MORE THEATERS TO SHOW HOBBIT SEQUEL AT HIGH FRAME RATE

The number of theaters that will be screening The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug at 48 frames per second instead of the usual 24 will increase to about 750 from the roughly 450 that screened the first film, An Unexpected Journey, at the higher frame rate, according to TheWrap.com, which noted that the studio and director Peter Jackson are playing down that fact. Last year several critics complained that the higher frame rate was every bit as clear as Jackson had advertised, but that the sharp resolution represented a distraction instead of an enhancement. According to The Wrap, the movie was screened for critics in the usual 24 fps format, so that it would not figure in their reviews. Overseas, where the higher frame rate did not create the kind of controversy that it did domestically, the film will be screening at 48 fps in 2,500 theaters, The Wrap reported.