Pandora at 48 Frames per Second: Aesthetics of Immersion and the Cultural Valuation of High Frame Rate Projection

ABSTRACT: This essay explores the discourses surrounding high frame rate projection in conjunction with other specialty exhibition technologies. Though consistent with earlier appeals to immersion via technological novelty, HFR 3D is often subject to backlash comparing the format’s appearance to soap operas and video games. Through an analysis of Avatar: The Way of Water (2022), I argue that these critiques expose hierarchies of taste by calling attention to limitations in accepted cinematic aesthetics; they demonstrate one way in which historically contingent filmmaking formats and practices are naturalized, with deviations subject to questions of cultural legitimacy insofar as they resemble less-respected media forms.