Cinerama is back on Blu-ray
— -- Home theater buffs can resurrect a groundbreaking Cold War-era film format in their homes this week with the new Blu-ray Disc version of How the West Was Won, out today ($35).
The movie arrives on standard DVD, too (in a $21 standard edition and a $60 collector's edition), but only on Blu-ray can you watch the 1963 triple Oscar winner in Cinerama. Or as close to Cinerama as you will get these days. How the West Was Won was one of only two narrative full-length films made in the format's full expression, which used three cameras to film scenes and three projectors with a larger concave screen to surround audiences.
As part of the restoration process, Warner Home Video created a special "smilebox" Blu-ray version that replicates the Cinerama theatrical experience. Instead of the standard 16-by-9 format, the image is shaped like a bow tie, widening at the left and right sides of the screen. (It was dubbed "smilebox" because the top of the image is shaped like a smile.)
Restorers used 3-D rendering software to approximate what the film would look like on the actual Cinerama screen. "For the home theater enthusiast to be able to experience an approximation of Cinerama was the bees' knees — and we knew a true home theater enthusiast would want it," says George Feltenstein, Warner's senior vice president of theatrical catalog marketing.
Launched in theaters in 1952 with the documentary This is Cinerama, which included rollercoaster footage and flyovers of national landmarks, the technology was brought to market in part by King Kong producer Merian Cooper and Lowell Thomas to jumpstart movie attendance after the arrival of television.
While This is Cinerama and travelogues such as Seven Wonders of the World played in special Cinerama-compatible theaters into the 1990s, the format's excessive cost resulted in only one other narrative feature film, 1962's The Wonderful World of the Brothers Grimm being made. Other films such as It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World, The Battle of the Bulge and Grand Prix were filmed with single cameras and shown in a modified Cinerama mode.
Related Stories
ABC News Live