Jurassic World — as with any film involving animals eating people — is absolutely in our wheelhouse, so the Spousal Unit & I will no doubt make an effort to see it opening weekend, IMAX upgrades & all. I personally have a soft spot for a well-meaning knucklehead who knows his limitations, so I was also kind of charmed by the Chris Pratt tongue-in-check “pre-apology” that is now outraging a certain sliver of outrage junkies across the interwebs. As quoted in EW…
I want to make a heartfelt apology for whatever it is I end up accidentally saying during the forthcoming #JurassicWorld press tour. I hope you understand it was never my intention to offend anyone and I am truly sorry. I swear. I’m the nicest guy in the world. And I fully regret what I (accidentally will have) said in (the upcoming foreign and domestic) interview(s).
I am not in the business of making excuses. I am just dumb. Plain and simple. I try. I REALLY try! When I do (potentially) commit the offensive act for which I am now (pre) apologizing you must understand I (will likely have been) tired and exhausted when I (potentially) said that thing I (will have had) said that (will have had) crossed the line.[…] Trust me. I know you can’t say that anymore. In fact in my opinion it was never right to say the thing I definitely don’t want to but probably will have said.[…] To those I (will likely have had) offended rest assured I will do everything in my power to make sure this doesn’t happen (again).
As R.A. Lafferty would say: Tongue so firmly in cheek as to protrude from the vulgar bodily orifice.
***********
What movie releases are you looking forward to — or dreading — this summer?
Debbie(aussie)
Chris Pratt is very cute. Not a fan of the Jurassic movies. Will probably wait for Netflix(whatever) release.
Frankensteinbeck
I’m sorry, I just… can’t deal with the lack of feathers on their theropods. The coolest scientific discovery in my lifetime, and Hollywood is too chickenshit to take advantage of it.
OzarkHillbilly
Movies? What movies? And who’s IMAX?
raven
We watched Mr Turner last night. You can’t get and further from these silly ass monster movies than that.
Mustang Bobby
I am trying to think of the last time I drove to a shopping mall, wedged my car in between a GMC Gigavan and a Ford Exxon Valdez, paid $8 (senior citizen discount), got a barrel of cold popcorn covered with butter-flavored cancer-causing initials, found a seat that wasn’t broken, covered with gum, or near people nattering on their cell phones, sat through 20 minutes of previews “In A World…” that told me the whole movie and convinced me not to see it, three commercials, including one for more lobby junk food, before the actual film began. Oh, and 3-D is useless for the rather sizable population who for some reason or another (strabismus in my case) where 3-D doesn’t work but they didn’t bother to put the film out in regular format. It’s been a while.
Starz and HBO here.
Oh, and get off my lawn you pesky whippersnappers.
John M. Burt
My wife and I almost never go to movies, and we had our cable disconnected years ago. We do, though, watch movies and TV series on DVD from our local library (that’s our public library, Republicans!), and I’m looking forward to seeing Guardians of the Galaxy some time this summer.
We’ll probably see Age of Ultron before Christmas, but not before we finish the second season of Orphan Black.
PurpleGirl
@Mustang Bobby:
GMC Gigavan and a Ford Exxon Valdez,
LOL. Very good, Mustang Bobby, very good.
OzarkHillbilly
Global warming is a hoax. These repeated extreme rain events are just figments of your imagination.
The widespread heavy rains are being caused by a prolonged warming of Pacific ocean sea surface temperatures that generally results in cooler air, coupled with an active southern jet stream and plentiful moisture from the Gulf of Mexico, said meteorologist Forrest Mitchell at National Weather Service (NWS) office in Norman, Oklahoma.
So far this year, Oklahoma City has recorded 27.37in of rain. Last year at this time, only 4.29in had been recorded.
I don’t know what OKC normal yearly rainfall is, but ours up here in Washington Co MO is 40-45 inches. No way OKC is more. We had a nice gentle rain last night, first gentle rain we’ve had in about 2 months. The rest have been 1″ in a half hour torrents. I get happier all the time about our little ridge top homestead.
Valdivia
@raven:
I have been wanting to see that. Love his paintings.
PurpleGirl
Haven’t kept up with coming attractions, so I don’t know what’s out there beyond what I see commercials for. Nothing has really excited me for months.
raven
@Valdivia: It is a long and perplexing film. The acting and cinematography are wonderful.
Valdivia
@raven: I will make sure to watch it. He and his art have always fascinated me.
raven
@Valdivia: If you have BluRay player I suggest you get that version.
OzarkHillbilly
@raven: Here’s something for you to go watch on a lazy summer afternoon:
US navy divers on mission to recover Confederate warship from Georgia river
The ironclad CSS Georgia was scuttled by its crew in 1864. Now the civil war wreck is to be raised and preserved to improve access to the port of Savannah
….
