xXx: Return of Xander Cage (D.J. Caruso)

[TGM]

XXX: RETURN OF XANDER CAGE

Director: D.J. Caruso

imdb

[TGM]

This was really silly. I enjoyed it.

[Skitch]

I'll wait for dollar theater.

[Morris Schæffer]

I'll wait for dollar theater.

I'm in GIF mode today.

[Henry Gale]

This is going to be a review of 4DX more than any triple X's.

I saw this because I suddenly had a few hours to kill and it was both one of the most convenient showtimes and I had a free pass that I could use for even the most expensive premium movie, so considering I've been cautiously curious about seeing a movie in 4DX and I'd seen most other things I wanted to at the moment, I walked into this without any real sense of what my expectations even should be. I mean, the original movie was funny and amazing when I was 12(?), but it basically set the bar for much better, crazier movies since (from Crank movies, Shoot 'Em Up, Transporter 2, Torque, all the way to Diesel's own recent Fast & Furious movies) and didn't seem like it'd be able to push things in a similar way, but in terms of 4DX, I genuinely didn't know how much it'd be to basically experience a 2-hour version of Honey, I Shrunk The Audience.

If you don't know what 4DX is: Your seat moves (a lot, except during a bland sex scene, which I thought was hilarious), wind machines blow at you, sequence-specific scents are pumped in (though being a bit stuffed up and under the weather, I didn't notice this aspect as much), you're hit with concentrated air beside your head when gunshots go off (and sometimes at your feet), you get patterned kicks in your back when characters get punched or get thrown at stuff (without subjectivity as to whether "you" are the good guy or bad guy feeling this.. you always get punches), fog rolls in here and there, controlled light flickers when things explode or cars crash into electrical things, and of course, water sprays at you and mists in the theatre when any wet activity happens on screen. The last one of those is the only option you are allowed to turn off.

I really wondered if this movie was made for this technology or the technology was made exactly for this movie. Because they're both really showy, abrasive things that end up being very inert and always getting in their own way to be effective.

The whole idea that films need to have something MORE than just sound and images to convey themselves to evolve in the future for people to stay interested in going to the cinema is already an idea I reject. Obviously 3D was another play at this for studios in the last decade, and as someone who loves great 3D and absolutely despises lazy 3D, there was definitely a long time when I did see it as an additive ingredient when most seemed to be annoyed by it categorically. Maybe I just did enough research and chose wisely as to which movies I wanted to see them in 3D rather than 2D, but it always did more for me when it worked than killed my hope for it when it didn't. But in an age when VR headsets can display 3D movies anywhere, anytime, and I can personally now see 3D Blu-rays on a gorgeous 4K 3D TV that displays them in full 1080p with great backlight, colour, and even less dim-impeding glasses (while also being able to use RealD theatre glasses), that novelty feels less exclusive to the theatre (though immersion of it there plus the big screen and sound is always going to be a purer version of it). So 4DX does include 3D in addition to all the physical elements I listed above, but the weird dissonance is that while the 3D (while generally not being a particularly well-done conversion) does all it can to pull you in, you have these other things pulling you back into realizing that you're just in a movie theatre, and a weird theme park version of one at that.

For everything 4DX intends to do to make you feel more immersed in a movie, all it did for me was pull me out of it. At least I now know not to ever see it with something I actually expect to be any good or emotionally invested in, because in the middle of an effective scene I know I'll be thrown off by my seat suddenly jerking me forward. Even with all the drastic seat shifting, I fell pretty much entirely asleep at two points. I mean, I was pretty exhausted anyway before going in theatre, but I think 4DX just drained my energy even more, despite literally shaking me to stay awake.

Having said all this, I'd kinda still be curious to see it with something that's pretty uniformly conducive to it that's already a great movie I've experienced several times like Fury Road, Blade Runner, or Speed Racer. (Though some friends of mine did see Rogue One in 4DX and didn't know how to feel about the "added" experience.) But really the dumb, dissident part of my mind just wants to see it done for things like Jackie, Toni Erdmann, and Manchester by the Sea.

[Dukefrukem]

I just tried to look for a 4DX movie theater in Massachusetts but I don't think we have any.

[Henry Gale]

I just tried to look for a 4DX movie theater in Massachusetts but I don't think we have any.

Well, the one I went to is the first and only 4DX in all of Canada. And looking on their site, there's only four in all of America. Two in New York, one in L.A., and one in.. Gurnee, Illinois (population 31,000).

It's still really new to us, with Doctor Strange being the first movie we got (NOW's Norm Wilner did a good sum-up of it then), but apparently Captain America: The Winter Solider was the US's first three years ago.

Still can't really outright recommend it, but I think it's worth it if you're similarly curious as I was was and can also see it for free or much less than its way-too-expensive pricing.

[Stay Puft]

But really the dumb, dissident part of my mind just wants to see it done for things like Jackie, Toni Erdmann, and Manchester by the Sea.

Haha, that's how I always walk out of these things. I remember the first time seeing something in IMAX 3D, I walked out thinking, "Sure, but what if Apichatpong Weerasethakul made an IMAX 3D movie?"

I still really want that to happen, obviously.

Thanks for the impressions. I've been curious about the 4DX thing but there hasn't been anything yet I wanted to actually spend the money on. And I really didn't like the seat moving stuff that the D-Box does (the Hobbit movies were the first and last time I bothered with that). I'm probably just going to skip 4DX altogether at this point.

[Morris Schæffer]

Just think about the smell during the pooping scene in Dumb and Dumber. The potential of 4DX is limitless.

[Dukefrukem]

This was basically more Fast and the Furious than a sequel to the original xXx. Ridiculous premise. Crazy set pieces. Hack this. Blow up that. Diverse cast. Donnie Yen was great. But the charm of the original is lost somewhere. Would watch another.