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When I was a kid, I assumed all third installments in a horror series had to capitalize on the ability to turn the “3″ in the title into “3-D.” Now, looking back, I only really remember (and can only find proof of) Jaws 3-D, Friday the 13th 3-D and Amityville 3-D. But that isn’t stopping me from assuming Hollywood will once again abuse the gimmick. And judging by today’s news from Disney that the third installment of Step Up will be in 3D (and is tentatively titled simply, appropriately and marketably Step Up 3-D), the integrity of digital 3D — as the hope for the future of exhibition rather than as another passing fad — is on its way down.

Of course, we’re in a big 3D trend right now, whether it continues as something more than that or not, and it at least makes sense for Hollywood to make decisions like this, and obviously it’s more logical as far as the title is concerned. I know that Toy Story 3 will be appropriately in 3D, too. Others will likely follow, and it’s better than the confusing mis-step that has been occurring lately with non-threequel sequels (and non-sequels).

Upcoming sequels Shrek 4 and Final Destination 4 will also be released in digital 3D, but titularly that’s confusing (especially because of DreamWorks’ direct-to-video release Shrek 4-D, aka Shrek 3-D). Fortunately for the former, it currently has a less-confusing title of Shrek Goes Fourth. As for Final Destination, New Line had once intended for the third installment to be appropriately a 3D film and be titled Final Destination 3-D. So it is fair that the studio had previously had the idea. But what will it be called?

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In the interest of full disclosure: I play a very small role in the subject of today’s SXSW preview, Natural Causes. As such, I’m going to have to pass the SXSW reviewing duties along to another member of the Spout team??????and in fact, as of this writing, I haven’t even seen the film, even though parts of it were made in my apartment??????but we passed along our standard 4 Questions to co-directors Alex Cannon, Paul Cannon and Michael Lerman nonetheless. Check out the Emerging Visions selection’s trailer above, and answers from the boys below.Tell us about your movie. Who did you work with, why did you make it? Give us the reductive, 25-word or less, “It’s like [pop culture reference a] meets [pop culture reference b]!” pitch, then explain what the quick and dirty sell leaves out.

25 words or less? Natural Causes is like the greatest hits of a relationship.

That said, we wrote it in 1 month and shot it in 11 days, some of them 23 hours long. This was our attempt to make an extraordinarily personal film about the nature of a young relationship. The three of us have gone through similar experiences and we know so many people who have as well. Natural Causes is our way of taking a look back at that and examining what it???s like to be with someone at this age and all the shit that goes along with it. We???re not blind to the fact that there are movies that resonate with us in an emotionally similar way, like David Gordon Green???s All the Real Girls or Atom Egoyan???s Calendar.

The best part of the whole experience might be the collaboration. Who better to make a movie with than two of your best friends? Combine that with a really great crew and you have the most fun the three of us have had, pretty much ever. Michael Tully is a jack-of-all-trades, Asif Siddiky is a genius and the whole cast is incomparable. We worked with some of the most dedicated and inexhaustible people around and the fact that nobody ended up screaming or in prison is a miracle, although we managed to get some stitches along the way. Literally.

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Last Friday, while Karina and I were apparently too Oscar-anxious to notice, MTV posted this news about a scientific study of Harry Potter fans — or as they conclusively label them, addicts — and the post-conclusion depression that’s afflicted them since the final novel arrived in stores last summer. Apparently, 10% of these “addicts” went through a serious period of withdrawal, equivalent to the aftereffects of quitting smoking. This study, the results of which are being submitted to the Journal of General Psychology with the title “Harry Potter and the End of the Line: Parallels with Addiction,” involved the polling of 4,000 fans online and found that a significant number were so obsessed that their “more than four hours a day on Potter-related activities” interfered with things like eating and sleeping. Here, a positively spun quote from the study’s lead researcher, Muhlenberg College psych professor Dr. Jeffrey Rudski:

“An addiction is an addiction is an addiction,” Rudski said. “An addiction to a drug is no different than an addiction to Harry Potter or the Internet or pornography. Although it’s not always a bad thing. There’s a community that you get with Harry Potter that you don’t get with heroin.”

And despite there being only 10% actual Harry Potter “addicts”, another 20% were considered by Rudski to fall within what he calls a “critical threshold.” They include the person who wrote this: “I had trouble getting out of bed Monday morning. I was depressed and had nightmares all night long. I dreamed I was being attacked by Lucius Malfoy and Fenrir Greyback and didn’t have a wand because I was Muggle-born.” Just imagine what those 400 actual addicts are like (by the way, Rudnick refers to his daughter as one such “addict”).

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Originally posted on:SpoutBlog