IMAX TECHNOLOGY AND THE TOURIST GAZE. Cultural Studies Acland 1998

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IMAXTECHNOLOGY AND
THE TOURIST GAZE
Charles R. Acland
Published online: 09 Nov 2010.
To cite this article: Charles R. Acland (1998) IMAXTECHNOLOGY AND THE

TOURIST GAZE, Cultural Studies, 12:3, 429-445, DOI: 10.1080/095023898335492
To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/095023898335492
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Charles R. Acland
IMAX TECHNOLOGY AND THE

TOURIS T GAZE
A bstract
IM AX grew out of the large and m ultiple screen lm experim ents pro-
duced for Expo ’67 in M ontréal. Since then, it has becom e the m ost suc-
cessful large form at cinem a technology. IM A X is a m ultiple articulation of
technological system , corporate entity and cinem a practice. This ar ticle
show s how IM AX is reintroducing a technologically m ediated form of
‘tourist gaze’, as elaborated by John U rry, into the context of the insti-
tutions of m useum s and them e parks. IM AX is seen as a powerful exem -
plar of the chang ing role of cinem a-going in contem porary post-Fordist
culture, revealing new con gurations of older cultural form s and practices.
In particular, the grow th of this brand of com m ercial cinem a runs parallel
to a blurring of the realm s of social and cultural activity, referred to as a
process of ‘dedifferentiation’. This article gives special attention to the
espistem ological dim ensions of IM AX’s conditions of spectatorship.
K eyw ord s
cinem a; epistem ology; postm oder nism ; technology; tourism ; spectatorship
Te chno log ie s and in stitutional locations of IM A X
O NE OF THE rst things you notice at the star t of an IM A X lm , after the

suspenseful atm osphere created by the muf ed acoustics of the theatre,
and after you sink into one of the steeply sloped seats and becom e aw are of the
im m ense screen so close to you, is the clarity of the im age. A s cinem a-goers, we
are accustom ed to celluloid scratc hes, to dirty or dim projections, and to oddly
ubiquitous focus problem s. The IM A X im age astonishes with its vibrant colours
and ne details. M uc h in the fashion that lm realism always dream ed of its
C ULT U R A L S T U D IE S 1 2 ( 3 ) 1 9 9 8 , 4 2 9 – 4 4 5 © Routledge 1998

430 C U LT U R A L S T U D I E S
possibilities, it is easy to m istake the IM AX screen for a wonderful, varying

w indow on to real and im agined worlds. The Living Sea (G reg M acG illvary, 1994),
an IM A X docum entary about the m ajesty and fragility of the world’s oceans, is
notable less for its eco-friendly m essage than for the schools of m ulticoloured
sh, edited and com posed in constrasting fashion so that their uid m ovem ents
are like w atching a rework display. O ther im ages com pete for the educational
them e of The Living Sea, especially IM AX’s stoc k point of view travelling cam era
shots, here used to y over ocean islands, to sw im through underwater seascapes,
and to participate in a coastguard practice rescue m ission. This is not to suggest
that these powerful im ages are incom patible w ith M eryl Streep’s gentle narra-
tion about the interconnectedness of oceanic life; rather, through the size and
clarity of the im age em erges a kind of postcard environm entalism , in w hich

