SPOKANE, Wash. – The Garland Theater in Spokane is offering a special screening of the iconic film “Jaws” to celebrate its 50th anniversary. Film enthusiasts can experience the movie as it was originally intended, on 35mm film.
“Digital to me, just it’s just somebody pressing play. Jaws just fits it. The 50th anniversary,” said Luke Anderson, the 35mm film projectionist at the Garland. “It’s one of the first summer blockbusters of all time. And people just want to see that stuff. They want to see the cool old stuff back on the screen again. It’s going to be an event. It’s actually seven reels.”
Anderson described the physical nature of film, noting, “Each reel has approximately 2000 feet of film on it. It takes 24 individual frames to make one second a film. But film to me is just, you know, it’s the movement, it’s the there’s something actually tangible there in your hands. You’re touching it. It’s moving through the projector. You can see it. It’s not just a file that was played.”
“It was a few miles worth of film that were put together in the right order. It’s just it’s a neat process,” Anderson said. “You know, it was around for over 100 years and over the last 15, it’s gone.”
The screening of “Jaws” is part of a series hosted by the Garland Theater in partnership with Eastern Washington University Film and Digital Media. This series will also feature films like “Back to the Future,” “Creature from the Black Lagoon” in 3D and “Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas.”
For those in the Spokane area, “Jaws” will be screened Saturday at 7:30 p.m. Tickets are $10 and are in low supply.
