Spy Kids 3D

[Chris D]

Well, Best Buy was having a sale today to coincide with the release of "Spy Kids 3D". If you buy this new movie, you can get Spy Kids 1 and 2 for $9.99 each. Seemed good to me.

Now, I haven't seen any of the Spy Kids movies, but I've heard they're good, and got some good reviews. I figure even if I don't like them, my kids probably will when they grow to the age where they can appreciate them.

But secretly, the real reason I bought them was to try out the 3D feature on this new DVD. I don't know of any other DVD's that are 3D, although there might be some out there. This movie comes with 2 discs, one with the 2D versio of the movie, and one in 3D. There are four 3D glasses included, just standard glasses with the cheap colored inserts.

I haven't watched the whole movie yet, so I can't comment on the story until I have. But I flipped through the movie on my 42" plasma with the glasses, and it seemed pretty cool. If nothing else, a nice little novelty. The interesting thing is, only parts of the movie are in 3D, and it has you put on and take off your glasses. Presumably to give your face a break from wearing them, so you don't get annoyed during the film.

The cheap glasses aren't bad, but being able to see light spill around the sides was a little distracting. Okay, so the theater geek in me wants to go out and buy high-end 3D glasses now. Or perhaps I could make a pair, since it's just tinted plastic? Hmmmmmm..... in any case, I'll be looking forward to trying out this movie when I get my 8' screen, (hopefully) projector, and complete darkened theater. THAT should be impressive for 3D effects.




CHRIS
Luke: "Hey, I'm not such a bad pilot myself, you know"

[Brandon B]

Picked this up too. Probably watch it this weekend.

Watch the other 2 in order Chris, couple of jokes that will be funnier that way. If you liked number 3, you should like those. Number 2 does a lot of little humor/homage bits about/to past movies like Indy, Harryhausen Sindbad stuff etc. Trivia note, the little blond girl, Gertie, is Haley Joel Osmet's kid sister. And Agent Giggles is Mike Judge (Beavis & Butthead, King of the Hill).

These were done by the same guy who did El Mariachi and Desperado.

BB

[blackstar]

i watched the movie on the weekend! what great fun!! it's a great movie to entertain the kids, and the novelty is fascinating enough to interest the techno dweeb in all of us. recommended!

robert rodriguez is the name of the director, and you both might be interested to know that he is a digital nut! he filmed "once upon a time in mexico", and "spy kids 3-D" using sony's new 1080p24 camera's! the bee's knee's in digital movie camera's. lucas is currently using the newest model of these camera's for episode III.




The Land of the "Horse"

[Brandon B]

Spy kids II was also "filmed" in digital video.

BB

[H.T.C]

There are other 3-d movies on dvd {imax} you can buy them at razor3d.com and no they dont use those anaglyph red-blue {false 3d as its known} glasses but shutter electronic glasses instead.

There is a lens for projectors to project in 3-d, forgot the companys name that is said to be almost as good as imax,it is being sold now with the fact you can view in progressive scanning and hdtv.

This company here 3dmagic.com sells 3d movies on tape and dvd including warhols frankenstein and friday the 13th and more.

I dont have those movies so i cant say how good the 3-d effect is but again they use electronic sutter glasses and they can be bought in a wireless form but the cost is a litttle more.




Robert

[Dean McManis]

I bought the LCD shutter 3D glasses, and movie pack, and it does work. But only with conventional TVs and DVD players. This may be great for most people, but for me I don't have any regular TVs around anymore, and I had to loan my 3D glasses and DVDs to a friend with a regular TV to see if it worked.

Remember that digital displays (LCD, DLP, LCOS, plasma) and computer based video sources (HTPC, scaler) all use progressive scanning.

But this LCD unit uses a composite (UGH!) connection, and NTSC-interlaced scanning to work. Which is fine for most TV viewers out there. :roll: :x

If that works for you, here's the website to buy them online:

http://www.razor3donline.com/3dvideos.html

I saw the IMAX movie Encounter in the Third Dimension in an IMAX theater, and it was an awesome movie with great 3D computer special effects. But I can't say how the DVD translation worked as I don't have that 3D movie. I'm still waiting for the progressive scanning version of this to come out, because I LOVE 3D stuff. Especially if I can project it up huge.

But if you are interested in 3D movies and you see the 3D movie "Comin' At Ya" available on DVD RUN away! It is a red/blue glasses movie, and easily the worst quality DVD that I have ever witnessed (yes, even worse than the first Final Countdown DVD) 8O ops:

Anyway, I've been tempted to get the Spy Kids 3D DVD, and now even more so. Maybe it will go on sale somewhere.

Thanks for the reviews guys. (I'm really waiting for 3D HDTV) 8) :twisted:

-Dean.

[Chris D]

I watched this series a few weeks ago, and have been meaning to post my thoughts. From a kids' perspective, I really thought all three movies were great! I enjoyed them as an adult, too. Not as major works of art or anything, but as fun flicks.

Now, getting into the special features and director's commentary, I was very pleased to find some very, very good stuff. Robert Rodriguez shares a lot of my perspectives on proper approach to movie-making, focusing on story-telling and themes, and making effects secondary. Some of the resultant scenes I think were a little cheesy, but again from a kid's perspective, they're fun.

Spy Kids 3D especially was fun to watch, especially in the director's commentary. Rodriguez points out that technology is still growing, and talks quite a bit about future progressions like high definition DVD's that will have a much, much better capability for 3D and such. I would actually recommend this movie and commentary for any film buff, not just as a kid's movie. Yes, the actual story isn't as strong, but I was "wow-ed" many times by the movie.

Can't wait to watch it on a 8' screen still!




CHRIS
Luke: "Hey, I'm not such a bad pilot myself, you know"