grand vistas of landscapes and anim al life appear to be literally brought before
you. As the audience learns about ‘the living sea’, they also experience the pleas-
ure of spectatorial centrality, nding that the power of the IM AX gaze is a m astery
over the lm subject.
Paul Virilio (1990) describes IM AX as a form of ‘cataract surgery’ that
essentially grafts its screen upon the eyes of spectators. In his view, IM A X’s total
encom passing of the eld of vision collapses hum an sight into both lm ic and
architectural space; the theatre and the im ages m erge w ith the audience’s senses
such that the only point of orientation left is that provided by the lm . Virilio
indicates that this brings IM AX back in tim e to the or igins of m otion pictures,
back to the fairgrounds of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. The
stunning lm s of IM AX and the special viewing situation reignite the early
exper ience of lm ic realism – the shock of m ovem ent and the sensation of ‘being
there’. But this return, a full century after the Lum ière Brothers and through the
hegem ony of H ollywood realist conventions, has som e striking differences. W hat
does IM AX restructure, and w hat does it offer as a practised space? W hat then
of its form and economy? This article show s how IM AX is reintroducing a
technologically m ediated form of tourist gaze into the context of the institutions
of m useum s and them e parks. W hile focusing upon those two institutions of both
public education and touristic activity, IM A X is also a powerful exem plar of the
changing role of cinem a-going in contem porary post-Fordist culture. In this
respect, the case of IM A X reveals new con gurations of older cultural form s and
practices, and how the conditions of spectatorship are woven into the new
arrangem ent.
IM AX C orporation grew out of the large form at and m ultiple screen lm s
produced for Expo ’67 in M ontréal. G raem e Ferguson, Rober t Ker r and Rom an
Kroiter, encouraged by the success of their experim ents, form ed a private cor-
poration to explore the possibilities of large form at cinem a further. Their strong
ties to the N ational Film Board of Canada m eant that there would be a history
of appropriating personnel, and w ith them , them atic and aesthetic concer ns; this
would be substantial enough for IM AX to be reasonably considered an unof cial
I M A X T E C H N O LO G Y & T O U R IS T GA Z E 431
spawn of the N FB. Fuji com m issioned the rst IM AX lm , Tiger Child (D onald
Brittain, 1970), for its pavilion at Expo ’70 in O saka. The rst per m anent IM A X
theatre, O ntario Place’s C inesphere in Toronto, opened in 1971. Two years later,
IM A X opened its rst IM A X DO M E, or O M N IM A X at the Reuben H. Fleet
Space C enter in San D iego, w ith its larger, cur ved screen and a projector that sits
in the m iddle of the theatre. As of M arch 1994, there were 121 perm anent IM A X
theatres in twenty countries, and a backlog of thirty- ve new theatres awaiting
com pletion. W hile rem aining based in Toronto, a U S investm ent group, W G IM
Acquisition C orporation, purc hased IM AX in 1994.
The IM AX experience is an am algam of a num ber of cinem atic innovations.
W ith the standard IM AX lm , the im age is eight storeys high and thirty m etres
w ide, m aking it approxim ately ten tim es that of a 35m m lm . This is achieved
by taking 70m m lm stock, turning it on its side, and using fteen perforations
(the sprocket holes on the side of the celluloid) to designate each fram e. The
physical dim ensions of the lm necessitated not only the construction of speci c
cam eras and cinem as, but also new ways to project the im age. The lm itself is
so heavy that it could not m ove sm oothly through a projector in a ver tical posi-
tion. Instead, the lm lies horizontally, on a at-bed, w ith the IM AX patented
‘rolling loop’ – a w ave-like action – m oving each fram e through the projector.
This atypical cinem a experience effectively im prints the corporate logo upon
every fram e; unlike conventional cinem a, it is im possible to forget you are watch-
ing IM AX technology.
The IM A X experim ent is incom plete. It is not a stable set of technological
structures in w hich a form of m onum ental docum entary resides. Instead, IM A X
m ust be seen as a m ultiple articulation of technological system , corporate entity
and cinem a practice invested in the notion of expanded cinem a, or w hat Andre
Bazin (1967) called the myth of total cinem a. Bazin’s claim was that an idea about
reducing the distictions between the screen world and the real world fuels lm ’s
drive towards realism . Because the ultim ate confusion between the m ediated and
the unm ediated is still a long way off, he concluded that the cinem a has not yet
been invented, but instead is a sym ptom of that tendency. IM A X, however, takes
us another step towards Bazin’s objective. Barring the various cr itiques of Bazin,
and of realism as the ‘essence’ of m otion pictures, IM AX is unam biguously a lm
technology and form designed to create the experience of being there, or getting
there, for spectators. Its goal is one of sim ulation, of hyper-realism , of produc-
ing im ages so real that they offer an illusion of m aterial presence, and of creating
the sensation of m ovem ent for its spectators. This leads IM A X to continue
technological developm ent to im prove upon the illusion. The conventions of lm
realism , cinem a vérité and continuity editing are never part of the IM AX pro-
m otional m aterial; instead, it refers to the technological innovations in screen
size, lm stock, lm speed, screen cur vature, 3-D and architecture. In the end,
this becom es its ow n best argum ent for investm ent in its technology; only IM A X
lm system s can create IM A X lm realism . 1
The corporation’s revenues com e from four m ain sources: long-term theatre
system leasing, m aintenance agreem ents for the system s, lm production, and
lm distribution. U ntil 1988, m ost of the IM AX theatre system s were sold, w ith
IM A X ow ning and operating but a handful. IM AX, however, found selling the
system s outright left them w ith no control over the quality of the theatre
environm ent, w hich occasionally deteriorated substantially. The possibility of
greater revenue through leasing arrangem ents, coupled with the desire to m ain-
tain a particular ‘fam ily-oriented’ im age for the com pany, led to a shift aw ay from
the sale of their system s. C urrently, leasing and m aintenance agreem ents are the
key source of revenue for IM AX , accounting for over 50 per cent. Put differ-
ently, IM A X is largely in the business of leasing its patented technology for lm
projection. There are over a hundred lm s in the IM A X lm library, though the

