Some rough retrospective on the home cinema setup I’ve been enjoying for the last month

I’ve come to understand that movies soundtracks are not meant to be used as a powerfull surround tool - which is a bit sad. The main goal of the soundtrack is much simpler: put you CLOSER to the sound stage. That’s what the rear channels do 99% of the time, and even in full-fledged action movies there is only a scarce usage of sweeping sound effects and subwoofer rumbles. Oh well.

Bringing the sound stage closer affects all viewers, so this is probably more a consideration for properly-built cinema halls, to make all spectators equally happy of (or oblivious to) the sound.

I guess that proper home-cinema fans are simply treated like a strange minority, like audiophiles. Outside of the VERY small local audiophile community, I actually don’t know of ANYONE with a proper surround setup, surely not in terms of equipment. It is quite understanble, the receivers are a never cheap and the investment in the living room is substantial.

Now that I think of it, I know some guy that has managed to get a nice setup with a Marantz 1600-something reciever (that was a long time ago) and Mission M-74/M-72 speakers. The amount of bass those speakers put out is overwhelming for most living rooms, this is one feature I couldn’t forget. Nice sound, though.