Aziz Ansari is pissed. Sure, Parks and Recreation seems to be off to a pretty decent start and he’s made appearances in some of this year’s biggest comedies including I Love You, Man, Observe and Report, and the upcoming Funny People. But Aziz is fighting for the little guy here (figuratively and literally, considering screen size), taking on IMAX and AMC.
Ansari recently noticed during a viewing of Star Trek: The IMAX Experience that the screen that he was watching the movie on didn’t seem up to par with normal IMAX screens. The screen was only slightly bigger than a normal one. When finished with his Star Trek experience, he immediately complained to a customer service rep who refused to comment on the IMAX screen and only offered Ansari two free passes.
Ansari states on his blog: “Basically IMAX is whoring out their brand name and trying to trick people. These new ‘IMAX’ theatres are really just nice digital screens with good sound, but they ARE NOT IMAX.” Ansari is now calling for a boycott of IMAX’s new digital screens, which can be found at many Regal and AMC theatres and are about one third the size of legitimate IMAX screens.
I’ve really only seen two movies in IMAX (unless you count that ride at Disney’s California Adventure). The first was some super sweet dinosaur documentary in middle school. The other was I Am Legend (mostly for the extended The Dark Knight preview that was being shown beforehand). And man, you can tell the difference. You can’t hide your face from creepy zombies when watching on a legit IMAX screen. Like its catchphrase suggests, IMAX is meant to be an “experience,” and higher quality sound and a somewhat bigger screen doesn’t really constitute that. So I say fight on, Aziz. You should write a Human Giant skit about it.
