Space Station 3D

So you wanna spend umpteen million bucks and go visit the space station? Why not just spend eight bucks and go see this movie? That way you get the weightlessness without the nausea (unless you're sitting too close to the screen).

For people expecting an action picture, I think Space Station will seem slow and dry. But for science and astronomy geeks who want to see what's up there, this movie is pretty cool. After thirty minutes, planet earth seems foreign, and the space station seems familiar! It seems so narrow and long, like a school hallway lined with scientific equipment.

Tom Cruise was a good choice of narrator, because of, yeah, star appeal, but also because his voice telegraphs his childlike sense of wonder. To me, there was also a sense of danger, similar to the danger of being on a submarine. You're travelling through a truly hostile environment, and always just a thin shell away from disaster.

For the general public, I'd give it a seven. But for space geeks, it's atleast a nine. Now I can't wait for "Apollo 13" to come to Imax.

I didn't even know that they had actually built this space station. I thought it was still in the planning stages. How did they manage to get all these huge pieces up in the upper atmosphere without it hitting the media in a big way? And all these international astronauts getting to go up! Here I thought I followed science news pretty well -- guess that shows me both a) that I don't and b) how the news media can get focused on a few big stories and black everything else out. I'm glad they made a movie about it so that we could find out.

You really could see what the space station looks like inside and out and what the earth looks like from space. It almost felt like being there, without the substantial disadvantage of having to go up there in a rocket and without getting motion sick and all. Plus you get to see a lot of different astronauts and the training areas.

Hearing Tom Cruise narrate was fun. His expressive voice really perked the thing up, so it wasn't ever in danger of being dry. I'm glad he's taking an interest in the space program. The space program could sure use his help.

I've never been to an IMAX before, so a lot of this was new to me.

The 3D goggles were kind of uncomfortable, but basically they worked pretty well, even over glasses -- though I did have some struggles with them, like when some of my hair got trapped down over my nose and trying to get the things over the clips in my hair that stick out. Maybe women with long hair should wear a bathing cap for this.

When things flew at you, it really did look like they were going to hit you.

Our theater let us go up and see the projection room afterwards, which was well worth the trip. It looks almost as complicated as the space station. The poor guy in there was running around after various reels of film like crazy.

Finally here is a film worthy of the Imax 3D technology. It's a unique audio and visual experience. Amazing visuals, awesome scenes of weightlessness, spectacular blast-offs. I highly recommend this film for 3D fans and everyone else.

Narrated by Tom Cruise, this is a fine documentary on the building and flying of the space station. Long takes of zero gravity work. Coverage of the Russian launches. It is a well put together piece in I-Max in space come on!

I'm sort of a fan of wide-screen processes and visual spectacle. And, lately, I've been disappointed. Up until "Space Station 3D," the two most spectacular visual experiences I've had in my life were "This Is Cinerama" (in the early fifties) and "2001: A Space Odyssey" (on its first run, in New York.)

I've seen "2001" several times since, hoping to capture the same thrill I did on its first run, but the visual spectacle was just not there in 35mm prints. Last year I saw a 70mm print of it at the Coolidge in Boston, and was very disappointed--I don't know what was wrong, but the focus was not good, and the deep, pitch-black, back-velvet sky I remembered in the original was washed out.

I've seen many IMAX films, many of them quite good--"Everest" being one of the best--but there is usually too much material in it that is just blown-up 35mm.

Oh, and I saw "Kiss Me, Kate" and "Miss Sadie Thompson" in lovingly restored 3D at a revival in Palo Alto, and while it was a blast, basically the 3D felt just as gimmicky as you'd expect.

OK. Space Station 3D is sharp, clear, all IMAX. The three-dimensional effect is totally convincing and natural. Like "2001," you can look AROUND at the things YOU are interested in instead of what the camera happens to be pointed at. I've never before had such a compelling sensation of "actually being there." Oddly enough, some of the most intense moments for me was not the scenes in space, but the scenes where astronauts and cosmonauts are simply walking around the Baikonur complex.

This film recaptured for me the sense of "being in space" that I had the first time I saw "2001."

This is just one sensational film and is well worth going out of your way to see. It delivers fully on the IMAX promise in every way.

(And I suggest that everyone make a point of seeing real IMAX while we can, as I have an uncomfortable feeling that IMAX is in the process of sinking into the mire of enhanced 35mm blowups).

I saw Cinerama in the early fifties, "2001" in the late sixties... I've had to wait over three decades to see something as spectacular. Go see it while you can. If 35 mm blowups and video "cinema" take over, it may be another three decades before we get anything like this again.