U2 in 3-D

Tue., Oct. 31, 2006 4:59 PM PST by Josh Grossberg

U2 is giving fans something they can almost feel.

The Irish rockers have announced plans to release a 3-D concert film next year.

According to Billboard, the movie is being culled from more than 700 hours of footage recorded during the South American leg of the band's Vertigo World Tour last February and March, which included massive stadium gigs in Mexico City; São Paolo, Brazil; Santiago, Chile; and Buenos Aires, Argentina.

The flick is being codirected by Mark Pellington, who helmed U2's "One" video before moving on to such features as Arlington Road and The Mothman Prophecies, and Catherine Owen, the creative director responsible for the group's mind-bending stage show visuals.

For the eye-popping project, Pellington and Owen called in Peter Anderson, director of photography on James Cameron's T2 3-D: Battle Across Time, the popular 3-D attraction at Universal Studios.

To capture the group in action, the filmmakers shot the concerts using CineAlta 950 cameras, special 3-D equipment manufactured by Sony, along with regular 2-D cameras.

Talk about vertigo.

A U2 rep tells Billboard that to coincide with the release, the Rock and Roll Hall of Famers are also considering a performance that would break ground technologically as "the first-ever 3-D multicamera live shoot."

Such an event would represent an extraordinary logistic challenge given the sweeping, complex camera movements around the stage and crowd.

In any case, the 3-D concert film is currently in postproduction. It is being shepherded by 3ality Digital Entertainment and will be released to theaters across the country using Real D's digital 3-D cinema format.

Real D has been hired by major Hollywood studios to give 3-D makeovers to such films as Monster House, Chicken Little and Tim Burton's The Nightmare Before Christmas, the last of which was just reissued by Disney in time for Halloween and has done excellent business in limited release.

At the ShowEast convention in Orlando, a biannual meeting of exhibitors, Real D presented its first theatrically projected live 3-D event, which, according to Billboard, helped sell U2 on the technology.

Real D and reps for U2 did not immediately respond to calls seeking comment Tuesday.

Hollywood has re-embraced 3-D movies in an attempt to boost attendance. Real D and rival IMAX 3-D have given the treatment to such blockbusters as Superman Returns and The Matrix and Harry Potter installments, as well as to animated offerings like Polar Express and Open Season.

Even more films are in the pipeline for 2007, led by Robert Zemeckis' Beowulf, Disney's Meet the Robinsons and a 3-D version of Star Wars: Episode IV—A New Hope, which will be followed over the next five years by the other Star Wars films.

As for U2, the band is getting ready to rack up more frequent-flier miles next week with dates in Australia, followed by a three-night stand in Tokyo and a Dec. 9 stop in Honolulu.