Potts said the weapons systems would be removed first, then divers would focus on the propeller and main shaft, portions of its steam machinery and large portions of the ship’s armoured encasement. The armor for the ship, which was anchored off Fort Jackson as a floating gun battery, was made out of railroad iron.
Archaeologists will still make sure there are no other remnants remaining after the navy divers leave at the end of July. Work to preserve and catalogue all of the individual artefacts is expected to take another year or more.
Zinsky
Anything involving Tom Cruise will be solidly on my “Do Not View” list. Beyond that, I am pretty open-minded. I refuse to fund a cult where that diminutive twit is the primary spokesperson.
satby
It’s dorky, but I’m waiting for Second Best Exotic Marigold Hotel to be available on Amazon Prime in July. I’m right there with Mustang Bobby on the going to a mall theatre, and I’m a fan of classic and off-beat movies anyway, not loud explosions and mayhem.
sm*t cl*de
I would watch the hell out of a good movie version of “Fourth Mansions”.
JPL
@Zinsky: He was shooting a film last week, not far from me. Although, I’m not a fan of his, I heard he was very friendly. Cruise spent 45 minutes posing for pics, signing autographs and visiting with neighbors.
MattF
The quote reminds me of the comments on time-travel grammar in Douglas Adams’ books.
Baud
H/T Reddit
raven
@OzarkHillbilly: cool
NotMax
Haven’t set so much as set a toe inside a movie theater this century. And plan to keep it that way.
Megaplexes as sterile and interchangeable as spark plugs and rude, inconsiderate audiences have sucked all the joy out of the experience.
Mike J
@NotMax: It doesn’t bother me at all that theaters all look alike. Why shouldn’t they? They all do the same job, All cement factories look pretty much alike too.
What I object to is paying to watch commercials. The trade off is supposed to be that if I’m willing to sit through a commercial, I get the entertainment for free. Why should I pay twice?
Frankly, most movies aren’t worth paying for once. Every few years they might release a movie that’s not about a pervert that flies around in his underwear. I’m sometimes tempted to go see one, but then I sit down and relax and the feeling passes.
OzarkHillbilly
@Baud: She’s just a RINO. A Real Conservative ™ would have shot him.
Patricia Kayden
@OzarkHillbilly: TX and OK are not hating on the gays enough. Their god is not pleased.
debbie
@John M. Burt:
I too see my movies thanks to my local library. Currently, I’m re-watching Wolf Hall (even better the second time around) and will then get to work on the movies that have come out since January.
Another Holocene Human
@Zinsky: actually lots of actors are really tiny, and those 80s muscle men, der Oesterreicher chief among them, were an aberration
Another Holocene Human
@Mike J: The theaters were spun off from the studios long ago. Now the theaters are like retailers, trying not to get screwed by the studios. Unlike most retailers, theaters get a special all the risk none of the profit deal. They only make money when a massive hit comes out that, crucially, stays in theatres for weeks. A one weekend splash is not profitable.
So they make money on concessions and local advertising. And they hire as few staff as possible and pay ad little as possible. Ask the studios and their VC bankers why theaters are so dirty.
WereBear
@Another Holocene Human: Movie actors, in particular, look good with a small body and a big head. It compensates for the lens distortion.
OzarkHillbilly
@Another Holocene Human:
The last time my wife and I went to a movie theater (7 yrs ago, waiting for my granddaughter to be born) she wanted a soda for the movie.
“That’ll be $6 ma’am.”
“WHAT?!?!?!?!!??? Does it come with a straw????”
A half hour later I was still laughing so hard I almost had to leave the theater.
Schlemazel
@OzarkHillbilly:
Those are Gawd’s punishment for homos and lettin’ the coloreds inta our schools – ain’t now warming an I ken prove it. IT SNOWED LAST WINTER!
NotMax
@Mik J
Because a part of the experience is the ambience and personality of the venue. One doesn’t expect (and would likely be disappointed if it were so) that every live theater should be indistinguishable from another. Ditto for non-fast food dining establishments.
Cement factories don’t cater to nor invite the public to share their space. They exist solely to crank out a product. Sadly, that’s what movie theaters have sunk to as the be all and end all as well.
donnah
Mustang Bobby, you’re a genius.
We quit going to movie theaters for the same reasons as most everyone else. Expensive tickets, expensive concessions, and the horrible behavior of the general public.
I’m a “you kids get off my lawn” kinda gal anymore. I always end up seated next to or just in front of the kick-my-seat kid, the cell phone junkie, the perfume-bather, or the talky moron who doesn’t internalize incoming information without saying it out loud. “He has a gun! He’s going to shoot somebody!”
Flatscreen and Netflix, thanks.
NotMax
@Mik J
(Repost to try to alleviate FYWP.)
Because a part of the experience is the amb1ence and personality of the venue. One doesn’t expect (and would likely be disappointed if it were so) that every live theater should be indistinguishable from another. Ditto for non-fast food dining establishments.