com pany has distribution rights to only thirty-nine (in 1994) of them . To date,
the m ost successful lm has been The Dream is Alive (G raem e Ferguson, 1985),
lm ed on a space shuttle, w hich has grossed over $US 100 m illion. IM AX also
generates revenue from the com m issions it receives to produce lm s, for clients
including Lockheed Corporation, the Sm ithsonian Institute, and the G overnm ent
of Canada. The rental of IM AX cam eras and expertise to other lm m akers is
another aspect of their operations.
IM A X’s tight vertical intergration m eans that it is involved in production, or
in bene ting from production through equipm ent rental, receiving com m issions
to produce lm s, distributing lm s, renting and m aintaining the theatre system s,
and even collecting adm issions receipts at the theatres it ow ns. In this light, the
lm s feed the core of the business, w hic h is leasing and m aintaining the techno-
logical infrastructure itself. O r, to use the cur rent language of the lm business,
the software of lm feeds the hardw are of distribution and technological struc-
tures. W ith this focus upon the technological system (indeed, until 1990, the
cor poration w as called IM AX System s), it is not surprising to see the IM AX
cam eras so frequently in the lm s them selves; technological self-re exivity
relates to the very heart of its business.
In as m uch as the system ’s renters represent the principal clients for IM AX,
as opposed to IM AX -goers or lm nanciers, the renters’ conceptions of w hat
kinds of lm s are appropriate play a signi cant role in IM A X lm production. It
follow s that the location of the theatres, and their association w ith other invest-
m ents, activities and practices, is a key determ ining feature for the lm s IM AX
m akes and for the role IM A X plays in contem porary culture. The m ajority of
IM AX theatres are situated at institutional sites; the content of the lm s re ects
this historical relation. In 1994, museum sites accounted for 59 per cent of all
IM AX theatres, them e parks accounted for 18 per cent, 3 per cent were zoos and
aquaria, and the rem aining 20 per cent were com m erical sites and ‘destination
com plexes’, w hich refers to high-concept shopping m alls. For the theatres
sc heduled to open over the next two years, the biggest jum p is in the nal
category, w hich accounts for 29 per cent of the current bac klog. Exam ples of
prom inent locations include the Kennedy Space Center in Florida, the M useum
of Science and Industry in C hicago, the Sm ithsonian’s N ational Air and Space
M useum in Washington, D C, the C anadian M useum of C ivilization in H ull, the
G rand C anyon N ational Park, four theatres at the Futuroscope com plex in
Poitiers, France, The Science M useum in O saka, the Singapore Science C enter,
the Swedish M useum of N atural H istory in Stockholm , and the N ational M useum
of N atural Science in Taichung, Taiwan. 2
G iven IM AX’s historical association w ith m useum s, it is not surprising to see
docum entary and educational lm s predom inate the IM A X lm library. A deal
w ith Capital C ities/ABC to m ake education lm s assures that this direction w ill
continue (N oble, 1994). R ecent m oves towards ction lm , however, coupled
w ith IM A X’s attem pts to bring its business closer to H ollywood, has developed
a strained relationship w ith the m ore traditional institutional locations. Som e
m useum s, including the N atural H istory M useum in N ew York and the A ir and
Space M useum in Washington, refused to show the popular IM AX concert lm
Rolling Stones: ‘At the M ax’ (Julian Tem ple, 1991) because it was seen as inappro-
priate to the m useum ’s m andate. A m ore am bitious m ove into narrative lm , and
3-D, is W ings of Courage (Jean-Jacques Annaud, 1995), about Antoine de St
Exupery and other pilots in 1930s Argentina, starring Val K ilm er, Tom H ulce
and Elizabeth M cG overn. O ther sim ilar developm ents include a deal with Sega
Enterprises to build two m otion sim ulators, or ‘ride- lm s’ (Enchin, 1995c) and
w ith Sony to construct two new IM AX 3-D theatres at Sony’s m ovie theatre
entertainm ent com plexes in San Francisco and Berlin (IM A X C orporation,
1995). This follows Sony’s success w ith IM AX 3-D at its Lincoln Square theatre
com plex in N ew York. As these corporate arrangem ents show, the shift from a
strictly educational em phasis to a m ixed educational and entertainm ent form at
occurs not w ith the production of lm s alone, but w ith the construction of new
theatres situated in different institutional locations. Consequently, this represents
not only a new aesthetic and m arket concern, but also an articulation w ith cul-
tural practices other than those of museum -going. In effect, the experience of
IM A X is becom ing m ore generalized in the culture, and less associated w ith edu-
cation and the m useum speci cally.
Ep istem ology of the p anoram ic view
In his pre-history to the ‘society of the spectacle’, Jonathan Crary argues that
vision becom es a kind of work, subject to a cer tain discipline, during the onset
of m odernity (1990: 18). The problem of the observer, a term that connotes ‘to
com ply with’ better than the related term ‘spectator’,‘is the eld on w hich vision
in history can be said to m aterialize, to becom e itself visible. Vision and its effects
are alw ays inseparable from the possibilities of an obser ving subject w ho is both
the historical product and the site of cer tain practices, techniques, institutions,
and procedures of subjecti cation’ (C rary, 1990: 5). A nne Friedberg (1993) has
com m ented speci cally on m otion pictures’ association w ith zones of cultural
and com m ercial practice, linking the visual experience of cinem a w ith that of
w indow shopping. The result, she argues, has been the form ation of a ‘m obile
virtual gaze’, w here the brow sing of shopping and the varying gaze of cinem a
engender sim ilar social relations. It is suggested by both Crary and Friedberg,
am ong others, that m odes of visuality provide a cer tain access to the world not
only through w hat is seen, but how it is seen in the context of speci c technolo-
gies and institutions. Tec hnologies of visualization are a structured relation
between the hum an senses and know ledge production, fashioned by and operat-
ing w ithin system s of social and institutional relations; they m ake discursive
powers them selves visible, and in this way provide access to historiographic
