swallow, Verniere is usually very derisive of genre and 3D movies (and he does kind of trash the plot) but for him to be so positive about the 3D would suggest to me that its a good effort.

Here's his review:
http://bostonherald.com/entertainmen...dge&position=3

We heard thousands of reviewers proclaiming Hugo was better than Avatar. So far this dude's the only one I know of who has said JC was better than either.

Of course none of those conversions are on par with carefully shot native 3D (although The Avengers was really really close, and I'd like to see it again). That's not quite what I meant by "wonderful." They are all pretty darn good for conversions. You might just be surprised if you go in with low expectations. You can find the John Carter, MIB III, and Wrath of the Titans 3D trailers in SBS on YouTube.


John Carter's 3D is not even close to Hugo's quality. It's certainly one of the best-looking conversions to date, but it just doesn't match Scorsese's efforts. I know 3D is very subjective, but I don't understand how a professional movie critic could come up with that opinion.

Scorsese literally planned every scene to benefit from 3D, while Stanton just shot John Carter like a 2D movie and let the conversion teams give everything dimensionality and depth. Most of John Carter's scenes ended up with multiple layers, but some didn't. The 3D looks great (often even indistinguishable from native) and works quite well superficially but can't compete with Hugo's strong parallax and Scorsese's outstanding cinematography/stereography.

Cinemablend's 3D review. Not great.

http://www.cinemablend.com/new/3D-Or...ket-29878.html

Just saw the movie in IMAX 3D. Wasn't what I expected =\\... Great story to it though but it lacked action scenes and had a lot of talking but like I said great storyline to it. As for 3D effects wasn't impressed with it at all, just scenery with depth and I didn't notice any pop out scenes. IMO not worth watching in 3D.

I fell asleep towards the middle, but woke up in time to see the White Ape arena battle. The movie was entirely too dark to keep us awake.

Wolfie

I was able to see a free screening Thursday, and I liked the film, and thought the 3D was simply OK. It was better and richer story wise than Avatar, but the 3D depth and realism was no where near Avatar. The 3D was on par with other Post converted films like the Phantom Menace and Harry Potter, it was there but did not add much to the experience. I will still probably buy the Bluray 3D set when it comes out on the strength of the movie alone.

Saw it today, IMAX 3D...I'm giving it 2.9 outta 5 stars. First of all, is this the unofficial sequel to Cowboys and Aliens ? Anyway, is it just me, or was the movie incredibly confusing?! There was too many factions, and way to much going on! They lost me halfway through. Who's he? Why's he doing that? What, where, how? I give it a 2.9 for the effects, but you'll be lost the entire time!

Is it also the sequel to Planet Hulk ? The slaves in the cell, taken out to the arena, where the "King" watches them battle the huge beasts? Its like the same script from the Planet Hulk animated movie. The slave kills the beasts, wins over the audience, and then challenges the King. They stole from a lot of other movies too...

Agreed! 2.5 stars for me

I mean, there's two factions at war on Mars, and one wants a truce by offering the princess for marriage. I get that...but then there's the strange bald guy...then theres the green guys...then there's the guy from one faction that looks too similar to the OTHER guy...why is he doing that?! What do the green guys have to do with all this?

If I got it on blu-ray, and was able to really sit down and sort things out, it would make sense. But if you're seeing it that ONE time at the theater? No pausing or rewinding, just a straight 2 hour run? You'll be scratching your head the entire time ! Just a terrible job of putting the story together.

Theres the big battle at the end of the movie? ALL the factions are involved! So if you're completely lost by this point-and trust me, you WILL be-seeing all the factions battling it out at the same time wont help you ! The green guys are there, Carter's there, the two Mars factions are there, and even the mysterious shape shifting bald guy is there! You'll be sitting there like, I have NO idea who is who or WHAT they're fighting for, I'll just watch this battle royale, and whoever wins is the hero !

The 2D conversion quality was much better than the first Starwars, unfortunately, thats not saying much and as usual i took my glasses off during that "epic movie" feel was there with the glasses off, but not on.

The Seattle Center Imax is for now not one i'd recommend for 3D. It was very dark [even with the glasses off!] and the motion resolution made all motion blurry, which is a ##$%@ shame because I could hardly see all that cool technology, like when they were flying through the underbelly of that walking city. While watching, i estimated it looked like wearing two pairs of sunglasses on a bright day. Really just unbelievable to me.

For now i recommend the Northgate Mall RealD theater for Seattle residents.

Ok, for fun [and $18!] i went back to see the RealD version of John Carter to compare it to the IMAX 3D version, which they also have. I had to go into James Bond mode to compare them (how did i get BOTH types of glasses with two employees chit chatting in the hall you might ask ), but I went back and forth a few times and i have to say, the RealD version did in fact look brighter and have slightly less blur during movement. In the RealD theater, I actually had moments where a scene transitioning from a light one to a dark one gave that "bright light" sensation in my eyes. When taking the glasses off, both (every theater i've been to actually) systems looked like they were at normal brightness, below even.

That said, this wasn't an accurate test at all, not seeing them side by side, no pictures, not the same scenes... I'd be really interested in someone elses opinion of these theaters. In a google search for RealD vs Imax 3D, there are a lot of anti RealD comments, so perhaps this theater has its brightness turned up on its projector or a newer projector?

