The Apple Vision Pro provides the very best way to watch a 3D movie. The screen can be as big as the largest movie theater. You get to sit in the perfect seat in the center. And you don’t have to wear polarized glasses that reduce the brightness of the film; instead, the image is crisp and bright in both of your eyes. When I recently watched the latest Avatar movie in 3D, widely considered to contain some of the best uses of 3D in a movie, I was astonished at how impressive a 3D movie can look. I never knew that 3D could look so good.
According to one post on Reddit, there are over 200 movies that are available to watch in 3D on the Apple Vision Pro. But perhaps the oldest one is the Alfred Hitchcock’s classic movie Dial M for Murder, released 70 years ago in 1954. At the time that the movie was conceived, studios thought that 3D movies might be the next big thing as studios started to use polarized glasses instead of the prior red-and-blue glasses. Making this 3D movie was not easy. As reported by Liam Gaughan of Collider, Warner Brothers only had a single 3D camera rig that it could use for this production, and the camera rig took up nearly the entire room. This made the movie particularly difficult for Hitchcock to shoot. For example, he could not have two cameras filming two sides of a conversation, and instead he would have to move around the bulky single camera for every different shot in the film.
Despite all of this effort, as the Wikipedia article on the movie notes, by the time the movie was finally released, public interest in 3D movies had diminished. As a result, there were very few 3D showings of this movie back in 1954. Starting in the 1980s, there have been rare times when select theaters would show the 3D version, and a 3D Blu-ray version was released in 2012 ($21.05 on Amazon). But most of the people who have seen the movie over the last 70 years have seen it in 2D.
Nevertheless, a lot of people have seen this movie, and for good reason. It is a suspenseful tale of murder from Hitchcock, a master of the genre. Almost all of the movie takes place in a single room of an apartment with only a few main characters, so the movie turns on the actors being good, and they are. Grace Kelly, in particular, is amazing. The whole thing feels more like a play than a movie, which makes sense because the movie was based on a play. The American Film Institute ranks this movie #9 on its all-time list of best mystery movies, and even 70 years later, the movie holds up very well. It certainly had me on the edge of my seat. There are a few lines of dialogue that reflect the sexism of that time period (such as references to what was appropriate for a wife versus a husband in a marriage), but other than that, almost the same script could be used today for a modern adaptation. And the film has been restored rather well considering its age, with no visible scratches and good color. When Hitchcock puts Grace Kelly in a red dress early in the movie, a not-so-subtle decision that adds to the plot, the dress pops on screen and she looks great.
But again, the reason that I watched this movie this past weekend is that I was curious to see how a movie that used cutting-edge 3D technology of the 1950s would hold up today in a Vision Pro. Initially, I had hoped to rent the movie. In the Apple TV app on the Apple Vision Pro, Apple has the movie listed, says that it is in 3D, and notes that it can be rented for $3.99. However, when I went to rent the movie, things did not go well. First, I was told that there were two versions to rent, but I could never get the button to click on one of the versions. Second, the single version that I was allowed to rent gave me the 2D version of the movie. I subsequently saw others say online that the only way to get the 3D version is to buy the movie, so I decided to bite the bullet and pay $9.99 to buy the movie and then dispute the charge on the $3.99 rental using Apple’s webpage for disputing a charge. (Less than 24 hours later, Apple refunded me the $3.99, either because they were feeling nice, or perhaps because their system noticed that I also bought the movie.)
Once the movie is purchased, when you select it in the Apple TV app, you see a pop-up window asking if you want to watch the movie in 3D or 2D. Finally, what I was looking for!
I am happy to report that this movie was a complete delight to watch in 3D and the 3D makes a real difference. The 2D version of the movie looks like a restored but still somewhat grainy movie from the 1950s—exactly what I had expected for a movie from this era. In the 3D version, the film still looks somewhat grainy, but I didn’t notice it nearly as much because the 3D effect made the movie seem more immersive and modern.
Additionally, and perhaps more importantly, the way that Hitchcock filmed this movie in 3D adds greatly to the suspense of the film. Hitchcock resisted the urge to overuse the 3D, so there are virtually no gimmicky 3D shots--except for one at the height of the drama that is totally worth it. For the rest of the movie, the 3D is used to make the room in which the actors are located seem more claustrophobic, which adds to the suspense. You see a lamp in the foreground as actors are plotting in the background. Or you see one actor closer to the camera and another a little further back. The end result is that you often get the sense that you are right there in the intimate room with the characters. Imagine watching a play that takes place in a single room where you get to be sitting in that room watching the play unfold in front of you. That is the feeling that you get thanks to the effective use of 3D camera placement. This movie is already good, but it is even better when you watch it in 3D.
So we have one of the greatest mystery movies of all time, made even better by the impressive use of 3D, and yet very few people have ever had a chance to experience it the way that it was intended to be seen. But now, thanks to the Apple Vision Pro, you can watch the movie in a way that is better than anyone has ever seen it before because the Vision Pro is so amazing at showing 3D content.
When my kids were younger, I would often purchase Disney (and similar) movies on DVD because they loved to watch them over and over again. But outside of those films, the number of movies that I have purchased over the decades is rather small because it is rare for me to want to rewatch a movie. I don’t plan to purchase a lot of movies from Apple just to have the opportunity to watch the movie in 3D. Instead, I’m glad that there are some great 3D movies available as a part of my Disney+ subscription and I hope to soon see even more good 3D movie options as a part of my Apple TV+ subscription. I wish that I could have just rented the 3D version of Dial M for Murder, but I enjoyed the movie enough that I probably received $10 of value in having the opportunity to see a classic movie like Dial M for Murder in such an amazing format.
If you own an Apple Vision Pro, and if the idea of a classic mystery appeals to you, I recommend purchasing Dial M for Murder in the Apple TV app. Bringing Alfred Hitchcock 70 years into the future is rather fun.
