Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

When I decide to be condescending, you won’t have to dream up a fantasy about it.

… riddled with inexplicable and elementary errors of law and fact

Tick tock motherfuckers!

Technically true, but collectively nonsense

“More of this”, i said to the dog.

fuckem (in honor of the late great efgoldman)

… pundit janitors mopping up after the GOP

I’d hate to be the candidate who lost to this guy.

Republicans are the party of chaos and catastrophe.

Let’s not be the monsters we hate.

You can’t attract Republican voters. You can only out organize them.

Good lord, these people are nuts.

The words do not have to be perfect.

Incompetence, fear, or corruption? why not all three?

Authoritarian republicans are opposed to freedom for the rest of us.

Their freedom requires your slavery.

Wow, I can’t imagine what it was like to comment in morse code.

Eh, that’s media spin. biden’s health is fine and he’s doing a good job.

The worst democrat is better than the best republican.

Not all heroes wear capes.

Is it irresponsible to speculate? It is irresponsible not to.

Balloon Juice has never been a refuge for the linguistically delicate.

Do not shrug your shoulders and accept the normalization of untruths.

if you can’t see it, then you are useless in the fight to stop it.

You are here: Home / Economics / C.R.E.A.M. / Respite Open Thread: Last Night’s Golden Globes

Respite Open Thread: Last Night’s Golden Globes

by | 183 Comments

This post is in: , ,

Since it’s very difficult to tell, these days: Yes, satire:

I’m kinda hoping, by this time next year — politics willing and the pandemic numbers don’t rise — we’ll have the mental bandwidth to spend a Sunday evening discussing dopey drunken movie award shows again.

Also, frankly, that preview parody makes more sense to me than ‘See, it’s the INTANGIBLES’ stories than this one…

Reader Interactions

183Comments

  3. 3.

    john b

    Emmy’s were done far better with less glitches. Also did not like last night’s extremely awkward “zoom chats” that half of the participants didn’t seem to realize were even being shown live.

  5. 5.

    Brachiator

    The sad irony is that there are still billions of dollars of movies still waiting for a release date.

    The Top Gun sequel. The last Daniel Craig Bond movie. The Peter Jackson redo of the Beatles documentary. Tons more.

    And no one knows if movie theaters will recover.

    I guess that NY and CA theaters are still closed. My sister sent a photo of a parking lot full of cars outside an AMC theater in Texas.

    If the pandemic is supposedly conquered, will you go back to the movie show? Or is streaming sufficient for your needs?

    I don’t want to have to join and quit a streaming service just to see any one particular movie.

    ETA: I taped the Globes, but didn’t have a chance to watch it. Makes sense that it was a Zoom spectacular. But that still had to be strange.

  6. 6.

    Raoul Paste

    Also I was shocked to see how handsome Sasha Baron Cohen is in real life

    I wish he would do a different type of comedy

  7. 7.

    debbie

    @Raoul Paste:

    There were plenty of glitches, I thought. And I don’t know why the sound quality still is very uneven.

    My local station lost their transmitter at about 10:45. I wasn’t impressed enough to be upset that I missed the last award.

  9. 9.

    mali muso

    I live near a drive-in movie theatre that has always been popular locally but has definitely seen a huge boom in traffic with the pandemic.  It will be interesting to see how things shake out.

  11. 11.

    Martin

    @Brachiator: I think theaters have been the problem. Streaming music didn’t consolidate around exclusives because there was no more dominant distribution channel. But theaters prevented streaming from being the primary distribution mechanism, forcing them to become production houses to compete and differentiate.

    I think we’ll see a new tier of streaming service which takes over the theater role of primary revenue driver. It won’t be ‘watch unlimited for $10/mo’ – more like the Disney+ surcharge approach, but one that would allow distribution on any streaming service.

    The upshot is that would force theaters to make their experience nicer, though lower volume (which they’re already suffering from).

  12. 12.