Cement factories don’t cater to nor invite the public to share their space. They exist solely to crank out a product. Sadly, that’s what movie theaters have sunk to as the be all and end all as well.
Schlemazel
Because we can’t agree on many movies we both want to see we rarely go at all & often go to the same movie bin but see different films at the same time. She thinks “Tomorrowland” looks good while my default on any movie based on a ride will stink (Pirates being the only exception so far) and that the trailer looks empty. I don’t pay much attention to what will be coming out so there you go – as has been said many times, many ways
Merryget off my lawn!NotMax
@OzaekHillbilly
Each time, when I pay a bill in person, the cashier asks “Would you like the receipt stapled to the bill?” I respond “Is there a charge for the staple?”
One of these days there will be.
Poopyman
@OzarkHillbilly:
Don’t blame Obama.
gene108
One of the local theaters has put in Lay-z-Boy-esque reclining seats. I LOVE going to that theater. No sharing an arm rest with the person next you. Put your feet up, relax and watch the movie.
Another local theater renovated recently. They have some very big screens that make watching movies very nice, but they went with stadium seating – so 1990’s – and now are re-renovating to put in recliners.
In other words, I still like going to see movies on the big screen and I especially like the new theaters with the modern upgrades.
ThresherK
Just once in a while we hit the Googleplex. One of the longest-running “little theater re-opened for movie geeks” is in our city and it’s our preferred place because of the decent prices, great sightlines from every seat, \big screen, and a staff which really cares about movies.
That I don’t see anything until everyone else has bothers me not. Of course, I didn’t have HBO during the Sopranos, and I don’t Netflix. Yet.
OzarkHillbilly
@NotMax: Heh… I blame Obama.
@Poopyman: I blame Obama anyway.
gene108
As far as movies I want to see, Spy looks interesting. Hopefully it will be as good as the Johny English movies.
NotMax
@ThresherK
Granted my experience is limited, but the few big screens I’ve seen in multiplexes are nowhere near as big as in the movie emporia of yesteryear.
Have had friends tell me how much they dislike digital projection, as the colors are either washed out or overly garish and the depth of focus erratic and inconsistent.
Glidwrith
@gene108: We have one or two theatres that also offer nice dinners and serve alcoholic beverages; sort of a dinner- and-a-movie all-in-one. No kids allowed.
catclub
@OzarkHillbilly:
Mudsliiiiiide!
Amir Khalid
@Mustang Bobby:
Ah, but you should also mention the people in the row behind you who do play-by-play and colour commentary on the movie as it plays. And the people who seem to go to the movies specifically to do all their texting, and indeed don’t take out their phones to do so until they see the PSA that says “turn off your phone — the movie’s starting.”
NotMax
This goes back quite some years:
Was in a store once, in line to checkout.
Next to the register was a box of A Nightmare on Elm Street trading cards.
The couple in front of me were carrying a very young child. Said kid pointed to the picture on the wrapper of the cards and haltingly announced “Fred- dy Krue- ger!”
Who the hell brings a toddler to that type of flick?
Germy Shoemangler
Something I noticed about ten years ago. Every time we’d go to a mall movie theater the movie would be real DARK. Even scenes in bright sunlight or white backgrounds were a washed-out sepia. Scenes in shadowy or night settings would be almost black.
Then I read that theaters were saving money on projection bulbs. I think it was Ebert that pointed this out. After that, I went to a small, locally-owned theater, saw the same film (cheap matinee) and it was twice as bright.
Never went to a mall theater again.
Germy Shoemangler
When my son was six or seven years old we went to see a movie. After paying for the tickets, we walked past the concession stand. A guy working the concession remarked loudly that he was amazed I wasn’t buying snacks. A lady co-worker said loudly “probably can’t afford it after the price of the tickets.”
This was a mall.
Never again.
OzarkHillbilly
@catclub: Are all below the ridge top.
NotMax
@Germy Shoemangler
I worked in a movie theater for several years while in high school. Had any of the staff made such comments within patron (or management) earshot, they would have been out on their butts before the lion roared.
ThresherK
@NotMax: The one college-snob cinema I refer to is now digital, and they’ve made it work. I don’t know if the ordinary places I go infrequently are digital or not, and don’t go often enough to know the difference without a bit of training.
[ETA: @Germy Shoemangler: Beat me to it! But note that this didn’t even save their precious bulb resources.]
Do you remember Roger Ebert’s tsk-tsking in the old days? He said that movie chains would have the projector bulbs turned down to supposedly make the bulb last longer. That, he said, was bunk, and it resulted in a crummier experience for you and I, got in the way of what the movie was supposed to look like, and didn’t save the theater money because it didn’t extend the life of that not-cheap bulb.
That was then. If there’s a way, in the digital, “nobody needs any skill” age, to cheap-ass projection of digital cinema to chase a few pennies, I wouldn’t be at all surprised to find it being done.
