The gargantuan dinosaur in Jurassic Park, as tall as the giant screen itself, leaps into view, and the audience members cringe in terror.

But when the big theater shrinks down to a little one, and the little theater gives way to the channel zapper lying on the coffee table, does that man-eating tyrannosaurus rex still make viewers' palms sweat and their scalps go numb? Or does it actually look more like Totoro, the cute little cartoon character?

Eighteen-year-old Shu-chen is a Hollywood movie freak. When she and her classmates go watch a film, they mostly like to watch it at the Ambassador theater in Taipei's West Gate district, because the screen is big.

When she hears that the Ambassador, which can seat 1700 viewers, is going to follow fashion and change into a venue with multiple small theaters, she says with an air of disappointment, "Then what's the difference from watching TV?"

Small group activity

The Italian film Cinema Paradiso, which won the 1989 Oscar for best foreign film, traces the life of a little boy who grew up "goofing off" at the movies, where he formed a close friendship with the theater's old projectionist. Celluloid and the silver screen are his childhood memories. After he has left home for many years, he goes back to discover that the only entertainment venue in the little town has been turned into a parking lot.

The evolution of movie theaters seems to be a phenomenon happening all over the world. But don't be alarmed--cinemas are not going to go extinct.

"The big screen can never be replaced," avers Wolf Chen, assistant vice president of marketing at the film distributor ERA International. Will television take the place of movies? We can answer that question with a few cases from history. When TV became commonplace, some people believed that radio was doomed. When video tapes arrived on the scene, some said the movie theater would disappear. Of course, neither of these predictions came true.

"Viewers who care about sound and lighting will still go to theaters," asserts Eric Shih, marketing manager for Warner Bros. Taiwan. "Every city will have one or two big cinemas to cater to this kind of viewer." Even though the Ambassador, the leading theater specializing in Hollywood productions, has been restructured, it will still retain one theater with a viewing capacity of 1000.

"Multi-cinema theater houses are the trend of the future. Big theaters are only a promotional gimmick, the attraction of a huge screen," says Robert Chen, associate professor of communication arts at Fujen Catholic University. During the 100-year development of the movie, it has evolved from an art form into a small-group social activity. It is easy to comprehend why empty echoes are often heard in the larger cinemas.

Chen believes that in the future viewing films will become a kind of "cultural rite." It will not necessarily be an activity of the elite, but rather a matter of "a select audience going to a select location to enjoy a special occasion."

"Theaters serve a function in society. In Taiwan, they are venues for social interaction among students and other youths. In Hong Kong, on the other hand, they are a blue-collar entertainment for workers after they clock out," says film critic Peggy Chiao. People can't stay at home forever. In both Taiwan and Hong Kong, going to movies has a very strong commercial appeal.

A pastime for the rich?

ERA's Wolf Chen notes as an example that the American movie Sister Act starring black comedienne Whoopie Goldberg is not actually in itself a quality film. A female singer goes into hiding to escape the mob and is secreted away in a monastery in the disguise of a nun. A stern and staid choir comes under her tutelage, and their songs of praise become dancing and shouting.

As Wolf Chen sees it, this comedy with lots of laughs and songs has resonance when viewed in a big theater. It offers the "contagious power" of shared humor.

Why then has watching movies, a consumer activity with significance in terms of social interaction, become a small group activity?

Media reports indicate that the principal reason film viewers' numbers have been decreasing is the high cost of admission. Three years ago, ticket prices soared throughout the market, and an uproar ensued. One film aficionado points out that for a single movie, an adult ticket cost NT$220. Factor in transportation and a bit to eat and drink--you couldn't go out the front door without spending NT$500. How could that compare to watching a video tape at home?

The last three years are proof that the higher prices have not been supported by consumers. Viewers began to watch their VCRs or cable TV, or to go to second-run movie houses. In the face of diminishing audiences, theater proprietors finally dropped their ticket prices. The box office price at one theater specializing in art films fell to NT$150.

Some people just can't afford to see a movie. Others feel the high price isn't worth the amount of enjoyment they get, and they view entering a cinema as a frightful experience. One lover of cinema commented that before a number of West Gate district theaters were renovated, his girlfriend was unwilling to set foot inside them, because "the carpet felt sticky when you walked on it, and the backs of the chairs were filthy."

Living a life of torment?

Watching a movie is not necessarily paying to be punished. Nonetheless, this prosperous era can certainly be inauspicious for operating a movie theater. The late film critic Wu Cheng-huan once wrote that in the 1950s and 60s, when television was still not commonplace, cinemas were built in the busiest section of town.

"In the old days, theaters only had ceiling fans; there was no air conditioning. The seats were mostly hard, stiff benches. Billowing through the blackness were endless wisps of white smoke. The theater was full of all kinds of strange odors--tobacco, sweat, urine and the acrid stench of edibles of every description. In this tight space with its weird smells, above the film's dialogue and music could often be heard the crying of babies, the shouts of parents scolding their children, frightened kids lost in the dark crying for help." Wu Cheng-huan remarked that when entrancing films such as Liang Shan-po and Chu Ying-tai or Waterloo Bridge were shown, the movie theater would be packed to capacity. Not only were the two outside aisles jammed with people, even the center aisle was filled with seated viewers.

