When I write about films, I hardly ever make a mistake but with my comments on the 3-D print of Journey to the Centre of the Earth, I didn’t just make a mistake; I made a blockbuster of a mistake.
I offer my humble apologies to my readers; KRS; Jimmy Zammit, Cinema Manager, Empire Cinema Complex, Bugibba and Janice Buttigieg.
I attended the first screening of this film, namely the 10 am show at the Embassy and as it was an awful film, and I was very frustrated to find that it wasn’t in 3-D as that could have provided some relief. It isn’t such a big deal for a cinema to be able to screen digital 3-D films. The really big problems and big investment come with having a cinema capable of screening IMAX 3-D films which are so much more advanced that digital 3-D films almost seem primitive by comparison.
When the film ended, I asked the only employee on that floor why they were showing the flat 2-D print. He told me that he didn’t know for sure but that probably it was because KRS didn’t get the digital 3-D version. The film was also going to be shown in an ordinary format at the Eden Century complex. It didn’t occur to me to check whether the Empire complex was showing it in 3-D.
Since March, KRS have prohibited me from attending their press shows for writing that most of the last reel of Over her Dead Body was extensively scratched. They demanded a correction and an apology. There wasn’t anything for me to correct as the reel is exactly as I described it. By informing my readers about it, I was only doing my duty as a journalist and I certainly wasn’t going to apologise for that.
However, in the case of Journey, I readily admit having made a big mistake. I have no difficulty in apologising to KRS and if I can make further amends for my mistake, I’m open to suggestions. I am my own harshest critic and I very much doubt whether I’ll ever forgive myself for having made that mistake. Worst of all, I feel that I may have let Saviour Balzan down.
Having to review films by going round cinemas creates physical and mental hardship for me. I have several serious health problems including the many complications created by the brain surgery that I had in the UK because of a haemorrhaging brain tumour. Not reviewing films by seeing them in advance at KRS press shows creates additional tension.
Working under additional pressure to keep the deadline may prevent me from realising my full potential at times and it definitely makes me unaware of certain things that, under normal circumstances, I would do as a matter of routine. I believe that is why it didn’t occur to me to check with the Empire complex and that is not an excuse but an explanation.

Eric German