Popcorn 'N Roses

SUNDAY AT THE SHOW: A disclaimer is needed for the weak of stomach...

We were walking through the theatre today on our way to our selected feature when I noticed that there were placards in front of the theatres running "The DaVinci Code" announcing that the trailer for the upcoming flick "World Trade Center" was running, and that it might be unsettling and uncomfortable for people due to the vivid images of September 11, 2001 that it contained. It was a nice gesture on the part of our local cinema, and maybe it was done nationwide, I don't know.

We went to see the new animated flick "Over The Hedge" today (PRL's review is forthcoming...), and I didn't expect to nearly lose my lunch...BEFORE the flick even started...over one of the trailers. Hedge could have used a disclaimer as well.  Someone IS going to lose their lunch over this one...

You see, one of the trailers running with Hedge is for the upcoming film based on the classic kids book "How To Eat Fried Worms". And the trailer is VERY graphic...and VERY disgusting. Showing any number of people - good kids, bad kids, teachers, parents - eating worms of any kind is bad enough, but when they go through the ritual of showing how each one is cooked...and how several people eat them without knowing about it...my stomach is turning just remembering it as i'm writing about it.

I know that compared to the intensity of seeing 9/11 happen all over again in "World Trade Center", this movie is a no-brainer, and that kids everywhere will find this gross-out humor funny. But any adults accompanying their children to "Over The Hedge" , beware....you could end up leaving the theatre in a very big hurry...on your way out the door, headed to the bathroom, to relieve yourself of your breakfast, lunch, or dinner...

And you can bet that from now on I'm going to keep a close eye on the trailers...and not watch the ones that TOTALLY GROSS ME OUT....and let the theatres know i'm not happy when they don't warn us about how gross the trailers can be...

SUNDAY AT THE SHOW: A word to theatre managers....ENOUGH COMMERCIALS ALREADY!!!

Ah yes, there's nothing quite like going to the show. We do it quite regularly - we wouldn't have this blog if we didnt...

So we settled in for our first Sunday at the Show in a couple months. PRL wanted to see "Lucky Number Slevin", and I...well I was along as usual, though far more unsure of it than she seemed to be...and her review will be posted soon.  I, surprisingly, rather enjoyed it...after I figured out what was going on....

However, whatI did NOT enjoy was the 8 minutes of commercials that our local Showcase Cinemas foisted upon us preceding the trailers.  8 MINUTES? Come on, people!  I don't mind the screen ads between movies, nor do I mind three or four commercials. But 8 MINUTES?

It wouldn't have been so bad if the commercials shown weren't so intolerable.  And the more intolerable they were, the longer they were.

When you're a captive audience, as moviegoers are, it is absolutely INEXCUSABLE AND UNFORGIVABLE to subject them to a long commercial for Pepsi featuring the untalented likes of Jimmy Fallon, and later of the equally strange Parker Posey, doing something that really didn't resemble dancing, around the streets of New York City...this ad feels like it goes on forever, and the longer it goes on, the more your eyes are burning in agony from being forced to see this in any way, shape, or form...there HAS to be something in the Geneva Convention rules and regs for captives that should outlaw this kind of unspeakable horror to force Pepsi upon us...

And then there's a long, and overly drawn out ad for American Express featuring director Wes Anderson (Rushmore, The Royal Tennenbaums) which goes on for a full two minutes. He mugs at the camera as they walk through a shoot making all kinds of silly remarks about the movie they're making, and how American Express can help him afford whatever he wants...I was so sick of this schmoe and his smug, "i'm so much better than you because I'M a DIRECTOR!" attitude by the end of this commerical that I doubt I would EVER do business with American Express....

And to cap it off, there were more commercials than trailers - only three were shown, and all three were for movies I have no interest in seeing at all, though I don't doubt many will...but the commercials should NEVER, EVER outlast the trailers for coming attractions. Those coming attractions are half the fun...at least for me...

So I think it's high time cinema owners do their best to limit their ads to no more than 4 minutes of screen time, or a total of our ads each not more than one minute in length. And I think that if at your local cinema they refuse to do so, then you shoud inform the management, and the head office if it's a chain theatre, that you will be boycotting that particular theatre until they agree to pull their ads back.  I know they need to make the money in a slow time for the business, but I'm not paying my money to see more commercials than trailers, and 8 minutes of them is just unforgivable...

I can just as easily pop into town to the AMC Boston Common theatre and see the same movies, and all of their commercials run as in-between feature filler. And they always show at least five or six trailers, too...

So the ball is in YOUR court, Showcase Cinemas....you've been fully warned....the next step is yours...

SUNDAY AT THE SHOW: Watching the ULTIMATE Chick Flick

We had had plans for this Sunday - we were going back to our favorite "avantgarde" movie theatre, Cambridge's Brattle, to see a flick i'd never seen before that PRL wanted me to see. However, the weather decided not to cooperate. We were in the middle of our first big blizzard of the year, and there was no way we were going out in it, especially as we don't have a car and rely on public transportation. And besides the Olympics had the Mens Snowboard Halfpipe competition on that evening...and there was NO WAY I was missing the Flying Tomato win his Gold medal...

So since PRL had the movie in her DVD collection anyway - she'd had it for TWO YEARS after asking for it as a birthday present and the wrapping was STILL on it - we popped some popcorn and sat down to watch the Deluxe DVD edition of Gone With The Wind.

GOD, WHAT A LOOOOOOOONG MOVIE!

OK, I can sit through the extended editions of the Lord Of The Rings trilogy in one sitting - no problem.  I can sit through a three-movie Harry Potter marathon too - also no problem. I love all of those movies.

