But I feel that I should mention that I do intend to make this a more frequent contribution to BMC—because we need something that's outside the sports world every once in a while. Another reason I'm choosing to put those "reviews" up here instead of over at excitablehonky is the timeliness issue. Obviously, I'm months behind here on seeing, well, all of these films. So if you're here looking for thoughts on new releases in theaters right now, I'd recommend coming back when it's on DVD.The entire theater experience vs. home viewing issue has been brought up a few times to me this Oscar season—most notably because of many friends' insistence that Avatar must be seen in IMAX 3-D Super-Mega-Hyper-Wacky-Outrageous-Giant-Boner-ifficVision (or whatever they call it). I still can't get over the idea that the movie's nearly three hours long, but then again, I made it through Titanic in the theater, so who am I to say?
But seriously, a moment to vent here: I prefer watching movies on DVD as opposed to going to the theater for multiple reasons. The cost is one issue. Neither the fat guy who chews his popcorn with his mouth open or the middle-age woman who has explain every joke to her husband at the theater are there to annoy me in my basement when watching a film on my DVD player. If a movie's too long, I can pause it and use the washroom without fear of missing anything. I can have a cigarette. Maybe two. If there's a date over, the movie sucks and we're horny, I don't have to worry about getting out of a theater and keeping her in the mood until we get back home.
In short, I become more and more convinced with each passing year that the "theater experience" that I'm told is so necessary for so many otherwise bad movies ("Yeah, but the special effects were good" automatically makes me even more cynical) is losing more and more of its appeal to me. As TVs and home audio systems continue to improve while the prices for both decline (I remember when a giant plasma screen in somebody's home was a sign of wealth, but now it seems everybody has one—except for me, of course), I don't see how the steadily increasing cost of seeing a movie in the theater really strikes me as the preferable option. Yeah, I guess if there's more people than just the lady and I, then the theater's the most logical choice.
But the girl I've been rolling with the past few weeks finally got me to move my living situation around and now that the TV and Bose system are in the real bedroom, I'm kind of enjoying the past few nights of getting almost an entirely new movie experience (NOTE: Not really anything new about said movie experience). Five of those seven films I've got checked off there were seen on DVD, while the other two have been seen in the theater. I'm making plans with one friend to see Avatar this weekend at the really ghetto-ass place next to where I used to work, and if we don't get shot there, then I imagine I'll be hoping to find Precious is still out there somewhere and saving The Blind Side for last (me thinks I might have seen one too many comments like this one, although I'm certainly not going to complain about Nine not being nominated).
And after that? Well, here's to hoping I just keep writing about whatever I'm seeing. Feel free to leave any recommendations in the comments and I'll let you know what I think.
No comments:
Post a Comment