Movie Day

I write this a little more than a week after I finished my day at the movies. Actually, I should quote that. Maybe capitalize it. Increase the import.

My Day at the Movies.

Better. By “day at the movies,” I don’t mean going to see a movie in a day and then nothing else. Like, “what are you doing today?” “Going to the movies.” No. Nor do I mean one of those crazy 24-hour movie festivals. That just sounds painful. What I want to discuss is a much simpler version of that. A little more complicated than the matinee, but still a little daunting, even for a movie-lover like myself.

I’ve done the two-in-a-row scenario, going from one movie in the theater directly to the next. I pay, of course. To pay for one movie and see two is thievery, no rationalization about it. Movies are products. Would you take a DVD off the shelf and run from the store? Same thing. No, I’ve paid for two tickets and seen two movies in a row several times. And loved it. It’s a nice, relaxing way to pass an afternoon or evening, especially if there are a few movies you’ve missed recently.

This time, though, I had missed a lot of movies. I’ve been in graduate school of late, and the hours required there pretty much mean I may get a rental in here or there, but movies are out. So on this winter break, I took advantage of that and planned on going to the movies, catching up on what I missed, 10AM showing to 10PM showing, as many as I can in no pre-planned order.

Like every other situation in life, there are obstacles. First of all, several of the movies I missed are gone now, off to the land of dollar cinemas (none round here) and “coming soon on DVD” ads. Elizabethtown, for example. I’m stuck in “I heard it was decent” mode until the DVD. I couldn’t see Saw II. Heh heh. Then, there’s the fact that movies don’t start on 10AM on weekdays. Even the national observation of New Year’s Day. No, the earliest was a showing of Munich at 11 or Narnia at 11:10. Which leads to the girlfriend factor. She didn’t want to see Narnia, and time got away from her that morning doing much-delayed laundry. When it comes to those with whom you share a relationship, you kind of let it go when it has to do with cleanliness issues. Think about it: what’s the alternative? Plus, she’s one of those people not back in school, one who carries one of those, whadyoucallem, ah yes, jobs. So the 10PM showing would be a bit much for her. You might say “Mike, you should have just gone by yourself,” but to that I say, hey, how many times are you in a relationship with someone who happily spends all day at the movies? Anyway, the time constraints brought about by these two cataclysmic factors ended up making for a better day.

So movies leaving theatres and time constraints combined, we opted for the 12:00 showing of Munich at the Loews theater on 42^nd Street, Times Square, Manhattan. My favorite place to go to the movies. Not because of the theater, necessarily, though it is a nice one. Like real estate, seeing all the movies you want to see depends on location, location, location. Across from the Loews is the biggest multiplex in New York, the AMC Empire 25. Between these to theaters, you can pretty much see anything you want (that’s currently playing). Both are comfortable, stadium seating, and full food courts (important for movie days). You see one movie at Loews, run across the street, and see another at the AMC. It’s a win-win situation. Ours started with Munich. See review.

As the credits rolled, we pulled out our one piece of outside help for the day: The New York Daily News Movie page, ripped out from the paper in a NYC subway that morning. We did a quick look over both theaters’ listings and found a choice between Rent and Brokeback Mountain. I’ve wanted to see Rent for a while. I loved the musical on Broadway, though it was flawed, and the movie sounds like it’s very similar, and it’s on its way out as far as theaters are concerned. So we decided to see Brokeback. Hey, sometimes you follow a sense of purpose, sometimes you follow your gut.

Speaking of gut, we stopped at the food court for a Nathan’s Chicken Sandwich with fries. It was a movie theater, so it cost something like $8.50, but well worth it. I would have gotten a dog, but it was also something like $8.50, and outside on the corner was a stand selling better dogs than Nathan’s for around a buck. It just wouldn’t have been right.

So we carried our lunch into theater number 25, or 18, or 6, hey, you lose track after Movie Day. And we quickly found that the world woke up.

The United States workers gets the Monday after a major holiday off if said holiday occurs on Christmas. This is generally true for many professions, mainly those that provide a service you’ll probably need that day, and some schools. Apparently, the workers from these high schools, post offices, and government offices decided to go to the AMC 25 that day. We walked in to Brokeback to a packed house. We found two empty seats, though. In the front row. Of a near-IMAX sized-screen. To read the title, you had to actually move your head from left to right. Freakin’ early birds, going to the movies at 2:30 on a Monday. My Movie Day. We didn’t get farther back than the third row the rest of the day. But we adjusted, sat back, looked up, and the movie started.