In those days, because of poverty, there were virtually no other options for entertainment besides watching a motion picture. "There were no choices, so there was nothing to compare to. With no comparisons, no distinctions were made as to quality," he says. By the standards of today, the movie theaters of the past were distasteful to the point of being unbearable, but they were the only form of entertainment for the masses. Of course, this does not imply that viewers were unaware that the theaters were as raucous as a street market; it is only that with no alternatives to compare to, they could only regard the conditions as an irremediable reality, and learn to live with them.

A different feeling

Compared with the situation of former years, the condition of today's movie houses is already vastly improved. The growth of people's income has given birth to a greater number of possibilities. Nevertheless, intelligent consumers and those truly infatuated with film want even more.

Peggy Chiao remembers when she was studying in the USA, one time she saw moviegoers standing in a line that wound around two or three times. She was very curious exactly what film could attract so many people. She also queued up and went in for a look. It turned out to be Star Wars.

The sound of interstellar spacecraft whizzing in stereo through the galaxy was truly thrilling. She felt it was the most enjoyable movie of that era. When she returned to Taiwan, she passed the word about this movie along to all her friends.

"It's a pity that during the seventies, you couldn't hear the effects of surround sound in Taiwan's movie houses," says Chiao. Today, every theater has Dolby sound, but surround sound involves more than just installing a set of machines. The walls must be made of special materials, and technicians must also calibrate the sound to achieve the proper effect.

As VCRs and laser disc players became commonplace, such factors as the expenditure of travel time changed the public spectacle of movie watching into a domestic activity. And the object to be stared at became a tiny box.

The special production techniques of some movies are confined by the television monitor, which does not extend beyond the center of our field of vision.

Yao Ching-kang, assistant general manager of Unique Entertainment Company, which runs a cable TV movie channel, notes that viewers don't have enough patience to watch slow-paced art films through to the end and will quickly change stations. Action films, farces and murder thrillers present a lot of fast, broadly choreographed motion. These are more suited for a small monitor. Romances should be like the Hong Kong film Endless Love, with a plot that oscillates from high point to low; otherwise, it will put them to sleep.

Since the television, now an essential appliance in every household, entered our homes several decades ago, it has changed our movie-viewing habits.

"The viewers have gone numb," says Peggy Chiao. "They need maximum action and dialogue. They can't tolerate subtle lighting. And all that chatter has fed a habit of staring at subtitles." Chiao believes this is damaging to esthetic sensibilities.

"The artistic aura of Hou Hsiao-hsien's The Puppet Master was similar in lighting and hue to that of the 17th Century Dutch painter Rembrandt. It needs to be illuminated with excellent facilities," says Chiao. When screened in inadequately equipped theaters, the film is transformed into a murky block. The situation is even worse on a television set, whose ability to differentiate between strong and soft light is considerably inferior.

The limitations of a little screen

Wu Cheng-huan believed that movie theaters could still attract an audience. Their major asset is the audio-visual environment they provide, something that the livingroom cathode ray tube cannot replace. "Some styles of film, like those of Lawrence of Arabia or Close Encounters of the Third Kind, completely lose their majesty and immensity when squeezed onto the TV screen. Their ability to stir the spirit is diminished."

"Movies seen in a theater, no matter if they're good or bad, tend to give people a more substantial feeling," said Wu. "Good films feel very good. Bad films seem to be very lacking. Films that are neither really good nor bad give a lukewarm impression. This kind of more thorough sensation is hard to get in one's livingroom." In a darkened theater, the only source of light is the movie screen. Even though there are people all around, there seems to be less disturbance. Everyone is focused exclusively on the story as it develops on the screen. The cinema concentrates the audience's attention completely on the movie itself.

Movie critic Chris Wang notes that scholars, when doing research on how films effect emotional interaction among viewers, all describe watching movies as "a kind of rite."

After VCR and laser discs cut off a slice of the movie market, and Dolby sound systems were mass-produced, simplified and installed into people's homes, "the only remaining elements which genuinely separate the moviegoing ritual from watching a video cassette are the projection equipment and the locale. Theaters still have the advantage of providing a huge, dark, soundproofed and isolated viewing experience," says Chris Wang.

The engine that wouldn't quit

In fact, movies and television are brothers, albeit with considerably different builds, and they have long been feuding. Television became commonplace in the 1950s, and within ten years it had become ubiquitous. The film industry began to lose ground.

In order to regain movie attendees, Hollywood tried a bold new recipe. Movies with lifelike effects, replete with technological wizardry and stereo sound, as well as films emphasizing huge scenes on wide-angle screens, came out one after another.

"All of Hollywood's historical epic films that focused on huge scenes and wide expanses came out during the age of television," Peggy Chiao points out. For example, Ben Hur's chariot race in the Roman coliseum and the sweeping scenes of the Biblical tale The Ten Commandments, in which Moses leads the Hebrew people and parts the Red Sea, were both products of a new generation of technology aimed at challenging TV.

A century of film has led us to the 1990s, with its rapid technological development, and movie theaters have still not been vanquished by television. They are still the first stop for the movie industry when it sells its products. Nearly all motion pictures appear on the market in video-tape and laser-disc form only after they have finished being shown in theaters.

With its powerful ambience and lifelike effects, this "train engine" of film culture continues to capture our gazes.