Today's Column: KDaMn!

Wrote another column for MovieScene, and here it is:

http://www.moviescene.nl/p/158665/column_kdamn

This particular column was written out of sheer frustration over the topic in question. I won't mention the specifics on when and where I experienced problems with current digital cinema projection, but I can tell you there were a few times over the last months I could scream out of utter vexation because the darn KDMs, or Key Delivery Messages (as you'll have learned from reading the actual piece, eh?), proved absent at the exact time they were needed. No KDM, no movie to project. Try explaining that to an eager audience of children who were all set for a fun viewing experience on a rainy sunday afternoon. Or better yet, try explaining it to their understandably ticked-off parents. Fortunately for me, I didn't have to explain it on these particular occasions, as others took the blow (do I feel for them!). But it sure wouldn't be the first time an absent KDM made it impossible to do my job. I remember the trauma of planning a nice special event involving a movie about a popular musical foursome from the Sixties and watching the whole arrangement nearly going awry at the moment of truth because I couldn't get the movie to play since no key was uploaded to the server. Thankfully, I had a back-up copy of the film at that time, but it could just as easily have proven a total failure, in front of a sold-out room no less. Not to mention the disastrous preview screening of On Stranger Tides, mentioned in this column, which had a less agreeable outcome...

I understand a KDM serves a definite function that is of benefit to both distributors and exhibitors, protecting both their services and products from plagiarism (or downright theft). So we shouldn't want to do without KDMs. But greater care must be taken to ensure all goes well in relaying KDMs, correctly encoded and promptly delivered, to cinemas. Of course, operators also need to be better trained in recognizing the problem when it occurs, so they can take swift action (when handled immediately, a screening can still be saved, but it takes time and patience, which often both projectionists and audiences have little off), but it's too easy and incorrect to lay the blame solely on their end of the problem. I refuse to believe my particular venues are the only ones encountering these issues which are simply bad for business and for the emotional health of those theater employees involved. I should know, I've seen things go south on multiple occasions in multiple locations. And it always hurts, even though I'm not at fault.

Incidentally, 700th post on this my blog! So to close things on a happier note, I saw The Woman in Black: Angel of Death today (review coming soon: no, really!), and here's a funny meme from the first film (the second as of yet doesn't really warrant funny memes):