Sabrina (1954) and Thoughts on Digital Projection

R: The Michigan definitely treats us right. Free chocolate? Check. Free champagne (pardon, "sparkling wine")? Check. Classic film? Check. If you haven't seen Sabrina, check it out.

What you'll see will probably be a DVD. And, unfortunately, it will look as good as what I saw. Because we had a digital screening last night. Kate called it, I protested, "surely they wouldn't! Not in the main theater!" And, as usual, she was right. The title credits came up, the whites were blown out, the edges of the letters were jagged, and there was plenty of digital noise in the background. The light tones were particularly blown out in this transfer, which was a problem throughout the film and particularly hurt several scenes.

Now, I'm no enemy of the digital revolution. Those who know me well know that I've spent an embarassing amount of time arching various bits of animation from VHS to digital formats, and take great pleasure in the various tricks one can use to get rid of the deficiencies of tape. I'll even stand for digital projection of films that were shot on digital -- it's a cheap way to do things, and films like Crossing the Bridge wouldn't get made any other way.

But Sabrina wasn't shot on digital, it was shot on glorious film, and we're far, far away from digital projection being an adequate substitute for film. This is one of the reasons we go to The Michigan -- to see something that we can't see curled up at home. We can tell the difference, and I hope the folks making decisions at the theater can tell the difference too.