claim s about w hat it m eant to look w ith m odern eyes. 3
Wolfgang Shivelbusch (1979) describes the reconstruction of city and
country space with the introduction of rail travel in the m id-nineteenth century.
H e argues that rail travel as a new form of m ass m obility also presented a
panoram ic perspective upon the m odernizing world. The view from the train
was one of both access to changing vistas, and a m ovem ent through them , as well
as a detac hed and distant spectatorial relation. The train offers view s of ‘an
evanescent landscape w hose rapid m otion m akes it possible to grasp the w hole,
to get an overview’ (Shivelbusch, 1979: 63). Shivelbusch sees the view from the
train as a new European perspective that is found in other popular form s. For
instance, ‘W hat the opening of m ajor railroads provides in reality – the easy
accessibility of distant places – was attem pted in illusion, in the decades im m edi-
ately preceding that opening, by the “panoram ic” and “dioram ic” show s and
gadgets’ (1979: 64). Though the relation characterized by Shivelbusch is said to
typify the m odern, it also seem s to capture the conventional postm oder n quality
of a collapse between actual travel and the illusion. In this w ay, Baudrillard’s
(1988) com m ent that the panoram ic experience of highway driving is in fact cin-
em atic is better understood as a continuation of long-standing sim ilar relations
between travel and representation.
D raw ing upon the particularities of nineteenth-century bourgeois percep-
tion, IM AX continues to insist upon spectatorial prim acy as a form of know ledge.
It is to our age w hat the Panoram a and D iaram a were to their tim e. 4 The orc hes-
tration of the all-engul ng im age places viewers in a central location as a source
for the unfolding of a know n and organized world; the panoram ic overview is
equally an educational technique to present that vision of the world to an as-yet
uninitiated audience or public. The characteristics of this form of bourgeois per-
ception, then, involve the extention and reproduction of that worldview. For this
reason, the im age of spectatorial centrality is ideologically linked to the rein-
statem ent of certain form s of epistem ological power.
H istorically, the m useum has been one institution built around particular
dom inant epistem ological structures and their arrangem ent for m ass audiences.
As Tony Bennett (1990) has discussed, the core discursive elem ent of the
m useum has been the dem ocratization of know ledge and a desire to m aintain a
x on the form s of know ledge presented. The m oder n m useum m atc hed, and
often m ism atched, a general Enlightenm ent principle of hum an universality w ith
a highly regulated and policed civic space. Codes of public behaviour, including
their sur veillance and discipline, de ned the m useum as m uch as discour ses of
openness and accessibility. This has frequently taken the form of developing and
enforcing a set of practices w hich guide the encounter between m useum visitors
and displays, hence between patrons and the m useum ’s tacit classi catory fram e-
work. A s Bennett (1990: 44–5) puts it,
The purpose, here, is not to know the populace but to allow the people,
addressed as subjects of know ledge rather than as objects of adm inistration,
to know; not to render the populace visible to power but to render power
visible to the people and, at the sam e tim e, to represent to them that power
as their own.
M useum s are very different institutions today, though traces of their earlier nine-
teenth-century form ation are am ply evident, and IM AX is consonant with the
m useum ’s new relations between entertainm ent and education. O n this shifting
stake, Rober t Lum ley observes that one of the central dilem m as of the m oder n
m useum is to determ ine w hether or not ‘m useum s are to have a cultural role as
distinct from that of the them e park’, and if so, how (1988: 18). The panoram ic
view of IM AX is part of the new populism of m useum sites, in their slide towards
the am usem ent park as a m odel and in the developm ent of expectations about
m useum visits. It is part of the m useum ’s shifting stake in the idea of guiding
people tow ards a system atic under standing of the world; it m aintains sim ilar
forces of subjecti cation, yet it erodes traditional ideas about education w ith its
powerful brand of sensory pleasure. In other words, IM A X is m ore than a bit of
ashy bait to get people into a dying institution; it prom otes a discursive relation,
and a speci cally technological one, between a public and its education. And the
very nature of its panoram ic realism , w hich encourages a collapse of the refer-
ent and the reference, reasserts a m odern, disciplined, visual relation and code
of civic behaviour. To adopt the IM AX gaze is to nd oneself rm ly interpellated
into an epistem ological pur view that covers both the museum and new enter-
tainm ent technologies.
IM AX lm s soar. Especially through the sim ulation of m otion, they encour-
age a m om entary joy in being placed in a space shuttle, on a scuba dive, or on
the wing of a ghter jet. For IM AX, ‘being there’ is m ost often thought of in
term s of a sensation of m ovem ent; ironically, it is the induced sensation of travel,
rather than arrival at a location, that prom pts the claim s of hyper-presence. The
m ost conventional w ays to construct this relation in IM AX are through point of
view cam erawork, rapid travelling m ovem ents and the use of dizzying heights.
The shots rem ain steady, for even the slightest tilt or jiggle can be felt in the
stom ac h. Canted cam era shots appear only to create the sensation of turning, at
w hich point the audience invariably tilts as well. It is no surpr ise that ight is a
key subject for IM AX ; they have explored a rem arkable variety of the educational
aspects of ight, from its history to the space shuttle and into ction w ith W ings
of Courage. IM AX also habitually presents aerial photography as a w ay to survey
other subjects, especially landscapes. The centrality of ight has been built into
one of IM A X’s cinem as in Poitiers. The innovation here is that the cinem a has a
transparent oor through w hic h the audience can look at a second screen below
their feet, running in sync w ith the vertical one in front. They have called this
the IM AX M AG IC C ARPET.
W hat happens as the lm s soar over their subject? W here the thrill(!) of air-
