The biggest movie of the summer will create a big headache for film geeks in Seattle who want to see “The Odyssey” precisely as director Christopher Nolan intended. For a population that has gotten comfortable watching anything and everything streamed on TVs and smartphones, the difference might not be that big of a deal. But the epic picture starring Matt Damon was shot on 70mm IMAX to capture the highest quality image and sound, and seeing it like that in a theater should be considered a treat.
can project “The Odyssey” in IMAX 70mm. Axios mapped the theater locations, as well as ones in Canada, showing how far apart they’re spread — unless you live in California, where there are eight. The true IMAX format used to be an option in Seattle at what was previously called the Boeing IMAX Theater, located at Pacific Science Center.
But earlier this year, The Space Needle purchased the theater as part of a sale of a chunk of the Science Center’s campus. IMAX at the Center, the only such theater in Washington state for the IMAX 70mm format, switched to showing documentaries, according to Axios, which said the Space Needle has “no immediate plans” to show feature films. The PACCAR IMAX Theater at the Science Center is showing “The Odyssey,” but the smaller screen is said to crop films that were natively shot for the taller 1.43:1 true IMAX aspect ratio.
So, if you’re willing to drive north to Vancouver or Richmond, B.C., two theaters across the border are showing the big IMAX version. Consider Odysseus’s 10-year journey before complaining about a 2.5-hour trip. Furthermore, if this has you really into distances and measurements, IMAX says “The Odyssey” was shot on 2.1 million feet of film — longer than the distance from Toronto to New York.
If you do decide to stick closer to home, what are you actually missing? The short answer: a lot of screen space. The long answer requires unspooling the technical jargon behind “70mm,” “IMAX,” and the digital formats filling up local multiplex listings: IMAX 70mm Film (15/70, 1.43:1): The native, uncompressed “gold standard” shot by Nolan.
Runs physical film horizontally for massive 18K-equivalent resolution and a towering 1.43:1 screen shape that fills giant 6-to-8-story screens. IMAX Dual Laser GT (1.43:1): Dual 4K digital laser projection. You lose the analog film grain, but it is the only …
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