By popular request, a report on Sunday’s movie-viewing activities:
I went to see “A MIghty Wind,” the latest psuedo-documentary from Christopher Guest. Guest was my fave on Saturday Night Live all those years ago when the cast included Mary Gross, Tim Kazurinsky, Gary Kroeger, Julia Louis-Dreyfuss, Christine Ebersole, Brad Hall, Eddie Murphy, and Joe Piscopo. Whew! Did I name them all correctly? That’s some memory there. That year also had my favorite opening titles – the ones made with the Quantel Paintbox, with the kind of linear scrolling city going by. I remember Gloria Estefan made a video using that style and I always thought it was cool. The amazing thing is that I now have the tools, technology, and knowhow to create that kind of video myself. But do I? Oh, no. Too lazy.
But, as usual, I digress.
“A Mighty Wind” – like “Best in Show” – is aimed at such a narrow audience. I think that most people I know would not get the humor, and this was proved by the sparse theatre audience yesterday. (And another aside: even thought it’s playing a few blocks away from my house, I went down to the AMC Hoffman Center theatres in Alexandria. These theatres are really nice, with big screens and – get this – friendly employees! I was astounded! If you had just looked at them you would have assumed they were the usual sullen high school kids, but they were friendly and courteous, each one saying “Thank you for choosing AMC,” or “Enjoy the show” or “Thank you for coming.” That was awfully nice and unexpected.
It would have been nicer still if I hadn’t paid $10 to sit for 10 minutes and watch commercials. Frankly, if I have to pay to see something I don’t expect to be assailed with ads. I wish I could take off $2 for every ad they show me.
Again, I digress. You see, this movie is unlike almost every other comedy in that you never quite know when the laughs are coming. It’s improvisational in nature, so it doesn’t really follow the standard cookie-cutter comedy flowchart. This also means that it’s hard to describe it here. And I know you don’t want me to just blurt out any of the jokes or what happens in the end, do you? Let me just say this:
“Wha’ happened?”
Cool. I’ve been meaning to see “A Mighty Wind” for a while now, but haven’t gotten around to it. I hear ya, re: pre-movie commercials. If they’re here to stay, I say they should play _before_ the stated showtime, and then start the actual movie _on time_. ‘Cause that’s what we pay for (in terms of money, and time as well), right? The movie? Wishful thinking, I know; advertisers of course want a captive audience.
Ah, that’s a film on my to-see list; I’m a fan of Guest’s work.
Re: your other comments on movie prices and advertisements… I was just catching up on Lore Sj�berg’s (of the Brunching Shuttlecocks site) Slumbering Lungfish blog last night, and he had a clever entry back in February discussing the same thing, in the guise of musing on “what if movie theatres didn’t already exist, and they were being introduced today?”: http://slumbering.lungfish.com/index.php?p=movies.1046124241