Doug R
@Mustang Bobby: Most decent theaters have a flat showing or two or may have one of their screens with flat showings all day
MattF
@gene108: A Landmark theater opened in my neighborhood several years ago. It’s great– ‘reserved’ seating, good independent movies, edible food. There’s even a movie club you can join for screenings on weekend mornings.
Also, a couple of blocks away, there’s your basic multi-screen chain theater, so if you want to see Mad Max, you can do that too.
Germy Shoemangler
@ThresherK: I haven’t noticed any dark screens lately. It probably still goes on in the mall theaters.
The commercials infuriate me. When I was a kid, a trip to the movies in 1965 meant cartoons before the movie.
Pink Panther cartoons mostly. They were fun to see on a big screen.
Now? Nissan commercials.
ThresherK
Ugh. Edit ran out. Here’s an aritcle pointing out if you ran a Xenon projector bulb at3000W bulb at 2000W, you’d extend its life by all of 2.3 percent.
And it gets worse.
Amir Khalid
@Germy Shoemangler:
Them kids need to get their facts straight. Overpriced junk food is not what you and I go to the cinema for; and it’s the studios, not us moviegoers, who are screwing the cinema business.
Germy Shoemangler
@MattF: I don’t know if I like the Reserved Seating concept. How does it work?
If I walk in and want to take a seat, there’s a big Reserved sign on it? And I have to find a chair in the front row, directly under the screen?
rikyrah
uh huh
uh huh
……………………..
Palo Alto to Enforce the Largest Mass Displacement of People in History of the City
Aram James • May 18, 2015
Palo Alto is about to embark on the single largest mass deportation and dislocation of a people in the City’s history. The residents of Buena Vista Mobile Park, totaling around 400 people, may soon be forced off of the grounds which has been many of their homes for generations. The park sits on an approximately 4.5 acre site very near to El Camino Real, in the exclusive Barron Park neighborhood of Palo Alto, where the medium sales price of a home in April, 2015 was listed at $2,650,000. Contrast this with the mobile homes at Buena Vista that are mostly extremely small, some very old (some dating back as far as the 1950’s) densely packed on the property. In recent decades the park’s residences have been mostly low income Latino families, who own their mobile homes and pay rent for their spaces.
Yet despite being the only remaining mobile home park in Palo Alto, the city council on Tuesday April 14, 2015, with some minor changes to the relocation package, ruled to allow the closure of the Buena Vista Mobile Home Park.
Say what you want, some may prefer to sugar coat it, but the reality is that the practical impact of closing of the Buena Vista Mobile Home Park is in fact the ethnic cleansing of a large portion of Palo Alto’s Latino population, and the further re-segregation of Palo Alto schools.
The dropout rate for Latino students both in Santa Clara County and statewide is about 30 percent, contrasted with an almost zero percent dropout rate for low income Latino residences of Buena Vista. Many residence of BV have gone on to graduate from universities including Stanford University. Recent college graduates have come back to BV to start families of their own. Stories abound of families working several low paying jobs to support their children, many, if not most, of whom have defied the odds and gone on to great personal and academic achievements. Access to nationally rated Palo Alto schools has played a big part in this story.
……………………………
Would this same all white citizen council have allowed this to happen had Buena Vista been occupied primarily by my dad and grandfather’s people: Russian and Ukrainian Jews? Not a chance! “Tell the truth and shame the devil,” is an applicable idiom for the current situation.
And the last minute face saving efforts by the council, to sweeten the relocation package, to include factoring in the value of a Palo Alto education, and the safe neighborhood feel of Buena Vista, doesn’t alter the bottom line: The closure of the mobile home park has been approved, the die is cast.The residences of Buena Vista have been thrown to the wolves, another causality of the war on the poor.
And make no mistake, this wealthy white city council could have stopped this vicious attack.
http://www.siliconvalleydebug.org/articles/2015/05/18/palo-alto-enforce-largest-mass-displacement-people-history-city
Germy Shoemangler
@ThresherK: I would love the movie’s director to come sit and watch how they’re dim-bulb showing his creation. He’d probably throw a loud tantrum.
Even the meekest, most mild-mannered director (if there is such a thing) would throw an absolute shit fit if presented with the dim bulb experience.
MattF
@ThresherK: Wikipedia has some, ah, illumination on the subject. Incandescent bulbs do last longer at a lower wattage, but– 1) Xenon bulbs are not conventional incandescents, and 2) the lifetime of an incandescent bulb depends mostly on how often it’s turned off and on.
NotMax
@ThresherK
Professionalism and pride in presentation still exist, but much less so.
Quoted from a movie studio exec: “we have a robust system and we can pay any idiot $5 an hour to run it.” Source
MattF
@Germy Shoemangler: When you buy a ticket, you choose a seat. So, in fact, all seats are reserved.
