Into the shadow Mother Nature is set to dwarf any Hollywood blockbuster. Ivan Semeniuk explains when and how to watch the total solar eclipse coming to North America on Monday

From Imax films to video games to virtual reality, today’s average North American has access to a visual banquet like no previous generation in the history of human civilization.
Yet, come Aug. 21, Mother Nature is set to top it all with a spectacle that dwarfs any Hollywood blockbuster.
For the first time in decades, the long dark finger of the moon’s shadow is set to sweep across the continental United States, plunging entire cities and towns into an eerie midday darkness. And for a few precious minutes it will be possible to look up and be reminded that we are but spectators in a grand celestial ballet that has been under way since the solar system was born.
A total eclipse of the sun is one of life’s genuine experiences. It is a fleeting and rare phenomenon that connects Earth and sky in a manner that is both hard to fully take in while it’s under way and impossible to forget when it’s over.