sickness is an indication of a successful m ediation between the viewer and the
lm ic m aterial, w hat has IM AX ’s panoram ic overview accom plished? First, it
provides a survey, w hich includes an attem pt to visually apprehend the w hole
world. Benedict A nderson (1991) has rem arked upon the relationship between
census-taking and the form ation of nationhood, w here the collection of popu-
lation data is not just a form of surveillance but also an exercise in asserting the
legitim ate power to construct im ages of a citizenry by centralized, and central-
izing, institutions. Sim ilarly, IM AX ’s m assive screen and travelling cam era
construct an idea of totality, leading to the question,‘W hat m ore could there be?’
This visual and physical exhaustion has correspondences to w hat Foucault (1970)
has pointed out as the m oder n epistem ological project of ‘ordering things’
through ‘les m ots et les choses’.
Second, the panoram ic survey has the result of arranging and squeezing
diverse terrains and distant locations into a central place in the lm , in the IM AX
theatre. Unlike Shivelbusch’s description of rail travel, IM AX offers m ovem ent
w ithout m oving, tourism w ithout travel, and effects a brand of geographical
transform ation akin to that of m ap-m aking. The sequence of im ages puts forward
an argum ent of geog raphic centrality to the spectator; the order, and the sensory
experience of that order, releases a foundational myth of tourism and m useum s
alike – that of the encounter w ith distant lives and places, but alw ays through a
set of ordering and structuring principles. In the end, IM A X sim ilarly writes a
geographical relation in w hich distance does not m atter and in w hich the organiz-
ation of sites is always possible in and through its technological system . This geo-
graphical transform ation through representation is inextricably linked to the
m useum ’s collapse into them e park m arkets and strategies. I suggest, as w ill be
developed in what follow s, that the discursive m atrix of IM AX represents a new
generalizability to the tourist gaze and its associated cultural practices.
IM A X and touristic anticipation
The G rand Canyon Tourist Center boasts an IM AX theatre w hic h presents Grand
Canyon: The H idden Secrets (Keith M errill, 1984) thirteen tim es a day in the
sum m er, and nine tim es a day in the w inter. The prom otional brochure explains
that the seventy-foot high screen and the six-trac k sound allow visitors to ‘dis-
cover in only 34 m inutes a G rand Canyon that would take a lifetim e to experi-
ence’. The two photographs on the brochure provide an interesting contrast.
O ne is an im age of the tourist inform ation centre and its parking lot. The other
is a still from the IM AX lm , denoted by the sprocket holes added along the top
and bottom of the im age, w ith a photograph of rapids literally spilling out of the
fram e. Nothing designates the location of the tour ist centre in the im age; it is
generic and could be at virtually any tourist attraction. By contrast, the broc hure
presents the G rand C anyon as it exists on IM AX. The lm begins w ith A nasazi
culture, then m oves on to conquistador D e Cardena’s 1540 im pressions, and
nally to John Wesley Powell’s 1869 explorations. This sim ple narrativization of
historical events is fam iliar to the IM AX screen; beyond the breathtaking im ages
of the natural wonder in the docum entary is a colonialist and orientalist story of
discovery and rst encounters w ith strange, native cultures. A nd to round out
the introduction to the fam ous national park, the visitors’ centre offers ‘native
am ericans in traditional dress on staff ’ and a Taco Bell restaurant.
IM AX is multiply positioned in discourses of tourism . First, as an unusual
cinem a experience, it is itself a tourist attraction, one that often requires a cer tain
am ount of travel and ‘departure’ to encounter. For instance, as of M arch 1994
there was only one IM AX cinem a in the UK , one in Indonesia, three in Australia,
and none in Canada east of M ontréal. U nlike the relative proxim ity of con-
ventional cinem a-going, IM A X rem ains an extraordinary form associated w ith a
special trip. Second, as noted above, the cinem as are often found at w hat could
be broadly described as tourist sites such as museum s and am usem ent parks. In
this respect, IM A X is part of an overall tourist outing, playing a role in the
journey as one elem ent in a day’s activities, as opposed to the destination per se.
O ne does not plan a vacation around the G rand Canyon IM AX ; one goes to the
G rand Canyon, w here the IM AX is one of the m any tourist-related experiences
available to sam ple. Third, IM AX typically offers view s to other locations and
attractions. Its cinem a of ‘transportation’ prom ises a form of virtual tour ism , and
invites an understanding of distant locations. For instance, IM A X strategically
placed at a tourist attraction m ight use them atically appropriate lm s, as is the
case w ith the G rand Canyon IM AX offering year-round screenings of IM AX ’s
Grand Canyon. Indeed, as a potential rst stop for the visitor, the lm presents an
ideal encounter w ith the natural wonder. The swooping cam eras, the high per-
spective surveying the vastness of the canyon, the clear and powerful m usical
score, create an awe-inspiring sensation that m ay contribute to and com pete w ith
the site itself. O f course, the lm ’s dram a of discovery and colonization lives with
the tourist as a w ay of narrativizing the visit and one’s im pressions. As John U rry
points out, a key aspect of tourism is the construction of anticipation of the
experience, and further, ‘Photographic im ages organize our anticipation or day-
dream ing about the places we m ight gaze upon’ (1990: 140). H ere, IM AX ’s m ode
of representation helps form the potential encounter, in effect establishing or
prim ing w hat U rry calls the system atized and socially constructed gaze of the
tourist. In short, IM A X’s stake in the tourist gaze is that it constructs a tourist
attraction as a view to tour ism itself.
Turning to D aniel Boorstein (1964), and even Jean Baudrillard (1983), one
would conclude that sites like the G rand C anyon IM AX are typical pseudo-events
– or, in this case, what m ight be called pseudo-visits – w hich feed a need for safe
inauthenticity. In effect, in this view, IM AX helps to insulate tourists from the