NotMax
@ThresherK
Fixed for link fail.
Professionalism and pride in presentation still exist, but much less so.
Quoted from a movie studio exec: “we have a robust system and we can pay any idiot $5 an hour to run it.” Source
MomSense
I’m going to make an independent film called My Life With a Canine Stalker. Right now she is crouching along the ground, stopping when I look at her, inching ever closer to my plate of smoked salmon.
NotMax
@ThresherK
Fixed for link fail. Again.
Professionalism and pride in presentation still exist, but much less so.
Quoted from a movie studio exec: “we have a robust system and we can pay any idiot $5 an hour to run it.” Source
Germy Shoemangler
@rikyrah: Thank you for that link.
Have you seen this? It’s from Australia, but it’s relevant here as well.
Svensker
@rikyrah:
That is awful. But you gotta feel for the rich folks, having to live so close to all those brown poor folks, oh my stars.
Changing the subject completely, anyone heard anything from Soonergrunt? Been wondering/worrying about him lately and with the crazy weather in OK, am worrying more.
Germy Shoemangler
@MomSense: Our cat gets very alert and attentive whenever my wife eats popcorn. Cat lurks around her chair, hoping for a stray kernel to fall.
Germy Shoemangler
@MomSense: You should film it from her perspective. Call it “My Life Among The Smoked Salmon”
Germy Shoemangler
@MattF: I don’t know if I like that. I have to look at a seating chart when buying a ticket?
And then remember the seat when I enter the dark theater?
NotMax
@Germy Shoemangler
Cheapest cat treats ever are those biodegradable packing peanuts made of cornstarch.
Glidwrith
@Germy Shoemangler: Your cats like popcorn!?
Glidwrith
@NotMax: Have you ever tasted one of those? I did out of curiosity: pure chemical soup. Is there anything to show those are safe for an animal to eat?
Iowa Old Lady
Obviously not a new movie, but this weekend I saw “Kingsmen” on pay for view. I figured Colin Firth, good deal. So you know how we talk about making someone’s head explode? Here it is.
MattF
@Germy Shoemangler: Yup. Something of a nuisance when you buy a ticket at the theater entrance. But if you buy online or with one of the half-dozen ticket-selling machines in the theater lobby, it’s like buying any other kind of ticket.
Kay
Great piece on how going after public sector unions (and privatizing public sector jobs) hits African Americans and women hardest:
In Ohio (historically) these two groups were able to get these jobs because public sector jobs relied on objective measures to qualify for employment- things like civil service exams- rather than more subjective measures where bias comes in, and labor and employment laws were actually followed in the public sector.
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/05/25/business/public-sector-jobs-vanish-and-blacks-take-blow.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&module=second-column-region®ion=top-news&WT.nav=top-news&_r=0
Germy Shoemangler
@Glidwrith: One cat. And yes, she has an unhealthy fascination with the few popcorn kernels that have fallen to the floor. I don’t encourage it. I think she likes the salty taste.
Woodrowfan
I don;t enjoy watching people get eaten, so I’m eagerly awaiting the Minions movie.
Woodrowfan
and that is no accident. to the republican base government jobs are “n****r work” and so don;t deserve good pay or any benefits….
Grumpy Code Monkey
@Poopyman:
God, that still pisses me off. Water conservation? Restrict capture? Build new reservoirs? Invest in desalination technologies for coastal communities?
Fuck that, it costs money and pisses off big donors, we’re going to pray for rain instead.
I love my state. I despise the people who run it.
Germy Shoemangler
@MattF: Here’s an article about reserved seating:
https://thedissolve.com/news/4540-lets-stop-reserved-movie-theater-seating/
When I walk into a theater, I decide where to sit. If I see noisy teenagers, I won’t sit in front of them. I only buy tickets at the box office, I don’t do it online or with an app.
I think this may be the last straw.
Kay
@Woodrowfan:
I watched a coordinated (and very sophisticated) smear campaign against public sector workers in my state in 2010 and it had two parts. One part was directed at “job creators- “lazy public sector should be privatized”, what we’re all familiar with.
But the other part was even more disturbing, because it was directed at lowest-level private sector working people- it was based on setting them against middle class public sector workers. “THEY have what you don’t have” and in Ohio anyway, there was definitely a race element.
It works both ways, and they run both simultaneously. The second is more dangerous, I think, because sometimes “liberals” sign onto it in what is in my view a misguided attempt to advocate for poor people.
ruemara
Lord, some a you complain. I like reserved seating, because I can pick my seat in advance. And I like going to the movies, when I can spare it. Why? Because why not? Some things deserve to be seen in theatres. Like Mad Max or Age of Ultron. I’m looking forward to hate watching Jurassic World with my friends and I may even see Spy. It depends on the budget. I won’t know what will strike my fancy until it does.
