Mainframe travels with IMAX

Vancouver, Canada-based Mainframe Entertainment will produce two feature-length, stereoscopic, 3D computer-animated films for IMAX large-format cinemas. The announcement comes exactly two years after the two companies announced a production deal [AF 8/21/96] to produce two 3D CG-animated ride-films based on Mainframe’s TV series, “ReBoot.” The first one, “ReBoot, the Ride” opened in IMAX ride theaters last year and the second, “Journey Into Chaos” will open next month. In the new deal, the first film to be produced will be “Gulliver’s Travels,” based on the story by Jonathan Swift and scheduled for release in 2000. The 15/70 format film will feature an eight-story-high Gulliver in the story’s Lilliputian world of the early 1700s. Mainframe’s Ian Pearson and production designer Brendan McCarthy are adapting the story. “The fantastic nature of ‘Gulliver’s Travels’ makes it a perfect choice for an IMAX 3D presentation,” said Mainframe CEO and vice chairman Christopher Brough, “No other company has ever produced a film like this.” The second feature in this deal has yet to be determined.