But after nearly four hours of watching some spoiled Southern bitch...er BELLE whine and cry her way through years of heartbreak without really being happy, I was ready to scream.

Scarlett O'Hara is one of the most spoiled rotten women to ever grace the screen.  And GWTW is one of the most depressing movies i've ever seen. Virtually NO ONE in this movie is ever happy. And it paints a rather rosy picture of one of the darkest times in american history. How do you deal so lightly and happily with the fact that you own other people?  For that aspect alone, i'll never understand why so many people consider this film one of their favorite movies.

Not to say the movie was ALL bad...I actually got into the story after all the Civil War stuff was over. Although for all his flaws, Rhett Butler was an IDIOT to fall in love with that whiny, completely self-obsessed woman.

Why is Scarlett O'Hara considered one of THE best cinema roles ever written for a woman? Personally, I liked her sister-in-law (sort of) Melanie Wilkes much better. Melanie got on my last nerve at first but as the movie went along, I grew to like her character a lot. In fact, she was the only likable character featured through much of the movie. So of course, she dies near the end of the movie.

In fact, that's one of my biggest problems with this movie - A LOT of people die. Some die on camera, some die off camera, but this movie is positively obsessed with death, before, during, and after the Civil War. It's as bad as watching a bad, overly melodramatic soap opera.

Now in all fairness, I didn't hate the movie either. Clark Gable dominates the screen whenever he's in the scene, and Vivian Leigh was wonderful in her performance - I hope she wasn't that much of a bitch in real life. I can easily understand it's mulitple Oscar nominations that year, and it's spectacular cinematography, even on DVD, shines through as some of the best in the history of film.

Would I want to sit through it again? Only if I can pick it up during the last two hours...the first two hours are just stomach-turning to me, hearing these people talk about the old South as if it were the grandest thing on the planet. Let me tell you something, Miss Scarlett, as long as you owned slaves, there was NOTHING GRAND about the South....

I can see why women love the the movie, though. The love story between Rhett and Scarlett is excellent if depressing, and there are plenty of places that will trigger tears in most women.

Me, I was intrigued, and wanted to see it to say i've seen it at least once.

But if I want a love story, give me Hero or Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon any day. Yeah, I know, they're depressing too, and a lot of people die in those movies too. But at least there's great chopsocky action to help liven it up a bit...

And there's NO laughable dialogue (The Tarleton Twins...I mean, COME ON...)...or scarily gigantic hoop skirts either...

SUNDAY AT THE SHOW: An animated double feature

This week, we were off to Cambridge's historic Brattle Theatre to catch a wonderful double-feature, our third viewing of Wallace And Gromit:The Curse Of The Were-Rabbit, and our first viewing of Tim Burton's Corpse Bride. Trying to coordinate getting there...well, that was an entirely different matter...

PlatinumRose has church at 11, and the show starts at 1:30. We rely on public transportation, but we still thought we'd have plenty of time to get there. I caught the 12 PM bus, and she would pick it up at the church. However, several things conspired against us. First off, the bus got stuck on a narrow street when a delivery truck was parked too far out in the road, causing a 10 minute delay. After she caught the bus at church, we headed off to the local Blue Line station. And then we had a 10 minute wait for each of the three trains we had to catch to get to Cambridge. We wouldn't have had such a horrible time getting there if I'd remembered that you can catch the Red Line to Cambridge from Park Street, but I didn't.  I was kicking myself all day about that one.

We arrived at the theatre just a moment or two late, though, and we had purchased our popcorn and drinks, and settled into our seats by the time the Madagasar penguins were about 1/2 through their short, which opens the Wallace and Gromit movie.

I simply can't praise Wallace And Gromit enough. It is one of 2005's best movies, and one of the most hysterically funny as well. I even gave one of my year end special awards to it, check the sidebar for the Poppys and what it got. Corpse Bride I had managed to avoid when it was at the theatre, even though Rose wanted to see it. I'm not a huge fan of Tim Burton's movies, and never will be. I can take them or leave them. But I was pleasantly surprised by this movie. Although the opening 20 minutes were deadly boring, it kicked into gear about then, and the rest of the movie was pretty good, even if they had pretty clearly indicated who the real villian of the piece was early on, and so the climax didn't shock me or anyone else in the theatre. Neither of us knew Corpse Bride was a musical, or at least a semi-musical, either. Apart from the first 20 or so minutes, and it's happy but rather abrupt ending, it wasn't half-bad.

Rose and I like to go to the Brattle theatre. It's a wonderful little non-profit theatre plopped down in the middle of Cambridge's Harvard district, and the namesake of Brattle Square. We learned from Kevin Murphy's wonderful book A Year At The Movies that he was absolutely correct about the Brattle in many aspects. It is usually either too hot or too cold (it was a bake oven when we first arrived yesterday), that the sound is horrible (we could hardly hear W & G), and that the balcony of the Brattle is absolutely one of if not THE finest place in the Boston area from which to view a movie.

Sadly, the Brattle may be on it's last legs. In desperate need of a $400,000 infusion of cash, they have raised but $100,000 of it so far, and they have only until the end of February to reach their goals, otherwise it may go dark forever. Some of the funds they've raised have helped them to invest in a new, bigger screen, which helps the place immensely, but they still have $300,000 to go. We continue to hope and pray that they'll make their goal.  If you as movie fans would like to help Bostonians save their favorite drafty old theatre, please take the time to click here and help us save The Brattle from an untimely demise. We'll appreciate it for years to come, and don't hesitate to contact us about YOUR local theatre if it's in trouble; we'd definately be interested in knowing about it.

All in all, we had a most enjoyable time this Sunday At The Show. And hopefully, whatever we see next weekend will be just as delightful.