OzarkHillbilly
@Kay: Yes, the old ‘those people have it too good” argument has been used for eons to bring everyone*** down to the lowest level as opposed to bringing everyone up to the higher level.
*** everyone = the 99%
MattF
@Germy Shoemangler: I don’t have a strong reaction to it, one way or the other. Since Landmark doesn’t do SF or action pictures, you don’t get hordes of teenagers anyhow. My guess is that it’s regarded as a sort of marketing ploy and an excuse to raise prices a bit.
raven
Here’s an article about the Vietnam War from a VC’s perspective.
Chris
Jurassic World and Mission: Impossible.
Not Ant Man, which I kind of expect to be Marvel’s shark jumping moment.
Iowa Old Lady
@Germy Shoemangler: Sometimes those theaters have reclining seats with footrests, making it difficult to get in and out of the aisle. I don’t know how fire regulations fit that in.
I like a movie at the theater though. It feels immersive so sit there in the dark in front of a huge screen.
lamh36
@ruemara: thank goodness someone else said this. I was just thinking the same.
the majority if this thread spends like a bunch of ole foagies :-).
I’m actually going to movies today to see Pitch Perfect and I love summer movie time. I’ll def be seeing Jurassic World, both cause I like Pratt and cause they filmed some of the movie in NOLA.
the next opening night movie I’m going to see will probably be San Andreas with Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson. One, cause I love him, and 2nd, I’m a sucker for a good special effects laden disaster film.
if I don’t see San Andreas opening weekend, I’ll def be seeing Spy! They had me at Melissa McCarthy and Jason Statham! Also to the director Feig, has directed 2 of my fav female-lead comedies of the last 3 years…Bridesmaids & The Heat.
Germy Shoemangler
@lamh36: I’m no old fart! I love the theater experience (ever since I stopped going to the mall theaters with their bulb-saving scheme) I love big action sci-fi 3D movies. Some films need to be seen on a big screen in front of an appreciative audience.
But I draw the line at reserved seating. I decide where I want to sit when I enter the theater.
Fuck reserved seating.
Chris
@Kay:
The federal government is one of the few places where black people can get a fair shake. So, naturally, it’s attacked as giving them unfair benefits. “Fair” would be shitting on them just like the private sector does; it’s not right that there be an employer out there that doesn’t screw black people, all the bleating about the value of competition be damned.
Similarly, the fact that federal employees are among the few whose pensions and compensations haven’t been totally raped in the last thirty five years is something horrifyingly sketchy and totally to their discredit, and we must screw them over as well or it’s just not fair. (And that’s totally not appealing to “envy” or “crab bucket mentalities.”)
gene108
@lamh36:
The Geologist in me (B.S. Geology, NCSU 1996, though have switched fields since), cringes at the bending of the laws of nature required to make San Andreas.
I could not sit through it.
Looking forward to Spy.
@Germy Shoemangler:
Seats are numbered, with rows being represented by letters, so far example you have a seat D4.
You can either pick the seat by ordering tickets on-line or just go to the theater and buy them and put in your seat choice, when you get tickets.
It is different, but the advantage is you do not need to come really early to a movie, in order to make sure you get a good seat.
Also, unless the theater is sold out – which you can look up on-line – you can move around to different seats that are empty.
FortGeek
@Another Holocene Human: My local AMC theaters (formerly RAVE Motion Pictures) don’t even have people staffing the ticket room out front (space for maybe a half dozen of them, if it gets busy enough) or even have ticket-tearing ushers at the door. You have to go stand in line at the big main concession counter for your ticket (and would you like a refreshing Coke ™ for $4.50?).
Eventually I expect they’ll just put an ATM-style ticket dispenser at the door of each screening room–or even on the armrests of each chair. Anything to cut back on those unnecessary “employee” vermin.
For “Mad Max” they had 15 minutes of ads on a loop. Ignored several of them twice, ignored the Cute Hollywood Gossip Story Chicks, ignored the concession ads (did turn off my phone, though), and endured the previews (buncha “nope” movies coming out, imagine that). Movie was good–but there should have been some discounts for all the freaking ads. (/grumble)
(my lawn sucks and has prickly stuff hiding in what little grass there is; we encourage young folks to go barefoot for our entertainment)
gene108
@Chris:
When people bitch about the lack of “competition” in government sector jobs, such as amongst public school teachers, I wish someone would just say, “what the fuck is wrong with job security and a pension, when you retire?”
It’s as if not being at the whims of the business cycle is somehow a bad thing, unless you are a big time T.V. talking head, where you probably have a pretty solid contract that your employer cannot terminate without cause.
In other words, I bet the losers on CNBC all have pretty good contracts, which give them some level of job security they want to deny to everyone else.
Germy Shoemangler
@gene108:
How do you know the seat isn’t reserved?