(un)realities of their world. Instead, I would suggest that IM AX coincides with
w hat U rry (1990) elaborates as the ‘post-tour ist’ w ho revels in and seeks out the
inauthenticity of such pseudo-visits, contrary to w hat Boorstein characterizes as
a retreat. Even m ore com pelling is D ean M acCannell (1976), w ho em phasizes
the tour istic occasion as a form of quest for authenticity, in w hich rei ed social
relations are enacted and reinforced. In this view, the ‘real’ of IM AX as a tourist
site is not the lm ic m aterial, not the im ages of the G rand Canyon, but the rapid
tour ‘backstage’ after the lm to see the m echanics of projection and, m ost
im pressively, the absence of m ore than an attendant or two to operate the auto-
m ated system .
It is my view, however, that the G rand Canyon IM A X is not about the fake
or the inauthentic, but that, like the nineteenth-century train, it is one touristic
activity that m ediates and structures the entire visit. Trips to the G rand C anyon
are still m ade, but they are m ade w ith the assistance of other institutions that
guide the encounter. For this reason, IM AX is best understood as an exam ple of
w hat Urry (1990) describes as a shift tow ards post-Fordist form s of tourist prac-
tices and econom ies. This develops in the context of form s of exible special-
ization, of international nance, and of new econom ic relations am ong national
m arkets. The tourist industry has been dem ocratized in cer tain ways throughout
the twentieth century; its em phasis upon ser vice products, its construction of the
‘ ight’ from the work week and its privileged encounter w ith other ness, w ith
the exotic, m ake it a key player in the postindustrial economy. Further, tourism ’s
current tendency to expand into virtually any realm of social life, through an
alchem ic process by w hich every place and event has the potential, w ith the right
developm ent, prom otion and m erchandizing, to be transform ed into a cash cow
tourist attraction, only heightens its per vasiveness.
The tourist gaze m arks an access point to the form ation of know ledge about
other ness. It ‘presupposes a system of social activities and signs which locate the
particular tourist practices, not in term s of som e intrinsic characteristics, but
through the contrasts im plied w ith non-tourist social practices, particularly those
based w ithin the hom e and paid work’ (U rry, 1990: 2). Tourism refers to a form
of visitation and encounter w ith the unfam iliar; it is a departure from the every-
day, in term s of both space (physical m ovem ent to other locations) and tim e
(designated travel or tourist tim es like weekends, annual vacations and holidays).
The ‘tour’ suggests a circuit which both guides one away, instructs about the
journey, and leads one back.
W hat then of tourism in the context of changing relations of distance, space
and tim e? W hat of tourism w ithout travel, as offered by IM A X? In other words,
if the very notion of ‘depar ture’ no longer refers to the sam e set of practices and
experiences, then we m ust think about the very concepts of tour ism . David
H ar vey (1990), like other postm oder n cr itics, rem inds us that the experience of
geography is prim arily a form of sim ulacrum in which the world can gure in its
entirety. Potential tourists can anticipate virtually anywhere, w hich suggests that
the postm odern condition is not only one of geographic collapse that provides a
sense of proxim ity to the globe, but that there is a relation of access to it, either
through im ages or actual visitation. W hile som e im ply that the distinction
between travel and im ages of travel is being eroded as post-tourism becom es the
norm , the existence of each rem ains, given an unequal distribution of w ho has
the resources to m ove between the realm of a m ediated representational
encounter to actual travel, from the pseudo-visit to the visit. Janet Wolff (1985)
and M eaghan M orris (1988) have both addressed the especially m asculinist access
to travel, as well as theory’s rom antic privileging of nom adic life over dom estic
space, which once again constructs a crude negatively valued fem inine sphere
against the ‘freedom ’ of m ale wanderings. To extend this argum ent, the power
to m ove throughout the globe, as structured by the m ateriality of class, race and
gender, additionally appears in and is constructed by representational form s. A
sim ple point, perhaps, but one worth em phasizing: w hile there are m aterial
structures guiding touristic practices, those structures are also em bricated in dis-
courses of tour ism . O ne essential elem ent that both virtual and actual touristic
form s share is that they are irreducibly lodged in the tourist gaze, one that
through its im agined apprehension of the globe per tains to both the construc-
tion of anticipation (i.e. know ledge) and availability (i.e. dom ination).
IM AX echoes other touristic pleasures and representational form s w hich,
broadly de ned, could range from roller-coasters to virtual reality. H ence, sight-
seeing, travel w riting (Burke, 1978; Said, 1978) and even localized resorts, such
as Blackpool (see Bennett, 1983; Thom pson, 1983), are all im portant precursors
to the cultural form s that are currently developing around the m ediation of
IM A X’s travel cinem a. In the history of sightseeing, Judith Adler suggests that
the conventions of travel w riting were part of a project to ‘survey all of creation’
(1989: 24). IM AX coincides w ith that articulation of the grand epistem ological
project of the Enlightenm ent, and its related colonialist im pulse, in the context
of collapsing spheres of tourism , m useum s and them e parks.
U rry concludes that ‘contem porary societies are developing less on the basis
of sur veillance and the nor m alisation of individuals, and m ore on the basis of the
dem ocratisation of the tourist gaze and the spectacle-isation of place’ (1990:
156). It is dif cult to rank the two, and certainly Urry seem s to underem phasize
the saturation of surveillance in contem porary life. But he is right to rem ind us
that the tourist gaze is no longer a specialized relation; rather, that it is a m odel
for cultural relations for a broad spectrum of social activity. As the industries of
the global m ovem ent of bodies and im ages expand, som e continue to celebrate
a dem ocratization of tourism ; I want to em phasize instead a distribution and rein-
vestm ent of the forces of orientalism and colonization.
Transnatio nal culture and th e destination co m p lex

