Ireland is first country to go 100% digital cinema

The BBC is reporting “here”:http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/northern_ireland/4365875.stm
that an American company is installing digital projectors in 500 cinemas in Ireland to replace the traditional film projectors. That means the whole country is going to be outfitted, much like “George Lucas wanted a couple years ago in the USA”:http://www.forbes.com/2002/03/18/0318digitaldistribution.html with the release of “Attack of the Clones”http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0121765/combined . We see how far that got.

I can’t quite understand why digital projection is such a hard sell to movie theaters. The first time I saw “Toy Story 2”:http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0120363/combined was at one of the few digitally equipped cinemas in the nation at that time. I could definitely notice the difference and I appreciated the higher quality picture. Plus, it makes distribution of films a lot cheaper and more practical.

Haven’t you ever had to sit through a movie where the projectionist wasn’t quite on the ball? The first few minutes are blurry and out of focus, or the picture isn’t framed up right, or the change between reels is jarring and jumpy? Just last week, for their anniversary, my parents went to a multiplex to see a movie and they were told in advance that there was a giant scratch in their print across the screen for about half of the movie. The theater offered to give them free tickets to another film if they were too distracted. My parents politely declined and went shopping instead.

It’s high time for digital. It’s just funny that, of all the folks, the Irish are paving the way for the rest of us. Is it a coincidence that St. Patrick’s Day was just a few days ago?