FortGeek
@Poopyman: God only took 4 years to get it done (dude’s busy helping sports teams, y’know ;). It would seem the prayin’ Texans weren’t specific enough to add, “…But don’t let it rain TOO much, mmkay?”
gene108
@Germy Shoemangler:
Nobody is sitting in it :-)
mattH
Went and saw Mad max yesterday, so worth seeing in a theater. Such a spectacle, I don’t think seeing it at home would quite have done it justice, and the feminist tones are nice.
Is there a single disaster movie that has held any semblance of scientific accuracy? Towering Inferno maybe? Not making any excuses mind you, suspension of disbelief is nearly impossible with any disaster movie for me, unlike sci-fi, fantasy, and distopianism done right.
Germy Shoemangler
@gene108: Until they show up ten minutes into the film and tell you to scram.
Lovely movie-going experience.
Valdivia
@raven:
thanks for the tip and reminding me that the movie is now on dvd.
Kay
I’m watching my son’s Corgo while he and his wife attend a wedding in Ohio and this dog is defined by the word “bossy”.
He stayed ahead of me all day yesterday while I gardened and I felt herded.
He’s cute and he seems smart but God, are they all like this? It’s like having a supervisor who won’t delegate. I think I can get from the front flower bed to the garage without oversight, buddy. No wandering off to the mailbox allowed!
mattH
Another thing, there’s new tech coming down the line from Dolby called Dolby Vision, increases the contrast ratio in a theater from the current washed out levels to much higher contrast levels, making for a more eye-popping experience. One of the few things I’ve seen tech-wise that makes me thing it may be just as good a reason to see a movie in the theater as at home where new TV’s can potentially do the same.
Ignore the numbers though for comparison. Contrast ratio, while being the most important thing a TV does, is pretty much unquantifiable. Testing isn’t standardized, nor does the number represent anything concrete.
FortGeek
@Glidwrith: I wish there were a theater with the attitude of Alamo Drafthouse where I live. They’ve got a not-safe-for-work ad up on YouTube mocking some young woman who got kicked out for texting. She called them and left an angry voicemail…and they use it in their ad, complete with mocking subtitles.
Epic. My kind of place.
gene108
@Germy Shoemangler:
What’s the difference between that and pick out your seat, having a group show and say, “hey, can you move, we are trying to sit together,” or “you know I ‘reserved’ that seat for my friend”.
Like I said, unless the movie’s sold out, it isn’t a big deal to find an empty seat and if the movie is sold out, you can pick a good seat or go to another screening, if there are no good seats left.
FortGeek
@NotMax: When the “Grindhouse” double feature premiered a few years ago, there was at least one couple who brought a toddler with them. I don’t know what the kid made of the first flick (“Planet Terror”, with gory zombies).
Did get a laugh, though, when the couple left after that movie–apparently unaware that there was a second movie about to start.
gene108
@mattH:
Earthquake movies are just over-the-top for me, unless it is on the SyFy channel and they are deliberately being over-the-top cheesy.
I mean really, getting several feet of vertical and hoirzontal displacement from an earthquake? That’s just too much for me to take.
There was that movie, a few years back, where the Earth was flash frozen – forget the name, something like “Day After Tomorrow” – which I can deal with, because it’s just over-the-top and not something that actually happens in the real world, unlike Earthquakes.
MattF
@gene108: Well, as a matter of fact, the great Alaska earthquake of 1964 had vertical displacements of up to 40 feet, so… it can happen.
ArchTeryx
@Frankensteinbeck: There’s a very easy handwave for that, which they gleefully use. These aren’t dinosaurs. They’re amphibian chimeras pretending to be dinosaurs.
That’s even before we get into the “let’s cook up a fully sentient apex predator, lock ’em up and see what happens!” bit.
I’m going just to root for the faux dinosaur. Maybe if it eats enough stupid people, we can all have nice things again.
shell
Somebody wanna explain the logic of remaking ‘Poltergeist’ ? One of the most perfect horror movies.
Gravenstone
@Germy Shoemangler: Our theater recently implemented this (along with retrofitting to install the recliner seats). My first encounter was for Age of Ultron/ Basically there is a touchscreen at the point of sale that shows which seats remain available. You select where you’d like to sit as you purchase your tickets. Then simply go to your selected seats.
ArchTeryx
@shell: Like with most remakes, Because They Could.
At least the Mad Max remake/reboot was done by the same director that did all the original movies. Not to mention, he took all the stuff good in the original movies and turned it up to eleven. That is how you do it.
Poltergeist: The Remake did none of those things. It deserves to die the same sort of ignominious death as the Poseidon Adventure remake did.
Elie
Count me as being conned, but I am lining up to see this Jurassic Park movie like I did all the others. I love the rollercoaster and it is one of my guilty pleasures that I sit in the movie and squee next to my husband while peeking though my fingers.. I don’t go for all the horror movies out these days, but the Jurassic Park series are fun to me…
Chris
@gene108:
I think at least part of my cynicism towards “support our troops!” rhetoric is because it’s matched by such complete, open contempt and hatred for every other kind of public servant (with the possible exception of cops).
