The MRT at Orchard was located below a huge mall. We had to ask two persons on two different locations to even understand which way we were supposed to go. At one point we found the MRT again and realized we had been walking in a circle. Then we found two kind of creepy escalators; the kind that would smell like piss in Sweden. Totally fine here in Singapore though. It looked expensive with mirrored walls so it would feel larger than the small space it was.
When we got up to the street again we had half an hour before the movie was supposed to start. We had been at least twenty minutes in that mall trying to find a way out. John even pointed out it was built like a casino with no windows and no clear directions. Anyway, the Shaw Theatres Lido was just across the street. Outside there was this pick-your-side booth between Team Ironman vs Team Captain America. Tony Stark was in the lead and he had both our votes. We went to the fifth floor and sat down to wait fifteen minutes before they seated the auditorium. When the IMAX "now seating" sign was blinking we got our pre-ordered large popcorn and Pepsi before finding our seats at row E.
This was my first experience with IMAX and boy was I excited! The IMAX had an intro where they demonstrated the screen and the speakers capability, with cool effects like a jet-plane motor and a pin dropping to the floor. It was so overwhelming. I could have walked out right then and be pleased with the IMAX experience.
The movie started. People were late and blocked the view for the first five minutes. I almost stood up to yell at them, but decided not to. Instead sat there with fingers tapping John's arm and sighing heavily. Apparently this is how Asian people go to movies, I thought.
In the middle of the movie everyone's glasses broke. The right eye went black. You could still see the movie, but it was half as good as before. Nobody moved from their seats, so the whole audience sat there a long time with this heavily downgraded quality. Eventually John took the issue into his own hands and made his way down the row. I saw him leave through the back door, thinking he was stupid since the people working there would be at the front. He missed a less important scene. I saw another guy rise from his seat and make his way down to the front where John was just entering with a woman. He told me and the lady next to him that they were going to fix it.
Two minutes later the quality was back. The movie continued.
After five to ten minutes the black eye was back. People both sighed and laughed. Glasses came of. The quality was blurred and desaturated. Then it came back again. Glasses on. A few more minutes of the IMAX experience and then it shifted again. Glasses of. Glasses on. The movie was nearing its end; the big scene where Mowgli runs with the Red Flower.
And just as the best scene, most exciting part, the start of the end was happening the screen died.
We stayed for maybe twenty minutes waiting for it to start again. At one point the sound came back. I heard it was a earlier scene, they had rewound it, but the picture never came on. And neither did the movie.
Basically, we did not get to see the end of The Jungle Book.
Instead we got two free tickets for any IMAX movie and our money back. I believe that did not make up for it. They left me broken, unknowing what happened in the end. Now spoilers will be avoided and the end will be seen on a less interesting screen at home (still at pretty nice TV though).
And that was my first ever IMAX experience.
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