What does it mean when a cinema is THX Certified? In a few words, it means your movie-watching experience is going to be awesome. Why? Let me break it down for you with the top five reasons to see your next movie in a THX Certified Cinema:
1. Your experience has been scientifically verified as the best.
When you see a “THX Certified Cinema” plaque outside a theatre, it means we’ve really put this auditorium to the test against our very high standards, and it earned our seal of approval. At the core of THX Cinema Certification are hundreds of rigorous tests performed by our very own specially trained engineers. They’re looking for excellence in every crucial category: auditorium isolation, baffle wall, reverberation control, background noise, reflections and echoes, speaker layout and coverage, sightlines, viewing angle, projection distortion, audio system calibration, projection calibration, screen luminance and uniformity, color calibration and accuracy, image contrast, focus resolution, and screen performance…
Still with me? Paying special attention to each of these elements ensures that the cinema auditorium is performing at its best possible ability, leaving no room for distractions or errors that could take away from the experience of the film. We would know — we’ve been doing it for 35 years and counting.
2. Nothing is added to or subtracted from the filmmakers’ vision.
The result of all our testing and tweaking is moviegoing at its finest — an auditorium environment that not only complements the cinematic experience at large, but has been scientifically proven to be able to recreate the filmmakers’ carefully crafted vision and deliver the movie to audiences in the way it’s meant to be seen and heard (let’s not forget how long and so-very-deliberate the filmmaking process is to get it just right…). This means no crackling speakers, no ridiculously bumped up contrast ratio and saturation, no confusingly noisy air conditioning units, no weird spots and speckles on the screen. Just the film you came to see, in its prime. So when Jon Turteltaub wants you to feel the fear of silence as the Megalodon creeps slowly up from the depths of the ocean to eat you, fear you shall feel!
3. The THX mission was created by movie lovers for movie lovers.
It all started in 1982 when George Lucas and his talented companions were working hard on Star Wars: Return of the Jedi and ran into a major problem: the team brought their film to test in a commercial theatre only to find that much of the audio detail and quality they mixed for countless hours in the studio was simply missing when played back in the cinema. Their vision looked one way in the studio, but different (in a bad way) in the theatre. To put an end to this painstaking phenomenon once and for all, George then made it his mission to establish a quality standard for commercial theatres that would utilize the best technology to consistently translate filmmakers’ work to the big screen. That’s when THX was born, and we’ve worked tirelessly to ensure movies look and sound their best ever since!
4. THX makes your theatre choice an easy decision.
Depending on where you live, there can be dozens of movie theatre options to choose from in your area. The THX seal of approval makes your decision easy-peasy — choosing a THX Certified Cinema means you’ll get the best audio and video experience possible in that auditorium, verified by experts. No need to risk a subpar moviegoing experience when we’ve already sorted out the best options for you! Now the only tough decision you’ll have to make is which size popcorn you need.
5. Movies deserve THX.
Movies are truly a work of art. The best of them are usually so great because of the incredible attention to detail — the soundtrack, the camerawork, the dialogue, the effects… all the pieces that filmmakers artfully stitch together for years to present their creative masterpiece to the world just the way they dreamt it up. So, there is nothing more tragic than the idea that any detail of their hard work would go unnoticed due to a cinema auditorium that had a projector too dull to show you the intricate makeup of your favorite hero, an audio system too old to highlight the pivotal whisper-line that changes the entire story, or walls so thin that your heart-wrenching sympathy was foiled by a thunderous boom from the action movie next door. Movies are hard work, and they deserve to be represented by the best equipment, tested and tuned by professionals to stand up to the task of transporting you to another world.
Find a THX Certified Cinema near you. Because quality matters.
