Peter Knight explores an ICE Theater auditorium experience and all it has to offer.

A n I m m e r s i v e E x p e r i e n c e :

Peter Knight, Commissioning Editor, Cinema Technology Magazine

What do you get if you take the best in cinema 4K RGB laser projection, add Dolby Atmos audio, sprinkle it with luxury VIP reclining seats, add some LED panels along each side of the auditorium, and put in carefully-selected lighting effects in the ceiling? And just to finish it off, a unique entrance into the screen? Why, you get an ICE Theater Auditorium!

Owned by CGR Cinemas in France, ICE Theaters is a PLF (premium large format) that is rapidly growing across the globe, with 50 ICE Theaters at the time of writing, across four countries (France, Spain, Saudi Arabia and the USA), with one opening shortly in India, and Estonia in 2023.

Back in 2017, CGR Cinemas Group (CGR) and global lighting leader, Philips Lighting, announced a collaboration to develop the Philips LightVibes concept, to deliver a unique immersive movie experience through connected light. It was an exclusive partnership to develop and distribute LightVibes, a breakthrough visual immersion concept for movie theaters themselves.

CGR introduced LightVibes on December 14, 2016, in Toulouse-Blagnac, France, as a key component of their ICEby-CGR premium Immersive Cinema Experience Theater concept. And feedback from general audience and cinema industry partners was consistently positive.

Since then CGR has gone on to package the technology and the overall experience into its own successful brand, blending the concept with their existing cinema expertise to produce a unique immersive premium format.

A n I m m e r s i v e E x p e r i e n c e :

ICE Theaters

Peter Knight goes in search of the new immersive cinema experience that has proven popular in France and is beginning to seed itself across the world.

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ICE Theaters was created by France’s second largest exhibitor, CGR Cinemas, owning over 700 screens.

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There are 50 ICE Theaters globally: in the USA, Saudi Arabia, France and Spain; more ICE Theaters are scheduled to open later this year in India, and Estonia in 2023.

ICE Theaters works closely with all major Hollywood Studios for moviegoers to experience all the biggest blockbusters. They will now also be working with Bollywood Studios, and with Bollywood post-production, to release all major titles in the ICE format across the Indian territory.

Over 120 blockbusters have been released in the ICE format, including “Top Gun: Maverick”, “Spider-Man: No Way Home”, “The Batman”, and “No Time To Die”.

The goal was to give birth to a brand-new innovative experience meant to captivate the most demanding moviegoers.

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So, What Makes ICE Different?

The ICE experience is deliberately different from all other PLF experiences, while, like many PLFs, it still utilises additional hardware both in the projection room and the auditoriums. It’s made up of several technological and experiential factors detailed below.

The immediate first significant difference is the immersive corridor entranceway to the auditorium, designed to let the audience know that they are about to enter another world. The corridor uses the same LED panels (also used in the main auditorium) to create a “visual atmosphere” that is connected to the movie about to be watched.

Inside the auditorium, there is the traditional main cinema screen, but along each side of the screening room, there are a number of low-resolution LED screens. And in the ceiling, predominantly towards the rear of the auditorium, are LED stage lights - again, two big differences to any other PLF set up.

A (N)ICE Projection Experience

4K RGB laser projection is at the heart of the viewing experience. The technology of the digital projector is based on nine lasers (three laser beams per primary RGB colour) and these produce a brightness of 60,000 lumens, providing a spectacular contrast level and cutting-edge image quality. The rooms all have Dolby Atmos audio that is configured for the maximum ear experience - with over 50 speakers and 30 amplifiers meaning that no matter where you are sitting in the VIP reclining deluxe seats you will experience a comfortable movie with great sound. And here you have plenty of space to move about, with up to 1.8m gaps between the curved rows.

The idea behind ICE Theaters is to create an immersive experience without detracting from the main picture, and without having to create vast amounts of additional movie material specifically for the LED panels. Instead, these panels show images that are the same colour and style as those on the main screen, meaning they may differ from one side of the room to the other. But these immersive panels are used to give a greater sense of speed and direction of movement within the movie (where appropriate) and to enlarge the vastness of a landscape or reinforce the impact of an explosion. The design and purpose of the LED panels is to reflect the peripheral vision of the human eye, maintaining the immersion of the audience in the movie.

In addition to the side LED panels, there are overhead moving lights that allow for a number of effects, again designed to enhance the experience and to immerse the audience in the film.

The system is flexible enough that if there is not a movie showing in the ICE format then the side screens are switched off. They disappear into the walls and are designed to be acoustically neutral.

Top: the main ICE Theater auditorium (OCINE Granollers)

Middle: A film mash-up display (OCINE Granollers)

Playback Technology & Business Model

In order to make the ICE content work correctly, there is a separate ICE server located in the projection room that has the specific playback script on it. This script tells the side panels and overhead lights in the auditorium what to show and play. It is all synchronised via timecode to the main DCP of the film, so it automatically plays at the right time.

