With 3-D, ‘Shark Boy’ aims to do a number on viewers

In the abstract, a special-effects-driven three-dimensional movie with a massive summer roll-out might have been the only appropriate outlet for a preteen superhero duo wearing candy-colored unitards and battling schoolyard bullies and evildoers on a planet called Drool. At the very least, there was never any doubt that 3-D was going to supply added visceral oomph to director Robert Rodriguez’s high-octane family film “The Adventures of Shark Boy & Lava Girl in 3-D,” a Dimension Films release that will hit more than 3,000 theaters in June. “Shark Boy” is also notable as the brainchild of his 7-year-old son, Racer. “We were working on a little children’s book to read to his brothers,” the elder Rodriguez explained. “My son came up with the story -- and I pitched it to the studio.”

He described the result as “kind of like ‘The Wizard of Oz’ meets ‘Batman and Robin.’ ”

Rodriguez should know from 3-D. The 36-year-old’s “Spy Kids 3-D: Game Over” was one of the highest-grossing films in Dimension history -- it took in nearly $200 million worldwide. In March, the director appeared at the ShoWest film industry convention in Las Vegas along with Robert Zemeckis, James Cameron and George Lucas to champion 3-D movies as the wave of the future. “It really creates this heightened environment where it sucks the audience into this world,” Rodriguez said. “People want to have that premium experience.”

Although he can fluently spout technical jargon about beam splitter rigs, active convergence and polarization, for Rodriguez the format’s appeal lies in its ability to push emotion buttons. “There is an old-school showmanship to it that I like,” he said. “And kids love getting free stuff and putting it on their heads. When I was pitching [the movie] on the phone, that was one of the first ideas: Boys get the Shark Boy glasses and girls get the Lava Girl ones.”

Innovations have allowed for vast improvements to anaglyph, the red and blue 3-D glasses technology nostalgically associated with 1950s moviegoing. “You don’t have that blocked-off look that you had in the old days. Everything is much more high-tech now,” Rodriguez said of modern anaglyph.

And he claims to have significantly improved his shooting techniques since “Spy Kids 3-D.” “We have a much better 3-D this time -- much bolder,” he said excitedly. “It works really well on a movie like this because of the superhero element. Their fists can come out really far into camera. Everything is just heightened and stretched.”