This past weekend, The Amazing Spider-Man 2 opened in theaters everywhere, officially marking the beginning of summer blockbuster season.
While many are gearing up for some of the summer’s biggest films—from the promising Godzilla reboot to the latest Transformers abomination—others are just biding their time until the fall’s hotly anticipated awards-worthy film hit the screens, most notably, the latest from The Dark Knight trilogy director, Christopher Nolan.
Not much is known about Nolan’s newest film, Interstellar, which hits theaters this fall. It’s a science fiction film. Matthew McConaughey stars in it. It has something to do with space, possibly worm holes. A lot of it was shot on 70 mm and IMAX film. That’s about it.
But the Smithsonian’s National Air & Space Museum is exclusively screening the first full length trailer (a teaser of it played during the Super Bowl) at their Lockheed Martin IMAX Theater, attached to showings of the films Hubble 3D, Hidden Universe 3D, The Dream is Alive, and To Fly. The Post’s Ann Hornaday reports that the trailer had its world premiere this morning to an unsuspecting group of tourists who settled in to catch Hubble 3D.
So how did the Smithsonian land an exclusive trailer of one of the year’s most anticipated films without anyone knowing? Zarth Bertsch, Director of Theaters for the Smithsonian, tells DCist that Christopher Nolan and Paramount approached them about the idea and wanted it to be a surprise for theater-goers. “Even [most of] our staff didn’t know,” Bertsch says. The trailer will exclusively screen with all films showing at the Lockheed Martin IMAX Theater until May 16, when it plays ahead of the new Godzilla film. Although the Smithsonian’s IMAX theaters on the National Mall are known for occasionally screening first run of big blockbusters (Nolan’s The Dark Knight Rises screened at the Lockheed Martin IMAX and the Natural History Museum’s Samuel C. Johnson IMAX Theater when it opened in 2012), it’s not yet clear if the full Interstellar film will play when it opens, but Bertsch says the Smithsonian will “be in ongoing touch with the teams at Paramount and IMAX.”
And here’s that teaser that played during the Super Bowl. Is it November yet?