    Jeffery

    I haven’t been in a movie theater in ten years. Don’t expect to ever go to one again. I get DVDs from the library.

  13. 13.

    debbie

    @Raoul Paste:

    True. But doing it by Zoom is doing it on the cheap. I can’t remember what I was watching recently, but they set up cameras in the participants’ homes, so the quality was far better. Considering how much was saved by not having to provide dinner, vast quantities of alcohol and wine, and maybe even goody bags, they should have been able to focus more on production values.

  14. 14.

    jeffreyw

    We had quit going to movies at theaters way before covid.  I am happy with streaming. I think the last movie we saw on a big screen was Saving Pvt Ryan.

  15. 15.

    Lapassionara

    @Brachiator: I’ll definitely go back to a movie theater when we are back to “normal.” I have realized that being with an audience is part of the movie-watching experience. I have also realized that activities that I considered “entertainment” were really more than just entertainment. They help keep me alive, mentally.

  16. 16.

    NotMax

    Robert Benchley, A Night at the Movies.

    :)

    On the same subject, while hardly a masterpiece, the spoof of the movie business “It’s a Great Feeling” is on TCM Tuesday at 5:15 a.m. Eastern time. More cameos than you can shake a stick at. And keep an eye peeled for character actor Irving Bacon as a railway station clerk, milking his scene for all it’s worth.

  17. 17.

    LuciaMia

    Got my first dose of the vaccine on Saturday. Yay! Not so Yay; wish there was a more comprehensive list of possible side effects. Seems 10 to 20% can experience diarrhea. Turns out I fell into that category. Hit me like a bomb Sunday night. If Id known I coulda been prepared. (Begging my sister this morning to get me some Immodium AD).

    Read that this shows an immune response. Great, As I got yanked outta bed at 2am for the sixth time I shoulda thought, “This is a GOOD thing!”

  18. 18.

    UncleEbeneezer

    Glad to see my crush, Andra Day ❤️❤️❤️, awarded last night.  While the US vs. Billie Holiday is uneven at times, focusses a lot on trauma and shitty men and doesn’t really do anything super-original with the traditional formula for biopics, Day’s performance is Oscar-worthy indeed.  Especially for her first role.  Also, the music (obviously) and costumes are superb.  Very enjoyable watch.  Really brings home just how racist our War on Drugs has been from the get-go.

  19. 19.

    debbie

    @Martin:

    There’s a guy on my local FB art group that does Etch A Sketches. He’s not of the caliber of your link, but the younger participants are very impressed. I guess younger folks know little or nothing about the Etch A Sketch potential.

  20. 20.

    Steve in the ATL

    My wife loves going to movies, but we’ve been to only one in the last several years because almost all of them are super heroes and/or comic books and we don’t swing that way.  Which makes us pariahs, apparently.

  21. 21.

    tokyokie

    I have always loved going to see movies, and until this last year, probably averaged seeing at least a movie a week for most about 40 years. Last Thursday, I got my second Covid shot (I’m a front-line healthcare worker, over 65, and have a couple of comorbidities), and to celebrate, I went to the big AMC in the suburb to see Nomadland in the theater’s IMAX auditorium. Only four other people were in the auditorium, and as I waited through the credits to leave, I was not merely the only person left in the auditorium, I seemed to be the only person (including staff) left in the theater and the shopping mall. It was a very odd feeling. And then it hit me that that had been my first trip to that theater in a year. I really hope that the film exhibitors industry doesn’t collapse. I don’t want to depend on streaming my entertainment.

  24. 24.

    tokyokie

    @Steve in the ATL: I don’t go to comic-book movies or movie versions of old TV shows, which limits my choices. But the theater where I saw Nomadland had been bringing in lots of Korean, Chinese, and Indian films, and I’d hate for it to close down, so I want to support it and other movie theaters. Even to the point of buying overpriced concessions.

