The Rolling Stones are blowing up again.
On the eve of the launch of their Martin Scorsese-helmed concert documentary, Shine a Light, the World's Greatest Rock 'n' Roll Band unveiled plans to unspool the hugely anticipated film on a record number of Imax screens.
Featuring Mick, Keith and the band performing at New York's intimate Beacon Theatre during 2006's record-setting A Bigger Bang tour, Shine a Light will debut in an unprecedented 93 Imax theaters, as well as 250 normal screens, nationwide on Friday.
"It'll be very large," frontman Mick Jagger said at a Sunday press conference. "After looking at all the options, Marty decided he wanted to make this small intimate movie. And I said the laugh is on Marty in the end, because we'd blown it up on this huge Imax thing...But it looks good on Imax, and we've got both formats, so we're happy with that."
Scorsese agreed, saying the large-screen format "puts you right in the center of every action and every move—it's as if you are right there on stage with the band."
The Oscar winner said while other films have captured the Stones in concert, this is the first to shoot them in a relatively tiny venue.
"I'm better suited to try and capture the group...on a smaller stage," Scorsese told reporters. "More for the intimacy of the group and the way they play together and the way you see the band work together and work each song. I found that to be more interesting. It's more of a compulsion of mine. I like to be able to see that."
The helmer is no stranger to concert docs. Scorsese launched his filmmaking career as an editor on 1970's Woodstock and made one of the best films of the genre with 1978's The Last Waltz, which documented the final concert of the Band.
Unlike the latter, which intercut performances with backstage interviews of band members, Scorsese largely sticks to the Stones rocking out onstage with archival footage of them in pivotal moments of their career intermixed throughout.
The ageless wonders crank through a set list culled from their four decade-plus catalog, including classics like "Jumpin' Jack Flash," "Sympathy for the Devil," "Satisfaction (I Can't Get No)," and "Brown Sugar" to lesser known songs like "Loving Cup," "Some Girls" and "You Got the Silver." They even drag out the old ballad "As Tears Go By."
Along the way, Jagger duets with Christina Aguilera, Jack White and legendary bluesman Buddy Guy—the last pairing of which is one of the film's highlights.
"We've done quite a few shows with Buddy Guy in the past and we've known him on and off for quite a long time. He's one of those continually wonderful blues performers that you admire," said Jagger.
"He's another Muddy Waters," interjected Keith Richards, who trades scorching licks with Guy in the film. "[Playing with him] was a high point for me."
"I think that Marty captured the duet thing we did with him was one of the high points of the movie for me," continued Jagger. "And I think the other guests in slightly different ways all add to the movie."
Ironically, the Stones initially pitched Scorsese the idea of a concert film of their performance to 1 million-plus fans at Copacabana Beach in Rio de Janeiro.
But after a series of conversations with the master, they eventually sparked to shooting on a smaller space, partially because it enabled Scorsese more control.
To capture the Rolling Stones in all their live glory, Scorsese assembled a crack team of internationally acclaimed cinematographers, supervised by Oscar-winning director of photography Robert Richardson. They included such shooters as Andrew Lesnie (Lord of the Rings), Robert Elswit (There Will Be Blood), Ellen Kuras (Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind) and John Toll (Braveheart).
"It was fantastically enjoyable but in other ways nerve-racking for us," said Jagger. "And I'm sure Marty has a lot of things going on, because he's got to cover it as it happens."
Of course, no Stones presser is ever complete without the obligatory nod to the band's AARP-eligible status.
Referencing one archival clip in Shine a Light in which a then-twentysomething Jagger answers that he could see himself doing the rock thing at the age of 60, one reporter asked if they can see themselves still chugging along at 70.
"That's only five years away!" quipped Richards.
Start 'em up, indeed.