LA Times: ‘Monsters vs. Aliens’ in 3-D: Taking filmmaking to another dimension

The push towards 3D is helped by the success of Monsters vs. Aliens. The Los Angeles Times talks with studios on the next move in the format.

Change in the movie business usually happens at a glacial pace, but the surging popularity of 3-D movies, dramatized by “Monsters vs. Aliens’ ” $59.3-million opening weekend — the biggest for a 3-D movie — has directors and studio executives quickly reconsidering which, and how many, of their future film projects can be reworked into the immersive medium.

” ‘Monsters vs. Aliens’ is the BC-AD of the 3-D platform,” said Greg Foster, chairman and president of Imax Filmed Entertainment, which sold $5.1 million of tickets for the animated film’s opening weekend in large-format Imax theaters, almost all of which showed the space-invasion comedy in 3-D. “Fifteen years from now, when people are talking about 3-D, they will talk about the business before ‘Monsters vs. Aliens’ and the business after ‘Monsters vs. Aliens.’ It’s the line in the sand.”

Like many recent 3-D hits (“Journey to the Center of the Earth,” “Bolt”) that preceded it, DreamWorks Animation’s “Monsters vs. Aliens” is a kid-friendly film. But the next wave of 3-D titles will include R-rated horror, some general audience live-action comedies and perhaps even an art-house film or two.

“You could do ‘My Dinner With Andre’ in 3-D, and it would be incredibly compelling,” said Patrick Lussier, director of January’s “My Bloody Valentine,” the first modern horror movie in 3-D. “Suddenly, you are seeing that this new venue is more than a fad.”

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