IM AX is one historical extension of C anadian cinem a, bringing together the

strong docum entary and experim ental lm traditions, em erging from a m ix of
public and private cultural funding, and continuing a tradition of national cinem a
w hich has its sights set on international m arkets. 5 A rguably the m ost successful
Canadian cinem a practice, and certainly the m ost am bitious in its developm ent
of speci cally designed elem ents for every stage of production, distribution and
exhibition, IM AX also took the next logical step, one that m akes it an even better
exem plar of the state of national cinem as in the context of international cinem a
m arkets: it w as bought by a consortium of U S investors. W hat at one tim e m ay
have been a paradox is no m ore; today, it is axiom atic that the forces w hich
elevate a culture industry w ill tend towards its increasing distance from the
national dom ain. Success invariably refers to the disper sal of a corporation into
the ether of international nance. In its place are the supposedly obvious pro-
posals of corporate location, as in IM AX ’s ‘Toronto-based’ operations. This takes
for granted a culture industry logic that the m aintenance of local jobs is all that
is at stake in questions of national culture. Ultim ately, there is no long-term
reason for a business to be in any one location, w hic h m eans that all those forces
prom oting the international com petitiveness of C anadian culture industries m ay
in fact nally succeed in m aking them so m obile that they depart from the scene
altogether. In this context, transnational ow nership tries to present itself as a
phantom itch – you feel it but it’s not really there, supposedly. Few are fooled by
this, which is one reason w hy a city or province’s ability to attract international
business has becom e a contem porary political obsession in Canada.
This is not to say that I think IM AX headquarters w ill leave Toronto at any
tim e in the near future, and in this way sever the last of its historical ties to C an-
adian cinem a practice. H owever, in a world of the increasing m obility of capital,
the very possibility of departure plays to a grander necessity for city, provincial
and federal governm ents to m ake their hom e a com fortable one for potentially
transient business endeavours. As the m any theorists of postindustrial capitalism
point out, the relationship between local investm ent and transnational ow of
capital lead to an ever tenuous expectation about the future econom ic strength
of a region. W hen this involves a culture industry, the very texture of com munity
life, w hether at a city or national level, is worn away, sending ripples of deterio-
ration far beyond those of em ployees and investors; it sends them on into the
heart of civic and intellectual existence.
But even w ith the ever m ore abstracted nature of industry, cultural life still
touches ground and m aterializes in particular locations. For IM A X, it is the
theatre itself. As a budding transnational cultural player, IM AX is equally an
em blem of a cer tain tendency in U S lm . In the context of the decreasing irrel-
evance of dom estic box-of ce receipts as a m easure of the success of a H olly-
wood lm , the industry as a w hole has been reshaping itself to deal w ith new
form s of distribution and new entertainm ent tie-ins. Consequently, new cultural
practices are developing around m otion pictures, particularly through its con-
nections to other activities and sites, thus transform ing cinem a-going.
In 1994, a U S investor group, W G IM A cquisition C orporation, purchased
IM A X. 6 This m ove also involved a m erger w ith Trum bull C om pany Incorpor-
ated (T CI), founded by H ollywood director and special effects wizard D ouglas
Trum bull. Already fam ous for work on lm s such as 2001: A Space Odyssey
(Stanley Kubrick, 1968) and Blade Runner (Ridley Scott, 1982), he participated
in earlier IM AX projects, m ost signi cantly Back to the Future . . .The Ride in 1990
at U niversal Studios, Florida. As a w holly ow ned subsidiary of IM AX, TCI
becam e IM AX RID EFILM , w ith Trum bull rem aining as Chair and CEO, as well
as occupying a m ore central position as a Vice-Chair of IM AX .
Som e of the salient attributes of IM AX for investors and for corporate strat-
egy include: a backlog of theatres to be built over the next few years (thirty- ve
in 1995), w hose system s leasing is the prim e revenue generator; lm s w ith a
long-term running potential, hence an extrem ely valuable lm library (of w hich
IM AX has distribution rights to about 40 per cent); short lm s, m eaning m ore
show s per day, and therefore a high audience turnover rate; and the uniqueness
of the IM AX experience, allowing adm ission prices to be set above those for tra-
ditional cinem a (considering the shorter length of the lm s). According to
investors’ logic, changes in consum er activity provide contextual details w hich
support IM A X’s potential. These include: a stabilization in attendance at tra-
ditional cinem as that has coincided with an increase in them e park attendance;
the grow th of in-hom e entertainm ent technologies (VC Rs, satellite delivery,
cable services, etc.) that have led consum ers to look for a variety of out-of-hom e
products that provide a distinct experience; and an overall increase in the am ount
spent on leisure activities.
The IM A X ‘ ight’ exper ience, and its m erging of both am usem ent parks and
m useum s, com plem ents rather than com petes with in-hom e entertainm ent
spending. Further, the em phasis upon developing new technological form s (e.g.
3-D) w ill continue to ensure that IM AX rem ains in a m arket w ith few com peti-
tors. This suggests that the overall incentive is to provide short ride- lm experi-
ences, w hich generates revenue (1) by introducing a new audience every ten
m inutes or so, (2) by charging a relatively high adm ission price (say U S$5) for
each ride, (3) by being able to offer a longer day (m ore show ings in the m orning
and through the evening) than traditional theatrical exhibition, and (4) through
the longevity of the individual ride- lm . O n this last point, the U niversal Studios’
Back to the Future . . .The Ride IM AX is already eight years old and show s no sign
of slow ing dow n as an audience draw. IM AX has already opened a m otion sim u-
lator in Lincolnshire, and plans to install others in m ultiplex cinem as in the U S,
in addition to its Sega deal (E nchin, 1995a).
Always key to IM AX is the location of the theatre and its integration w ith
other activities and practices, especially tourism and the m useum and now, m ore
recently, shopping. The sharp jum p in the installation of screens at com m ercial
sites includes a contract to build ve theatres w ith Ham m ons Entertainm ent, the
biggest single deal in the corporation’s history (Enc hin, 1995b), and the Sony
Theatre in N ew York, a twelve-screen site w ith an IM AX 3-D theatre, described
as a theatrical exhibition ‘them e-plex’ (Evans, 1994).
D e-differentiation is a convenient term to describe the blurring of realm s of
social and cultural activity. W hat m ay have been m ore conventionally delim ited
spaces of public and private life are less identi able. U rry refers to the post-
m odern collapse of the high/low culture dichotomy and of spheres of social
activity including ‘tourism , art, education, photography, television, m usic, sport,
shopping and architecture’ (1990: 82). In the present context, the distinctions
between the m useum and the am usem ent park, between institutions of public
education and public entertainm ent, between shopping and tourism , and their
associated m odes of presentation, are increasingly m uddied.
The last collapse is evident in the creation and grow th of ‘destination com -
plexes’ w hich on the surface appear to be upscale, high-concept shopping m alls.
Even an article on the front page of the N ew York Tim es announced, ‘A m er ica’s
hot tourist spot: the m all outlet’ (M cD owell, 1996). A s sites for public life akin
to the m arketplace and the tow n square, these are locations for the exchange of
ideas as well as m oney. D estination com plexes have also been involved in
attem pts to revitalize urban spaces previously devoid of econom ic activity. A des-
tination com plex is w here people go to experience som ething beyond the chores
of shopping. It is a shopping them e park; an environm ent that offers a unique or
special shopping exper ience is offered, and a place that presents an idea of exclu-
sivity to an everyday activity. In this way, destination com plexes are the antithesis
of w arehouse-style shopping, w here the attraction is built around an idea of the
stripped down functional form of buying as m uc h as possible for as little as poss-
ible. And the presence of an IM AX theatre, w ith its related assem blage of edu-
cational, entertainm ent and touristic discourses, ensures the form ation of a m all
into a destination com plex. Though the tourist gaze is dependent upon its ‘depar-
ture’ from the everyday, de-differentiation, especially at the site of the destina-
tion com plex, subsum es this gaze into this recon guration of ‘ordinary’ social
activity.
These observations m atc hing IM AX ’s operations with sociocultural trends

suggest that IM A X is being seen as one im age of future cinem a-going; m ore
speci cally, the im plications point to an agreed-upon notion of ‘upscale’ cinem as
and its relation to special com m ercial sites. W hile there are m any other interpre-
tations of these shifts, it is im portant to take seriously w hat is salient to those in
a position to put their assum ptions into effect. W ith an agreed upon future for
both cinem a and IM A X operating in investm ent circles, one can reasonably
expect it will have direct consequences in corporate decision m aking, thus affect-
ing the organization of the sites for leisure. And sure enough, the ride- lm and
the developm ent at com m ercial sites are becom ing a focus for IM A X’s place in
the c hanging environm ent of cinem a-going. In short, IM AX is one sym ptom of
a general shift in leisure as well as a m ore speci c reconstitution of the cultural

practice of cinem a-going.
The conservative horror often expressed about de-differentiation betrays an
elitist notion of guarding the best of culture as well as a general disdain for
popular pleasure. N one the less, it is worth considering w hat is being lost as well
as w hat is being enabled by the shifts in cultural form s and practices I have
identi ed here. The sliding tourist gaze is one form of popular interpellation,
hence of subjectivity, w hich is becom ing increasingly pervasive. By naturalizing
coinciding shifts in technological and social relations. IM A X is a com plex m ani-
festation of late capitalist form s of perception and knowledge.
N otes
1 For additional discussion of IM A X technology and lm realism , see Wollen