  25. 25.

    zhena gogolia

    @schrodingers_cat:

    The movies we have gone to see in theaters in the last ten years are:

    The King’s Speech (maybe that’s 11)

    Mamma Mia Here We Go Again

    Little Women

    Florence Foster Jenkins

    Downton Abbey

    Paddington Two

    We have great taste!

  27. 27.

    Van Buren

    My wife is calling one of her MAGA brothers to wish him a happy birthday and I can hear him mocking the idea of getting vaccinated.

    So over stupidity.

  29. 29.

    Ohio Mom

    LuciaMia @18:

    Yes, my friend who is a pharmacist told me long ago, Side effects are good! We like side effects, that means it’s working.

  31. 31.

    John Revolta

    When there’s a movie out that Mrs. Revolta and I want to see, which is fairly rare these days, we’ll wait ’til it’s been out for a month or so and then go to a late showing at the multiplex. Often we’ll be the only ones there. It’s great!

  33. 33.

    WaterGirl

    @LuciaMia: My own personal theory is that the side effects hit you at your weakest links.  Old injuries that don’t normally bother you?  Shooting pains.  You tend to get headaches?  You’ll get headaches with shot #2.  Tend to have sensitive skin?  Blazing red after shot #2.

    That’s my theory based on all the reactions I have seen so far.  I could be right or I could be full of it, but that’s my theory, anyway.

  37. 37.

    Geminid

    @Raoul Paste: I read that Sascha Barron-Cohen says he is moving on from his impersonation comedies. He was good at it, and had a shrewd sense of how to spoof people. When he made his movie about American conservative gun nuts, Barron-Cohen pretended to be an Israeli security expert. Most of his targets fell for the act head over heels, although Sarah Palin smelled a rat. But now, Barron-Cohen has no need to make low-budget mockumentaries.

  38. 38.

    Brachiator

    @Martin:

    I think theaters have been the problem. Streaming music didn’t consolidate around exclusives because there was no more dominant distribution channel. But theaters prevented streaming from being the primary distribution mechanism, forcing them to become production houses to compete and differentiate.

    Streaming of new movies might be a little different than streaming music.

    People listen to the same music on the services, maybe a few exclusives. But say the new Bond movie and the Top Gun sequel are from different studios.

    What if I just want to see the one movie and not sign up forever for the entire catalog? Yeah I can sign up and cancel, but do I want to do that once a month or once a week?

    Studios will also have to give up IMAX and 3D, which were significant revenue streams.

    And, the elephant in the room, is that the streaming service model may not cover movie production costs. There was already a mini-scandal about WB adjusting their backend deals for the director and star of Wonder Woman 1984.

    Side issue: I don’t know how switching to streaming will affect whether the second run movie houses will still get product.

    I think we’ll see a new tier of streaming service which takes over the theater role of primary revenue driver. It won’t be ‘watch unlimited for $10/mo’ – more like the Disney+ surcharge approach, but one that would allow distribution on any streaming service.

    This might be interesting. But I also hear that Disney, Amazon, Universal may open their own movie theaters, where they show only their own movies.

    The upshot is that would force theaters to make their experience nicer, though lower volume (which they’re already suffering from).

    I don’t know that this solves the problem of fewer movies. The Alamo Draft House experience. I can’t see parents paying a premium for kid’s movies. This is already a niche market. Making it more niche is not going to bring people into the movie theaters.

  39. 39.

    trollhattan

    @NotMax: 
    Bunnies everywhere!

    Binging “Babylon Berlin” and am on season 3. Surprised at how much of the little bits of colloquial German I’m picking up (been a looong time since high school) because the subtitles don’t distinguish between du and sie, for example, and the many ways to say “hi” and “goodbye.”

    Anyhoo, a very well done series if you like that sort of thing (quite a few characters are not very nice). To compare and contrast, “Peaky Blinders” also covers the period (1929) but spans much more time.

  40. 40.

    Brachiator

    @NotMax:

    And keep an eye peeled for character actor Irving Bacon as a railway station clerk, milking his scene for all it’s worth.