Granted, the adoration we have for soldiers is highly contingent and mostly for show in any case.
Elie
@Chris:
I think a lot of things are going on with the excess reverence for the military. For the elite, its a symbol of their dominance and schools such as West Point and the military academies are reserved for the true rich elite and the poor who are smart and do very well in school. For poor people – especially poor and working class whites, with so so education, I think its a way to identify with being elite themselves. Without that, they are just ordinary po folks like the blacks and browns they so hate. The reverence does not carry over to other public servants because poor whites do not go into public service (except for being policemen) . Their need is not for serving the public or community. It is to be elite. They can stand shoulder to shoulder with the elite military leadership and dream of themselves as significant and representing the glories of conquest (which implies being better than others — again, dreams of the elite). Secondarily, the military also offers jobs to those who might have trouble finding them otherwise. Also.
Chris
@Elie:
Agree with all of this, I think.
I think it’s notable that the only jobs that command any respect anymore are business leaders and uniformed servicemen (military and police). That would be, to use the old Marxist frame of reference, the bosses and their enforcers. Every other form of work from schoolteachers to mechanized labor to any of a number of jobs that used to be proudly considered salt-of-the-earth, is now devalued as worthless, not real work, jobs that are given as charity to the lazy, unskilled, talentless masses who should be grateful they’re even getting that much.
I hadn’t thought of it this way but you’re right that in that context, the “enforcer” job comes off as aspirational to a whole load of people who know they’re never going to be bosses. But by God, at least they’ll be somebody.
sm*t cl*de
@Germy Shoemangler:
Have you seen this? It’s from Australia, but it’s relevant here as well.
SMUT ANGRY. SMUT SMASH NOW.
Anne Laurie
@Kay:
Yep, sounds like a Corgi!
Thing to remember is, they were bred for cattle herding, and cows are meaner than sheep — they kick when a dog nips to move them along. That’s where the short corgi legs are an advantage, the kicks tend to go over the dog’s head. (Lots of corgis also seem to be hardwired, they nudge/nip to move you in the direction you ‘should’ go, and then lean their whole body backwards, as if avoiding a phantom hoof.)
Other way of thinking about it, the corgi bloodlines come from Viking cattle-thieves (Swedish Valhund) by way of French-Breton cattle drovers. So you’ve got the Viking machismo thing plus the French arrogance…
Bonnie
I stopped paying attention to the trailers when I realized they come out so far in advance that when the movie opens, I have forgotten what the movie is about. However, I don’t like sci-fi; I don’t like too much nudity/sexual intercourse or cussing. And, I don’t like the special effects that look like cartoons. Thus, there is very little the current movies offer an old broad like me who just wants to see a good story with good acting. I wouldn’t walk across the street to see most of these movies, let alone pay $10 to see one. It is disappointing because I think going to see a movie in a theater on a big screen is one of the great experiences that has been ruined. However, I do understand that I am not in the age group that all this stuff is geared for; but, it is sad that it is one more thing that makes growing older even more difficult.
MDC
@NotMax:
I really doubt that has anything to do with digital projection. Digital is far, far more consistent than old-school film projection, where prints were often dirty, scratched, spliced, faded, jittery, etc. Digital images are rock-solid and look the same every time.
What I think your friends may be noticing is not changes in projection, but changes in filmmaking. It’s become common practice now to apply heavy-handed color grading to films in post-production. Some films get a desaturated, washed-out look; some get unnaturally vivid color; some get a strong color tint — greenish, or bluish, or something else. And then there’s the continuing rampage of teal and orange.
Tehanu
@shell:
You need an explanation? Never mind, Jake, it’s Hollywood. $$$$$$$$$$$$
@Chris:
What you and Elle both said. I never thought I’d see the day when the whole “us vs. them” thing was used against ourselves.
VFX Lurker
@Frankensteinbeck:
The “Velociraptors” (*cough* Deinonychus *cough*) in Jurassic Park III had feathers. Do a Google image search for “feathers Jurassic Park 3” to see them.
That said, Hollywood’s happy to serve whatever audiences will eat, as long as it doesn’t cost too much. It’s hard (and expensive!) to make computer-rendered feathers that look believable on the big screen.
Zinsky
Went to Far From the Madding Crowd today with the wife. Decent acting and beautiful cinematography – but, the storyline was implausible and lots of plot holes or unresolved questions.
jl
Why didn’t they just nuke it?
Paul in KY
@OzarkHillbilly: She was burning fossil fuels during the murder attempt. You gotta give her that.
Paul in KY
@WereBear: Makes them look skinnier, too.
Paul in KY
@Amir Khalid: They do that in KL too? Man, the world just got a little smaller…
Paul in KY
@raven: Excellent & interesting article, raven. Thanks for the link.