Welcome to brain Stuff from how Stuff Works dot com where smart Happens. Hi'm Marshall Brain with today's question, when did it get so complicated to pick a movie theater and what is next in the world of movie theater picking. A friend of mine invited me to go to a movie within this weekend. That sounds simple enough, doesn't it. And in the past it was simple. It used to be that you went down to the theater and you watched the movie. In the movie Back to the Future,
you can see that world. That's a nineteen fifty five representation, and in that movie there is one movie theater in town and one movie playing at that movie theater. In the case of Back to the Future, the movie is Ronald Reagan's Cattle Queen of Montana. So that idea, one theater in town, one movie playing. That's the movie you see. So it couldn't be simpler. Now, let's look at how
things have morphed since then. In the United States, in the early nineteen sixties, the idea of a two screen theater took hold, so at least you had a little bit of choice when you went down to the theater. Then, during the nineteen seventies, the idea of a multiplex exploded. The number of screens per theater mushroomed into the teens and then the twenties. By the nineteen nineties, a single theater with thirty screens had been built. Then came things
like Dolby and th X sound systems. If you wanted the best experience, you would only go to a certified theater. Then came stadium seating. You get a better view with the seats in a stadium configuration, and they're a lot more comfortable because they're usually padded and they have nice arm rests and so on. So now you wouldn't go to a theater unless it had th X and comfortable
stadium seating. Then came digital projection. There's no more scratches on the film and no more weird stuff between reels. So that became a point that you wanted to have if you want to see a movie theater, you wanted th h X with a digital projector and stadium seating. And now there's three D projection. Some theaters have three D projectors, some don't, So if you want to see a movie in three D, you need to make sure the theater has a three D projector, and now now
that three D option is morphed as well. There's actually three technologies that are used to display three D movies. So my friend wants to see the new film, and he sends this email which theater near you has three D digital projection? And I look up theaters in my area and one nearby is actually showing the movie he wants, with stadium seating on two separate screens using two different three D projection technology. The first is Imax three D and the second is Real D three D. So now
the obvious question is which is better. If you've got a choice like that, how do you pick whether you want IMAX or real D. I jumped into Google to find a review, and the difference seems to be that IMAX three D is more of a pop out effect where stuff comes out of the screen towards you, and real D is a more subtle into the screen effect where you can actually see depth rather than being kind
of shocked when things come out of the screen. Based on that review, we chose our show time so that we could see it in real D. So now the question is what is going to happen next. There's been all these different differentiators that have been built into the movie theater experience over the last couple of decades. Something is going to happen next. What might it be? Be sure to check out our new video podcast, Stuff from the Future Oin how Staffork staff as we explore the
most promising and perplexing possibilities of tomorrow. The hou stefforks iPhone app has arrived. Download it today on iTunes.