LOTR Movies Coming Back to the Big Screen -- but not the biggest

[Scott Jentsch]

With the upcoming Fathom re-releases of The Lord of the Rings movies, I am hoping to get more information about these releases, Fathom's capabilities, and the logic of putting these classic movies (if one can refer to them as "classic" yet) on anything but the best room a theater has to offer.

The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring - 2026 Re-release opens in theaters January 16, 2026, followed daily by the other two installments. These releases are being distributed by Fathom Events.

The first movie won 4 Oscars, including for its Score and for Cinematography. The second took home 2 statues. The final installment ran the table and won 11. Even for those that don't care for their content, it would be difficult not to classify them as classic movies and certainly, they're signature movies for the studio, the director, et al.

I realize that most Fathom releases are placed in small rooms at movie theaters, but some have gotten more traction lately than in the past. However, these are not inconsequential movies and (in my opinion) deserve better treatment than being stuffed in the small theater in the corner of a multiplex.

Given that the only major release that weekend is 28 Years Later: The Bone Temple and the weekend before doesn't have any titles that are going to burn up the box office report in their second weekend, why aren't these movies getting any PLF love?

Out of the 1104 theaters that we have showtimes for the first installment on Jan 16, I'm not seeing any that are indicating Cinemark XD, AMC Prime/Dolby, Marcus UltraScreen/SuperScreen, etc.

These movies have been available for home viewing on 4K Ultra HD Blu-ray with Dolby Vision HDR and Dolby Atmos sound since December 2020, but as far as I can tell, theaters will not being showing them with those attributes. In the spirit of Geoff Jones' thread here, Classic Films Belong on the Biggest Screens, I have to express profound disappointment in this situation.

Is this a Fathom limitation? I found some old documentation that Fathom devices are limited to 5.1 sound. While I am big on the sound aspect of movies, I can handle a good 5.1 presentation (but RoTK was a DTS-ES/Dolby Digital EX theatrical release, IIRC). Are they also limited to 2K, or can they do 4K?

Many of the showings are already selling out the best seats, if not the entire theater, which reinforces Geoff's point that classic movies should be given their due and placed on larger screens. Movies like this market themselves.

However, let's look at it from the marketing perspective. As a theater, do you just mention that you're playing the movie like you would any other, or would you rather brag about "the biggest movies of a generation are coming to our biggest screen"? Not being able to do the latter is a huge missed opportunity, and not just for those that are interested in going to see them, but for their ability to market the magic of seeing movies on the big screen (the way they were meant to be seen).

Especially in the light of the Warner Bros. absorption and what it might mean for the industry, I feel like every possible opportunity to match and exceed the home viewing experience should not be missed. After 31 years in this industry, things like this continue to mystify me, so I'm trying to increase my understanding.

Can anyone shed some light on these specific examples, and perhaps, the idea in general?

Is this a Fathom issue?

Are these titles available for booking in the better formats (either through Fathom or through traditional methods) and theaters are just not taking advantage of what's available?

[Jim Cassedy]

At my venue, we've played the entire legacy series of LOTR twice in the 4 years I've been
working there. As I've stated in previous posts, I have nothing to do with booking or what
auditorium they wind up in, but my personal impression, based on when and where they
played here is that they seemed to be considered nothing more than "filler" programming.
Each title played twice, or possibly three times over a two week booking period. None of
them played on our largest screen, although they all had at least one showing in our mid
size auditorium, which seats around 100ppl. ALL of these bookings occurred just after
Christmas, in the months of Jan/Feb, which is traditionally a slow period for movie theaters.
In January of this year (2025)for example, we closed for several days during January for
the installation of new screens and laser projectors (including our big BARCO HDR )
Next year (Jan 2026) we're shutting down several days again for the installation of new
carpets, seating and a few other renovations and infrastructure improvements.

The LOTR trilogy played here in Jan/Feb of 2023, and 2024, so, as I said, IMO, I think
they were booked simply as 'seat fillers', because there is always a certain number of
people who can be guaranteed to come see them. Is it just a coincidence that these
Fathom shows are also occurring during the month of January or are they simply just
seat fodder for Fathom too? ( I also recall that the January 2024 LOTR shows here
were all victims of the 2024 certificate bug, which had to have special keys and/or
VF's ingested to play on the Sony servers we had at that time.)

The LOTR titles came from WB, through Deluxe, who handled the KDM wrangling.

Here's what the CPL's looked like:

LOTR_CPLs.jpg

[Scott Jentsch]

If I'm understanding correctly, all 3 movies are available in 4K and in Atmos. At least when coming from WB via Deluxe.

I wonder if Fathom is the limiting factor then...

[Ian Puffenberger]

There are some PLF shows in the DC area, Alamo Big Show and Cinemark XD specifically. At my regular Cinemark the XD screens aren’t the widest in the building, there are two side-masked 2.2:1 (or so) screens that are wider, and Fellowship is actually playing on one of those. Unless it’s a true premium large screen—purpose built to be significantly larger than the others—I’d be more concerned about the Fathom format. I’ve never been to one but they don’t have the greatest reputation. There are some claims that all their feature films are now shown via DCP as opposed to a satellite stream but I don’t know if that’s true.

[Marco Giustini]

My feeling on this is that sometimes "more is not better".

4K might be an improvement if the original negatives are properly scanned in 4K - though I have a feeling that the original film grain will make 4K more or less pointless.

Everything else (Atmos, HDR) is not something you achieve at a press of a button. Well... you could, I understand those workflows have an automatic conversion (at least for HDR) which will give you a baseline to work with.