The IMAX was a lot bigger, which increases the separation between the two images, which is good, but ill be going to the RealD at Thorton Place from now on.

Man, I just left the theater and thought this was quite possibly the most boring movie I have paid to go see in the last 20 years. ALL and I mean ALL acting was BLAND! I couldn't get into any one character. If Mars would have exploded, that would have been a great ending. Wait, I take that back. THat Dog thing was the only character with personality.

I was thinking Dune meets Avatar the whole time for some reason. Maybe the big Thars like people reminded me of the Navi. Don't know. But I was thoroughly let down.

I got to tell ya to, the Avengers and Spiderman trailers before the movie did absolutely nothing for me. Hulk looked way too CGI, Black Widow/Hawkeye way out of place next to the superheroes. Spiderman, how many times are we gonna do this in 15 years? Come on. With MIB3 also headed out this summer, this just might keep me away. I think viewers should not go to the movies and let some of these bomb to make a statement to Hollywood. IMO of course, I just can't take the rehashed, hurry up and put it out type of movies we are getting.

Spiderman looks great, at least for me since I grew up watching the 90's cartoon and they finally got the character right, also it was shot in 3D so at least its not a conversion

Now officially a huge bust. Articles about it being a colossal bust are everywhere, but that wont stop me from seeing it

The movie is not bad by some reports, but cost way too much to make and there was little fanfare at its arrival. This is just going to fuel the 3D critics, but there are enough big blockbusters right around the corner to squelch that

Perhaps this movie would've done better at the box office if the producers had aired some sort of featurette on TV? Maybe explaining who's who, and what all the fighting is about and how John Carter got involved in the first place? I bet a huge percentage of the 150 million dollar cost of the film went to converting it to 3D...a shame, considering that the conversion was probably done solely to boost profits. So I'm not surprised at the very poor reviews it's getting from 3D enthusiasts as well as average moviegoers.

IMHO, producers and directors need to plan 3D films as such from conception to end, instead of trying to make EVERY movie into a 3D masterpiece. Subject matter, storyline, characters, sets, costumes...EVERYTHING needs to be designed just right for 3D to work. And cinematographers need to rethink the way they use depth of field to emphasize aspects of a scene, as this can ruin the 3D effects. JC could've been a major blockbuster if it had been planned, written, shot, and directed in 3D. Instead it's being referred to by many as the biggest flop in ages for Disney, which is sad. Here's hoping the director is able to salvage something worthy of his efforts from this, and create a Blu-ray release that can make this 3D conversion finally shine.

I saw the RealD version of John Carter and enjoyed it and the 3D conversion. The image was bright and strong at the RealD presentation I saw using Barco projectors. I felt the added depth helped me get involved in the story, which I liked a lot. I think Disney dropped the ball on marketing this film and now they will pay for it. Those ugly red posters and lame previews gave you no idea as to what the film was about. Also it seemed to me that the media had it out for this film and Disney as there were many articles about what a failure it would be prior to it's release. ie. full page in Time magazine. Anyway I enjoyed it and can't wait to see it again on my 3D system.

Also, I thought the preview of Avengers looked like an excellent conversion. I have grown to like a good conversion as they can be as effective, to me, as poorly planned 3D native film. Hell, Pirates looked like a bad conversion to me!

Conversions themselves aren't inherently bad 3D. It's just that most directors who choose 2D-3D conversion end up shooting the movie without planning and framing their shots for depth. An intelligently shot conversion can look just as nice as an intelligently shot native film if the artists do a good job.

That's what I'm talking about. I also think the converting artists could be a little more creative. This will possibly come with time.

Looking back, I think John Carter's lack of 3D greatness was more related to Andrew Stanton's directing than StereoD's conversion. There were zero intentional pop-outs and too many scenes lacked multiple layers, which is probably why some people thought it looked too flat or inconsistent. It maintained good separation between images throughout the film, but sometimes there just wasn't enough objects on-screen to provide the obvious sensation that you're looking at a real dimensional world. Stanton was usually going for more of a 'barren desert' feel, which still worked in its own way.

Again, I loved the film and still enjoyed the 3D presentation. I'm glad Disney made the decision to convert John Carter even though Stanton obviously had no real interest in shooting for 3D. Some will disagree, but I'd rather have a natural-looking but boring 3D presentation than just regular 2D. It's at least nice to have the option.

Avatar has converted scenes though I'm not sure which ones.

The majority of Transformers: Dark of the Moon's converted sequences, which is about 50% of the movie.

Hugo has some nice converted sequences of old films.

The car chase scene in Underworld: Awakening was converted.

The opening rainy street scene with all the umbrellas in John Carter.

The horse and carriage chase scene and some underwater scenes in Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides.

The trailer for James Cameron's conversion of Titanic.

I hear Shrek, Shrek 2, and Shrek the Third are excellent conversions.


Then, of course, most of the above could have looked even better if they were planned and framed by someone with an eye for depth like Martin Scorsese before shooting.

I totally agree with you. I could not have said it better. Give those of us who like a good conversion the 3D option. No one is forcing anyone to watch it.

I'm asking which converted movie or scene you know of looks as good as a genuine 3D movie? Or scene. I totally disagree btw, if Avatar had been done using 3D conversion, it would have looked like ass, or i'll compromise, one ass cheek!