There’s something about the start of a movie you want to see. The previews finally come to an end, sometimes after a very long time, to the point that you have forgotten what you came to see but you know ESPN has a new sports movie on that night, and the lights go from half-lit to dark and the now five or six logos movies have flash by, and then the screen goes black and the movie starts, either through music, or an image, or “Blankety Blank Presents,” or all of the above. And you’re off. It’s the beginning of a great, unknown journey, and you don’t even have to do anything but watch. What a great species we truly are to be able to be taken away by this, and what a great medium it is that takes us away. But at this moment, it’s heaven. You’re watching a movie. The cell phone is off. The argument you’ve been having has to stop. The mustard stain on your shirt disappears in the dark. You could be watching Showgirls and it wouldn’t matter, not now, not at this point, it’s the beginning of the movie, it hasn’t had time to suck yet. Soon, you’ll start to form an opinion. Or get taken away. Or get lost on your own. Or get bored and impatient, worried about your stain, annoyed by the last thing said in the argument. But not now. Now the movie’s starting. It’s a rare case in life where the possibilities truly are endless, for a short time.

Cut to the end credits rolling. You make decisions on Movie Day. I stay in the theater until the end of the credits. It’s part of the movie, so I watch it. I paid my ten bucks, so I’m getting my money’s worth. Sometimes there’s more to finding out that Mo Henry is the negative cutter. Sometimes there’s a little treat at the end of the credits, from a music cue like in The Naked Gun to an entire scene, like in Napoleon Dynamite. But on Movie Day, you use the credits to find the next movie. The time it takes to watch the credits then become the difference in Cheaper by the Dozen 2 and Walk the Line. Maybe if Steve Martin cursed more in those movies, but for today, it was the Man in Black.

Walk the Line is the only movie we caught that day that had actually been out for a while. I had been dying to see it, but again, because of my schedule, couldn’t join any of the outings to which I was invited. Some people have friends who will wait for them to see a movie. Those friends obviously aren’t movie fans. Mine are. So we walked down to the lobby, bought the ticket, and escalated our way back up to the theater and got inside just in time for the movie to start, only at the cost of half of Brokeback’s closing credits. The theater was almost as packed, but we found two seats, next to each other, in the second row. I almost walked out, tried to switch movies. If something else I wanted to see was next door, I could go in there, see that, buy a ticket for it after I leave, then catch the next showing of Walk the Line…but it all got too complicated. Second row, on the far left, non-IMAX screen. We sat down and had just enough time during some previews that I had seen twice that day to sit back, relax, get over being mad about second row seating and get used to it. Then, that magic happened and the movie started. See review.

What is it with front rows in movies now? When I was a kid, and granted, that wasn’t a really long time ago, but it was long ago enough that a non-multiplex, non-arthouse movie theater could stay open for years without losing business. This two-theater theater in Texas City, Texas, is where I saw some greats from my youth. Friday the 13^th Part VII. Pumpkinhead. Halloween 5. Annie. And I would sit in the front row at times, for fun no less, and look up at that screen and have a grand old time. Sure, I was shorter then, but not by much. And the screen was smaller than today’s multiplex, but not that much—oh wait, IMAX. Multiplex. Stadium seating. Big screen. Right. I’m no architect, but if you’re going to double and triple the size of movie screens, shouldn’t you also move the seats back a little? If you can put your foot out and hit the wall and you’re looking straight up, neck extended, back back, isn’t that too close? Shouldn’t those seats be cheaper, since you can’t actually see a whole frame of the movie at any one moment? It’s more than being young, more agile, having a better back. It’s that now movie screens are huge, and they still sell seats right up there. Cut some seats out. If it sells out, I’ll catch the next showing or come back another day. It can’t be about losing money, not in a capitalist socie—oh, right. Hello Starbucks, goodbye Earl’s Sandwich and Coffee shop.

Johnny serenades us out of the theater, and as usual, I feel a little better, a little more lonely, and a little more together at hearing his music. We have now seen three pretty heavy movies, featuring terrorist assassins, ruined families, and amphetamine addiction, in that order. It’s time for something light, and something light we find. Johnny Knoxville in The Ringer. There was I time, round about the “Jackass” years, that I wanted nothing to do with Knoxville. I’d just as soon walk to the town in Tennessee than tune in to an episode or listen to him give an interview on Letterman. And then The Dukes of Hazzard happened. And now, The Ringer. I willingly make this the last film of Movie Day. It’s funny, it’s wrong in all sorts of ways, and it’s an hour and a half long. This will get us out at about 10:30. Laughing your way out of a theater is a good way to end the Day.

So one last time, we go in, find seats, watch those lights go down, and enjoy. Third row back, on the left, two seats over from a guy who works with the disabled, and becomes pretty vocal about it during the movie. Why come then? Me, I don’t mind. It’s My Day at the Movies.

So how was it? Awesome. Great. Near-perfect. Four movies in a row was actually perfect. Any more than that, the emotional ones start to get a little less emotional, the funny ones lose some humor, the backs and necks start to hurt more. And the quality of the day was great. Spielberg to Ang Lee/Larry McMurtry. Johnny Cash. And a movie that gets away with being politically incorrect. I’m not only okay with it, I love it.

From the Munich Olympics to the Special Olympics, it was a great day.