But in order to achieve GOOD ATMOS and GOOD HDR, you need a skilled person to re-do the grading and/or the sound - and that cost money. Proper Atmos has objects, it means a considerable amount of work to add them.

Larger releases might have the budget to do a decent job but I've seen "conversions" which were painful to watch.

LOTR is from an age where we'd have a Digital Intermediate so there is no need for restoration. I'd say I'd be happy to watch an original, untouched, LOTR version, in glorious 5.1 EX/ES as the original version. With 7.1, the original 6.1 track could be easily converted to 7.1 with identical Back Surrounds and the added dynamic/clarify from a lossless PCM track. If 4K is available good.
Anything else requires some serious work and skilled professionals plus the director involved.

[Scott Jentsch]

There are some PLF shows in the DC area, Alamo Big Show and Cinemark XD specifically. At my regular Cinemark the XD screens aren’t the widest in the building, there are two side-masked 2.2:1 (or so) screens that are wider, and Fellowship is actually playing on one of those. Unless it’s a true premium large screen—purpose built to be significantly larger than the others—I’d be more concerned about the Fathom format. I’ve never been to one but they don’t have the greatest reputation. There are some claims that all their feature films are now shown via DCP as opposed to a satellite stream but I don’t know if that’s true.

That's good to hear. Alamo doesn't make it easy to know that the showings of Two Towers and Return of the King are in the Big Show auditorium at the DC Bryant Street and Crystal City locations. We usually get those designations (like we have today for Five Nights at Freddy's 2 and Zootopia 2), but they are missing for the Fathom shows. I would imagine that their choice to not show Fellowship of the Ring might have to do with the evening showtime on Friday vs. the morning showtimes on Sat and Sun.

Given the difference between the Friday and Sat/Sun shows at the Alamo locations, I did a search for XD showings of Two Towers and Return of the King, and found 45+ showings each day. That's heartening!

It's also interesting to see how well the seats are selling. How many movies can sell 50+ seats on a Saturday morning/afternoon in January?

[Scott Jentsch]

My feeling on this is that sometimes "more is not better".

4K might be an improvement if the original negatives are properly scanned in 4K - though I have a feeling that the original film grain will make 4K more or less pointless.

Everything else (Atmos, HDR) is not something you achieve at a press of a button. Well... you could, I understand those workflows have an automatic conversion (at least for HDR) which will give you a baseline to work with.

But in order to achieve GOOD ATMOS and GOOD HDR, you need a skilled person to re-do the grading and/or the sound - and that cost money. Proper Atmos has objects, it means a considerable amount of work to add them.

Larger releases might have the budget to do a decent job but I've seen "conversions" which were painful to watch.

LOTR is from an age where we'd have a Digital Intermediate so there is no need for restoration. I'd say I'd be happy to watch an original, untouched, LOTR version, in glorious 5.1 EX/ES as the original version. With 7.1, the original 6.1 track could be easily converted to 7.1 with identical Back Surrounds and the added dynamic/clarify from a lossless PCM track. If 4K is available good.
Anything else requires some serious work and skilled professionals plus the director involved.

I agree that more is not always better. I don't like the idea that so many catalog releases on 4K Blu-ray are getting Atmos releases, when someone isn't being intentional about doing a good job. There are many examples of Atmos obviously being an option that was checked when doing the sound mix instead of someone actually taking the time to create the object-based environment and doing good job of it. The same goes for lackluster 4K upsampled video transfers, but the home video community has been doing a pretty decent job of calling out the releases that are poorly done. Cash-grabs are identified as such, and when it happens to A-list titles, the studios get to hear about it.

Fortunately, the 4K home video release of the Lord of the Rings movies have gotten very high marks in the video and the audio department. I know that what looks good on a 10' wide screen in 4K is not necessarily going to hold up when it's projected on a 50' wide screen, so there is not an assumption on my part that just because the home video release looks good, that a theatrical release will also look good. I've not seen these movies projected in 4K theatrically, so I can't vouch for how the movies look in that environment. Given that the home video releases have been praised for their audio quality, one would hope that a theatrical release would not fall apart.


In the case of these movies especially, the audience coming to a theatrical release is most likely going to be comprised of fans that have seen them multiple times. They've likely seen them in 4K via streaming or disc, and a number of them are going to have Atmos setups as well. This is the bar that theaters have to clear at a minimum, and they have the ability to exceed the experience that a large number of people are capable of having at home.

But they have to be willing to do it. Then, they have to market it like it's an event. These are event movies, and what better way to energize moviegoers in the dregs of January but to put on an event?

Alamo should be bragging about the movies being in their PLF auditoriums. If Cinemark is playing them in Atmos in their XD screens, why not publicize it? If a movie can sell 50+ good seats a month in advance on a Saturday in January, how many more could they sell if they put it in a larger room?

But I guess Greenland 2: The Migration might do so well, they need to reserve the big auditoriums for its second weekend...

These movies are near and dear to my heart, so I have a special axe to grind in these examples, but the concepts are there for any classic movie and how a release can/should be handled. I'm trying to gather information in the hopes of writing an article about it, so I appreciate everyone's perspectives.

[Mike Blakesley]

I'd love to play some of these Fathom classic reissues but their terms are always horrific, and of course as usual their schedule could never mesh with other movies anyway. It's infuriating the amount of money we could be making, not only for us BUT FOR THE DISTRIBUTORS if only we could book our single screen in a way that made sense.

[Marco Giustini]

Fortunately, the 4K home video release of the Lord of the Rings movies have gotten very high marks in the video and the audio department.

If I remember right the original FHD releases of LOTR were not great video-wise. That said, as you pointed out, that doesn't mean that the theatrical version comes from the same master.