“I love 3-D and think it has a huge potential for engaging the audience in a way that 2-D can’t,’’ Van Ness said. “When you’re watching something in 3-D, you actually have to do more work than if you’re watching the same thing in 2-D, and that work is the same work you have to do if you’re actually in somebody’s presence. So there’s a sense of immersion, a sense of engagement that’s deeper.’’
The 35-minute film plays on the hour at CinemaSalem (owned by Van Ness) at the Museum Place Mall, and is one of two films about the witch trials to debut this month, and one of six new attractions for day-trippers and tourists making their annual October pilgrimage to Salem.
“It’s always good to have new things,’’ said Kate Fox, executive director of Destination Salem, a marketing group that promotes the city. “So many people come to Salem year after year that if we didn’t have new things, they’d get bored. The new productions keep it fresh.’’
Among the other new attractions:
■ The Essex National Heritage Commission has produced its own film, playing around the corner from CinemaSalem at the National Park Service Visitor Center at 2 New Liberty St. Called “Salem Witch Hunt: Examine the Evidence,’’ it features reenactors speaking from the words of victims and accusers, taken from nearly 1,000 manuscripts and other written records.
■The Witch Mansion is a new haunted house at 186 Essex St., on the pedestrian mall.
■ The Witches Cottage, 7 Lynde St., is offering a new dramatic production as actors perform excerpts from “The Crucible,’’ with a question and answer period afterward.
■ Gordon College’s History Alive! program plans to add “Chambers of the Curse’’ at the Old Town Hall, scheduled to debut Saturday. The interactive, multimedia theatrical production focuses on some of the more strange and frightening aspects of Salem’s nearly 400-year history, including eccentric characters, other-worldly events, crimes, and the possible curse that ties them together.