In terms of the business model, often there can be as many in number as there are different types of PLF options, but the ICE Theaters auditorium works on a straight purchase, with a five-year service. It is expected that the cost is recouped in less than five years and generates additional revenue from day one when compared to a traditional auditorium.

The immersive entranceway into the ICE auditorium

“I was looking for an experience that would sublimate the image, that would give the film an additional visual power, and that would allow the viewer to dive into the heart of the movie.

ICE Theaters is an addition of elements of technological perfection: the absolute comfort of reclining seats, Dolby Atmos sound system, the latest generation of laser projection, and the ultimate experience with the ICE Immersive technology. ICE Theaters is a compendium of excellence. All studies show that moviegoers are looking for a premium cinematic experience. ICE Theaters is a flamboyant response to this demand, an accelerator of attendance and seat-occupancy rate, a booster of boxoffice revenues, a vector of increase in average ticket price, and a concept that creates consumer satisfaction.”

Jocelyn Bouyssy, CEO, CGR Cinemas - ICE Theaters

What’s On The Screen A Personal View

Peter Knight

Like any special viewing experience, ICE Theaters’ success is dependent on the available content, especially when it requires something additional to be done to the original feature, as with ScreenX or D-Box. But with over 120+ titles available - many of them from the big studios, including the biggest movie titles of the year - the ICE format is proving to be successful. The number of titles that are available in the format means that there is the opportunity for nearly one screening a fortnight and these screenings include some of the biggest titles that are being released in the mainstream.

One of the main differences between ICE Theaters and other immersive experiences is that 100% of the movie is in the ICE format, so there is no coming “in and out” which can happen with other formats and is off-putting and confusing. In 2022 so far, there have been 25 titles released in the format, including a rerelease of “Avatar”, “Top Gun: Maverick”, and “Elvis”. “Avatar: The Way of Water”, will be released in December.

Content is provided by the studios in advance and the ICE team then work with it to create the experience in their own facility, known as “the bunker”, before it is approved by the studios and sent off to the cinemas.

Entering the ICE experience at OCINE Granollers

The Numbers Don’t Lie

In a relatively short time, ICE Theaters has become the leading immersive and high-end theater screen format in France. When compared to the average occupancy in a similar capacity standard auditorium, ICE records numbers twice as high and similarly sees double the box office when compared to the national average market share of CGR’s cinemas.

During CineEurope 2022 I got the opportunity to visit an auditorium at the OCINE Granollers cinema, ICE Theaters’ first immersive screen in Barcelona, Spain, where I saw a demonstration of the ICE system for myself. And it did not disappoint.

The first thing you encounter is the entrance corridor which makes it clear that you are about to experience something exciting and, literally, unusual. The lighting effects create a warm welcome, beyond the initial signage for the entrance. You then enter the auditorium that continues with the same lighting effects, duplicating them across all of the LED panels that are now lining the sides of the auditorium. It’s a pleasure to discover the seats are very comfortable to sit - or even lie - in, given how far they actually recline.

Probably one of the most noticeable things about ICE Theaters compared to other PLF experiences is that it was not housed in the largest of the auditoriums in the cinema. However, it is a perfect size to provide the intended, optimal experience - the audience can see the whole auditorium without having to move their heads. This is where previous versions of this technological experience have failed, by using the largest auditoriums where the full width of the screen could not be seen, and experienced to the full. ICE needs the audience to be able to take in the

full width in their peripheral vision for it to be effective. But not having to use the largest auditorium is also an advantage in terms of flexibility. And the whole concept is designed to help reinstate the cinema as being a spectacular location again, different from anywhere else. The demonstration included a variety of different content from adverts to trailers to feature film extracts, including “Top Gun: Maverick” and “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness”. Most of the content had the

desired effect, keeping the audience immersed but there were a few scenes that showed that it doesn’t work, aesthetically, for all types of content. Overall, however, it was a success, with the additions of the overhead lighting adding the perfect little extra touch. And it’s another option that can’t be currently reproduced in the home - something that cinemas should always be trying to do. Like ScreenX, 4DX and others, opinions can be split as to whether it is worth experiencing and worth the ticket uplift. This question is - what, exactly, do you want from your cinema trip? But we’re so lucky to have the choice! Whether the format appeals or not will probably also depend on whether you’re able to concentrate on more than one thing at a time, with lots of visual information coming at you from different angles - or whether you prefer one focus. Personally, my brain likes both so I love the ICE experience. CGR has used their long-established knowledge and experience to develop it into an extraordinary PLF alternative.

As a lover of technology and cinema, I’m excited by the ICE team’s work and I look forward to seeing (and experiencing) what they do next.