Yesterday, I finally went to see Milk, and it made me remember why I never go to the movies anymore. You've had this conversation, right? How you haven't gone to see a movie for ages and you're not sure why... You think maybe it's because you're so busy these days you can never block out the time, or maybe the movies have become so expensive that you think twice or three times before committing to go, or just that the movie you want to see always seems to playing a bit too early or too late to fit in with your schedule that particular day.
I know, for me, it's a combination of all of the above. And then I finally got it together to get my ass to a movie theater, and the real reason I don't go as often as I should came back to me in a rush. It's the people. The general movie-going public is a nightmare.
Last night, in a chock-full theater, I got stuck next to two ladies somewhere in their upper sixties. I'm guessing, I didn't look at them too closely when they arrived—late—and grabbed the last two remaining seats in the room. And they proceeded to ruin the whole movie for me. They were fine for the first 45 minutes, apart from some too-loud exchanges during the opening sequence—I think these broads were there at the time, so there were barks of recognition during the Castro-Back-in-the-Day montage.
But the hell began when they finished the popcorn. After placing the bag on the floor, the lady next to me began methodically to reach down, rummage around the bag for the leftover dried kernels, and, with her arm raised way high in the air, drop them into her mouth from her fingers. And then she crunched them with her mouth open. It sounded like someone smashing a sack of rocks against a wall. It was disgusting. She did this over and over again, slowly, deliberately and with great relish, crunching and cracking and smacking her lips, for about an hour, taking a short break now and then to lure me into a false sense of relief, only to lurch forward and start all over again.
It was so vile and distracting, I wanted to lean right over her, grab the bag and shake out the kernels all over her head. During particularly violent smacks and crunches I started making little noises like "Oh dear!" or "Oh my God!" and looking straight at her, but no, she was too far gone in her euphoric mastications to notice.
Towards the end of the film, she started reacting to the dramatic foreshadowing of Harvey's ultimate demise with a staccato outbursts of "Ah, ah, ah!" and announcing three times to her friend "Uh oh, this is when it happens!" in the later scenes with Dan White. I was ready to lose it and shushed her right in her face, which she seemed to ignore. Then she and her friend started openly discussing the action during the film's penultimate, climactic scene, and I that was it: I hollered, "Ladies be quiet for God's sake I mean it!"
They cowered. And they shut the hell up. But that was it, too late, the movie was ruined. I have no idea if it's as good as everybody says it is. I know Sean Penn nailed the mannerisms and turned in a sensitive, sympathetic performance, and Emile Hirsch was, what can I say, fabulous. But I was never really able to get into it. Thanks, bitches!
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