American Cinematographer - August 1993 - 55

Riding the Movies with Doug Trumbull
Crossover

potential is fully realized with the

Back to the Future franchise.
by Chris Pizzello
Throughout
career

a long, adventurous
of cinematic innovation,

Doug Trumbull's hyperactive
imagination has been a doubleedged sword. On the one hand,
Trumbull has been responsible for
the special effects behind some of
the most

awesome

squashed by skeptical studios, he
finally turned his back on the com¬
mercial movie industry.
"It took me 15 years of
hammering like hell to find out that
the movie business just can't ac¬
commodate the technology,"

and indelible

ever put on the movie
the giddy 70mm thrill-ride

images
screen:

film" entertainment form, which he

had helped to create in 1974 when
he combined a 35mm film with a

flight-simulation motion platform.
In

1989, when Universal Studios

Florida asked Trumbull to direct

the ultimate Omnimax ride film for
Back to the Fu¬
ture
The Ride,
-

he couldn't turn
down the chal¬

through the Stargate corridor in
Space Odyssey, the breath¬
taking view of the towering
"mothership" in Close Encounters of

2001: A

lenge.

the Third Kind, the futuristic vision
of the Los Angeles landscape as a

Trumbull
feels that the
Back to the Fu¬
ture ride film

brooding, neon-drenched night¬

represents

in Blade Runner. Yet this

a

same

perfect synthe¬

zeal to constantly push forward the
film medium ultimately left
Trumbull alienated from a risk-

sis of his talents.

averse,

formula-driven Hollywood
industry.
Following years of futile
attempts to introduce revolution¬
ary film formats (like his own
Showscan process, in which 70mm
film is projected at 60 frames per
second for maximum clarity) to
commercial Hollywood produc¬
tions, Trumbull began to search out

real dramatic

film

content, yet it
also has a high

alternative media in which to dis¬

ing movie ride

play his vision of

in

mare

a

"It's part movie
direction, with

technological
quotient. It was
like

a

come

dream

true," he

says.
Billed
as
the most excit¬

more

the

world

immersive, visceral film experi¬

since its

ence.

1991

"After

May
opening in

Horida, the Back

working on 2001,1

got completely hooked on the

to the Future at¬

whole idea of subjective experience

traction

films," Trumbull says. "That was a

Trumbull laments. "It's kind of

very experiential movie, shot in
70mm with Cinerama, for giant

catch-22. You can't make

screens.

Unfortunately, at about

that time they were in the process
of multiplexing the world. Screens

a

a

movie

with a process like Showscan un¬
less all the theaters can show it, and
the theaters won't put it in the pro¬

cel¬

ebrated its

gala Hollywood open¬
ing on June 10 at Universal Studios.
The ride footage was filmed in the
65mm Omnimax format and pro¬

jected onto

80-foot dome. Visi¬
eight-passenger
time travel car as they
an

got smaller and over the years I saw

jectors unless all of the movies use
the process. So the movie business

tors sit in an

the business going down the tubes,

is really just stuck in its format, and

technically."

the only place new formats are hap¬

chase Back to the Future villain Biff
Tannen, who is loose in the "Insti¬

When Trumbull's dream
to

the Showscan format in his
1983 sci-fi film Brainstorm was

use

own

DeLorean

tute of Future

Trumbull turned his concen¬
tration toward the fledgling "ride

Technology" and
threatening to end the universe.
Engulfed by the curved screen, rid-

August 1993

American

pening is the theme park."

Cinematographer

Special effects
pioneer and
Back to the

Future: The Ride
director Doug
Trumbull

presides over
the film's

futuristic Hill

Valley set,

one

of seven

miniature
milieux created
for the 'most

exciting movie
ride in the
world. '

53
American Cinematographer - August 1993

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