2010: One small step for cinema audiences, one giant leap for cinema itself…

The release of Avatar earlier this year saw the unleashing of a new breed of film on cinema screens. Last year 3D took a leap into new territory with films such as Disney’s Up seeing audiences don new 3D attire in order to get the most from its visual effects.

Further 3D films trickled in to cinemas following Up’s success, including re-releases of the fantastic Toy Story 1 and 2, Alice in Wonderland and a reinvention of A Christmas Carol. Whereas such pioneering 3D films are admittedly mostly animations, Avatar saw the dawn of performance capture. The pictures that have been released of the sequel to the then-groundbreaking Tron (Tron: Legacy) look visually stunning and Spielberg’s rendition of Tintin looks set to follow suit.

With increasing amounts of audiences exiting cinemas now discussing whether films may have been improved if they had either embraced performance capture or had been released in 3D it signals that a new age has come to cinema. That is not to say incredible films aren’t on their way to release, but it does ask the question; has the bar been raised in what we expect in our cinemas?