3D used to be a technology reserved for schlock. I’m talking the schlockiest films on a studio’s slate. Once utilized to emphasize brutal stabbings in Friday the 13th Part III or an exploding shark carcass in Jaws 3D, 3D technology has been hoisted up the food chain in valuable marketing techniques by Mr. James Cameron and his Avatar spectacle.

Make no mistake: 3D is still very much a marketing technique, and thus you will be seeing cash-ins all over the place; 3D glasses will undoubtedly start popping up (if they haven’t already) with straight-to-shelf DVD fare. Hell, I’d even count Tim Burton’s Alice in Wonderland and Louis Leterrier’s Clash of the Titans in with this category: 3D is seemingly an afterthought in both, and both are as immersive as a children’s pop-up book.

So where do we take 3D from here? Not every director has the funds to throw at their film to engineer its 3D from the ground up the way Cameron has done. Instead, it’s quite likely that before the fad dwindles out, we’ll be seeing a lot more pictures re-released or converted in postproduction to sell pricier tickets and to keep the 3D machine running for as long as possible. And if it’s inescapable, we might as well find some pictures that would benefit from a 3D makeover, right? Here’s a list of ten flicks I’d love to see in 3D.

10. Evil Dead II

There are few films that I can get as psyched up to watch for the 100th-odd time as I did the first time I viewed it. Evil Dead II is one of those films, a bombastic, hilarious horror-comedy that established Sam Raimi as one of my very favorite filmmakers. Many credit him for initiating the “MTV style” of cinematography, with all of his fluid camera movements, long tracking POV shots and Dutch (read: 45-degree) camera angles. Between this sort of cinematography, all the vibrant blood and guts on display, and a performance by Bruce Campbell that leaps off the screen regardless, Evil Dead II would make for a perfect 3D film if it were re-released in that format. And with an already established fanbase, it would undoubtedly be a success.

9. Twister

This may be a bit of a stretch, but I think using 3D to amp up Jan De Bont’s already tense and thrilling 1996 film Twister would be freaking fantastic. With all of its long shots of looming storms over a vast horizon of farmland, one could really use 3D to an advantage of establishing depth of field, making the ominous tornados all the more present and real. And let’s be honest — if we as a species don’t produce at least one 3D film that contains Philip Seymour Hoffman, we have really failed ourselves, haven’t we?

8. Watchmen

Zack Snyder’s much-hyped and much-anticipated adaptation of Alan Moore’s Watchmen (the graphic novel which I hold as the bar standard for graphic novels) wasn’t exactly a commercial failure, but it wasn’t quite a success either. Made on a budget of $130 million and gathering a gross revenue of about $180 million, mainstream audiences were perhaps insufficiently clued in that this wasn’t your average superhero film, but a psychological analysis of what heroism truly is.

That doesn’t stop Watchmen from being a great film, both beautiful, textural, and thematically dense. Given ten years, Snyder’s film will have gathered enough of a following to warrant a re-release, and 3D would make the film all the more stunning — imagine Doctor Manhattan’s Mars sequence re-visualized in 3D, or any of Snyder’s excellent fight choreography. It’s a film that feels almost ethereal and dreamlike (just like a certain neo-noir film coming up on this list), and 3D would only enhance that.

7. Pan’s Labyrinth

Guillermo Del Toro’s Pan’s Labyrinth is such a wonderful movie that I feel as if I end up putting it on any list I assemble: best films of the past decade, best screenplay, yadda yadda yadda. Del Toro does amazing things with his dark fairytale of a girl’s search for belonging in a world torn apart by violence, and in its dreamlike qualities 3D would make it shine even more. If you’ve seen Pan’s Labyrinth, you know what I’m talking about. If you haven’t — just look at the screencap above and tell me that wouldn’t freak you the hell out in an extra dimension.

6. Oldboy

In a lot of ways, Park Chan-Wook’s grim and disturbing Oldboy plays out like a sickening pop-up book that dives straight into its main character’s madness. 3D wouldn’t be used here to draw the audience into the film, but instead to disorient them, strengthening the increasing levels of insanity on display. Also, can you visualize the infamous hammer sequence playing out in 3D? I’m not sure it would work, but it’d be worth a try just to find out if one could take a straightforward drama and embed it in a 3D framework.

5. Star Trek

J.J. Abrams’ reboot of Star Trek was hands down one of the coolest films of last year, and the sort of visual spectacle that we rarely see anymore — you know, one that is competently shot, vibrant, fun, and not headache inducing. I’d say that it’s reasonable — even likely — to expect some sort of limited re-release of the film right before the inevitable Star Trek 2 hits theaters, and 3D would be the way to go. Abrams talked up the lens flare that permeates the film, and how it was intended to make the audience feel as if there’s a larger, active world outside the periphery of the frame. 3D would only enhance that, making sequences of interstellar combat and set-pieces like the parachute sequence feel even more spectacular.

4. 300/Sin City

2005 and 2007 saw two comic book adaptations born from the same digital soundstage process — first with Robert Rodriguez and Frank Miller’s Sin City, and later with Zack Snyder’s 300, also based on Miller’s work. Neither of these films feel at all realistic, and this is a good thing: the synthetic nature of violence in both would make for a great 3D double feature. I could watch bloody limbs fly about in three dimensions all day long, and I’m sure there would be a thousand ladies (and lads) eager to see shirtless muscled Greeks in a more — ahem — tangible fashion.

Not to mention the fact that with Sin City, it’d be a neat exercise to watch a black and white film in this format, something I believe hasn’t been attempted before.

3. Blade Runner

Ridley Scott’s 1982 science-fiction neo-noir classic isn’t just one of my favorite films: I’d be hard pressed to say there are many movies better than Blade Runner, period. In my mind, it defines the moody, jazzy cityscape, one that Zack Snyder very overtly pays homage to with Watchmen. I’ll be honest: I’d kill to see a 3D transfer of Scott’s film, with those lingering shots of Spinners flying over a dystopian Los Angeles, endless oblique skyscrapers and hazy, obscured lighting. If done correctly, I think a 3D version of Blade Runner could be utterly beautiful, and of any of the ideas on this list, this stands the best chance of being as immersive of an experience as James Cameron’s Avatar.

2. The Lord of the Rings Trilogy/The Hobbit

Come on: you had to know this was coming. With Guillermo Del Toro’s two-part adaptation of The Hobbit coming up in the near future, one has to wonder what a 3D version of Middle Earth would look like on the big screen. Here’s my hypothesis: incredible. Peter Jackson and co. put years of work into rendering a version of J. R. R. Tolkein’s novels in the most faithful and beautiful way possible, and they were completely successful. Pairing their work with 3D technology would further create a sense of place and setting, and there are far too many sequences between the three films that’d benefit from the 3D treatment to mention.

1. Tron Legacy

But wait — what!? Isn’t the sequel to Tron already in the works, in 3D no less?! What a rip-off! This list is utter bull#%@^!

Here’s my reasoning: even if Tron Legacy wasn’t on the horizon for this coming December, a 3D version of the world of Tron would still be at the very top of my wishlist. Ever since I first sat down and watched the original film, I couldn’t help but think that a 3D treatment — one that utterly immerses the viewer in a world of darkness and neon — would be one of the coolest experiences possible on film. To imagine what’s in store for us — 3D lightcycle chases, 3D disc battles, etcetera — sort of blows my mind. It’s the only 3D film currently on the slate that gets me excited about the format’s possibilities, and I’m certain it will be one of the most unique 3D films audiences will have a chance to see in 2010.

What are your ideal 3D movies? Let us know in the comments!