What’s so great about 3-D?

I was hoping I wouldn’t have to talk to you about 3-D. The process does rear its ugly, spectacled head every two decades or so, only to vanish into the stubbornly flat middle distance long before it hardens into a trend.

The first, Eisenhower-era craze lasted just three years. By 1956, audiences had grown tired of ducking hurtling spears and had banished 3-D to the same mass grave that claimed such unwanted gimmicks as Emergo (actual skeleton rattles across auditorium), Percepto (electric shocks in the seats) and Illusion-O (special glasses reveal otherwise invisible beasties).

In the early 1980s, when video was threatening to annihilate commercial exhibition, the studios briefly turned to the cardboard spectacles once again. Jaws 3-Dand Amityville 3-Dthrust clammy fingers into the auditorium, but audiences responded by extending their own hands forward and turning their middle fingers toward the ceiling.

So, when, in the middle part of this decade, 3-D began sneaking back into cinemas, it was not unreasonable to assume that it would not tarry too long.

Okay, this was (pause for sacred intonation of key millennial buzz word) digital3-D, and digital3-D is very different to the old non-digital process. (It's digital, you see.) In the unlikely event you want to know what it's like to have Bono sit in your lap, then the new technique is here to make your sordid dreams come true.

But, in truth, though the current 3-D is better than the old 3-D, it is, for spectacle wearers at least, not sufficiently superior to justify donning those ridiculous, uncomfortable goggles.

More seriously, 3-D is still hounded by a troublesome contradiction. The effect has trivial, short-term value as an amusing gimmick – watch out for the hurtling missiles and spacecraft – but, to become fully accepted, it must, like colour or sound, become such an inherent part of the experience that we barely notice its presence.

So, whereas the recent Coralinecontinued to throw stuff in our face, Disney's Bolt(a funny film, incidentally) attempted, in John Lasseter's words, to use the 3-D in an "immersive" fashion. The 3-D boffins resisted temptation to propel the action into the auditorium and tried instead to swell backgrounds and flesh out faces. The result? Kids miss the hurtling meteorites and adults wonder why they're being forced to wear these stupid glasses.

For all the efforts of the digital wizards, most of us still think of 3-D as a digital cousin of Emergo. As Steve Coogan said on a recent radio interview: “It’s okay, but I wouldn’t want to watch a Woody Allen film in 3-D.”

Yet the bumpy films keep coming. Both Pixar's Upand James Cameron's Avatarwill be offered in 3-D, and cinemas are still alive with hurtling Jonas Brothers. Why? Well, you can't pirate a 3-D movie on your camcorder. And it encourages exhibitors to invest in new digital projection systems that will ultimately save distributors millions in print and transport costs.

Meanwhile, speckies sit and fidget. Bring back the clattering skeletons and the electric shocks.