(1993). B elton (1992) offers a broader analysis of the history of projection
context.
2 W ith m useum sites as the m ainstay of IM AX ’s m arket, it is worth noting the
extent to w hic h these institutional locations are frequently central to their
various national contexts, suggesting that there is som ething about IM AX ’s
m am m oth representational for m that ts neatly w ith m andates to prom ote a
centralized national discourse. W hile it w as initially prom inent in C anadian
technological nationalism , the IM AX system is rem arkably m obile and can
easily t w ith other, or any, national endeavour or location. For exam ple, at
Expo ’92 in Seville, Spain, IM AX w as the centrepiece of the C anadian, Japan-
ese and French pavilions.
3 C harney and Sc hw ar tz (1995) offer several investigations that expand on the
relationship between cinem a and m odernity.
4 For exam ple, the C ycloram a in Ste-Anne-de Beaupré, Q uébec, established in
the late nineteenth century, still offers a circular tour of the C ruci xion of
C hrist. In its day, it w as the largest single canvas painting in the world.
5 M y articles (Acland, 1995, 1997) elaborate on these obser vations.
6 Two investm ent analysis repor ts prepared for the new IM AX C orporation, by
D onaldson, Lufkin and Jenrette (1994) and by Goldm an Sachs (1994) are the
sources for m uc h of the inform ation concerning IM AX ’s future econom ic
developm ent that follow s.
R efe rences
Acland, C harles R. (1995) ‘Shadow s on the landscape: notes tow ard an anatomy of
IM AX ’, Point of View , 27: 8 ff.
— — (1997) ‘IM AX in C anadian cinem a: geographic transform ation and discourses
of nationhood’, Studies in Cultures, Organizations and Societies, 3: 289–305.

Adler, Judith (1989) ‘O rigins of sightseeing’, Annals of Tourism Research , 16: 7–29.
Anderson, Benedict (1991) Imagined Communities (revised edn), N ew York: Verso.
Baudrillard, Jean (1983) Sim ulations, trans. Paul Foss, Paul Patton and Philip B eitch-
m an, N ew York: Sem iotext(e).
— — (1988) America , trans. C hris Turner, N ew York: Verso.
Bazin, Andre (1967) What is Cinem a ? trans. H ugh G ray, Berkeley: U niversity of C ali-
fornia.
Belton, John (1992) Widescreen Cinema , C am bridge, M A: H ar vard U niversity Press.
Bennett, Tony (1983) ‘A thousand and one troubles: Blac kpool Pleasure Beach’, in
Formations of Pleasure , Boston, M A: R outledge: 138–155.
— — (1990) ‘T he political rationality of the m useum ’, Continuum , 3(1): 35–55.
B oorstein, D aniel (1964) The Image: A Guide to Pseudo-Events in America , N ew York:
H arper.
B urke, Peter (1978) Popular Culture in Early Modern Europe , N ew York: H arper & R ow.
C harney, Leo and Sc hw artz, Vanessa R. (eds) (1995) Cinem a and the Invention of
M odern Life , Berkeley: U niversity of C alifornia Press.
C rary, Jonathan (1990) Techniques of the Observer: On Vision and Modernity in the Nine-
teenth Century , C am bridge, M A: M IT Press.
D onaldson, Lufkin and Jenrette (1994) ‘IM AX C orporation: com pany analysis’,
unpublished m anuscript, N ew York.
Enchin, H arvey (1995a) ‘IM AX says ABC deal w ill survive’, Globe and Mail , 2
August: B8.
— — (1995b) ‘IM AX lands U.S. order for ve giant-screen theatres’, Globe and M ail ,
7 July: B2.
— — (1995c) ‘IM AX , Sega to team up at two Japanese them e parks’, Globe and M ail ,
16 February: B7.
E vans, G reg (1994) ‘Sony’s N.Y. “them e-plex” stirs exhibs’ interest’, Variety , 12–18
D ecem ber: 9ff.
Foucault, M ichel (1970) The Order of Things: An Archaeology of the Human Sciences , N ew
York: Random H ouse.
Friedberg, Anne (1993) W indow Shopping: Cinema and the Postmodern , Berkeley: U ni-
versity of C alifornia Press.
G oldm an Sachs (1994) ‘IM AX C orporation’, U npublished m anuscript, N ew York.

H ar vey, D avid (1990) the Condition of Postmodernity , C am bridge, M A: Blackwell.
IM AX C orporation (1995) ‘Sony and IM AX expand relationship’, Press release, 6
M arch.
Lum ley, Robert (1988) The M useum Time M achine , N ew York: Routledge.
M acC annell, D ean (1976) The Tourist: A New Theory of the Leisure Class, N ew York:
Schocken.
M cD owell, E dw in (1996) ‘Am erica’s hot tourist spot: the outlet m all’, The New York
Times , 26 M ay: 1 ff.
M orris, M eaghan (1988) ‘At H enry Parkes M otel’, Cultural Studies , 2(1): 1–47.
N oble, K im berley (1994) ‘IM AX team s up w ith giant’, Globe and M ail , 1 N ovem ber:
B 19.
Said, E dw ard (1978) Orientalism , N ew York: Vintage.
Schivelbusch, Wolfgang (1979) The Railway Journey: Trains and Travel in the 19th
Century , trans. Anselm H ollo, N ew York: U rizen.
Thom pson, G raham e (1983) ‘C arnival and the calculable: consum ption and play at
B lac kpool’, in Formations of Pleasure , Boston, M A: Routledge: 124–37.
U rry, John (1990) The Tourist Gaze: Leisure and Travel in Contem porary Societies,
N ew bury Park, C A: Sage.
Virilio, Paul (1990) ‘C ataract surgery: cinem a in the year 2000’, trans. A nnie Fatet
and Annette Kuhn, in A nnette Kuhn (ed.) Alien Zone: Cultural Theory and Con-
temporary Science Fiction Cinema , N ew York: Verso: 169–74.
Wolff, Janet (1985) ‘T he invisible Flaneuse : wom en and the literature of m odernity’,
Theory, Culture and Society , 2(3): 37–46.
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London: British Film Institute Publishing: 10–30.

IMAX TECHNOLOGY AND THE TOURIST GAZE. Cultural Studies Acland 1998

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