    So, you are saying that Bacon is really a ham…

  42. 42.

    BruceFromOhio

    Amy & Tina still got it.

    Also: Gaia save me, I accidentally clicked on one of the ads in the banner, and now it’s an endless parade of ads for compression bandages and medically-oriented products. I really miss the Revolve swimsuits. Time to reprogram the AdSense cookies!

  45. 45.

    Brachiator

    @Lapassionara:

    I’ll definitely go back to a movie theater when we are back to “normal.” I have realized that being with an audience is part of the movie-watching experience. I have also realized that activities that I considered “entertainment” were really more than just entertainment. They help keep me alive, mentally.

    I know what you mean!

    Streaming at home is just not the same.

    I guess whether I return to the movie theaters depends on news we hear about the vaccination rates. I am not sure that I would want to be in a packed movie house with a lot of non-vaccinated people, even if the vaccine is supposedly protecting me.

  46. 46.

    debbie

    @Dorothy A. Winsor:

    There was a period back in the 1990s (which I think began with Miramax) when the trailers were more or less mini-synopses. Sit through the trailer, skip the movie.

  49. 49.

    GGordonL

    1. I wish someone would make the satire “The Hills Have Eyes Eulogy” wherein a Harvard educated son of a murderous irradiated mutant clan returns to the proving grounds of his youth to discover that his community has been abandoned to their fates by the coastal eliets.
    2. Only problem is the right won’t get the satire.
  54. 54.

    Chyron HR

    @Brachiator: ​
     

    There was already a mini-scandal about WB adjusting their backend deals for the director and star of Wonder Woman 1984.

    As opposed to the major scandal of the script, one presumes.

  55. 55.

    tokyokie

    @Brachiator: 

    This might be interesting. But I also hear that Disney, Amazon, Universal may open their own movie theaters, where they show only their own movies.

    How can that possibly be squared with the Supreme Court decision in U.S. v. Paramount Pictures, which forbade the vertical integration of the motion-picture industry under anti-monopoly laws?

  57. 57.

    Tom Q

    I’m aging and stuck in my ways, and possibly dismissable to a lot of you, but…Jesus, I can’t imagine giving up on seeing movies in theatres.  I typically go to 20-30 movies a year — not the frickin’ super-hero movies, the grown-up ones — and it’s driven me batty to have had to watch them at home this year.  I just can’t muster the full concentration I automatically get when I’m in an auditorium with a huge screen and powerful sound system.  I’ve worked hard, on movies like Mank, One Night in Miami, Judas and the Black Messiah (the last having an exceptional performance from Kaluuya), but it’s hard work not glancing away at distractions (to say nothing of getting interference if someone calls or texts in the middle of it).  I also don’t subscribe to every damn streaming service on the planet, leaving me without the universal access to movies I’d have in a normal year

    I’m in NY, where the big AMC is supposed to open this week, and I’m hoping to be able to see, minimally, Nomadland there before the Oscars (the only award show that counts, assuming any of them  do).  I’m getting my second Moderna shot Friday, so I’m figuring by two weeks from now I’ll be safely able to go with my old friend/movie buddy, who’s already had her two shots.

    Obviously our lives vary, but being able to go to movies again is one of the primary things I crave in the post-COVID world.

  58. 58.

    raven

    The “movies are just different” in theaters reminds me of the “records just sound better than CD’s or streaming music”. If you want it to be it is. I gave up on movie theaters when all the bullshit talking and raising hell during the films started and I won’t be going back. Every now and then I’ll go by myself to something like Dunkirk but otherwise I’ve been done for years.

  60. 60.

    raven

    @Tom Q: ” but it’s hard work not glancing away at distractions (to say nothing of getting interference if someone calls or texts in the middle of it).  ” Huh?

  61. 61.

    Brachiator

    @tokyokie:

    This might be interesting. But I also hear that Disney, Amazon, Universal may open their own movie theaters, where they show only their own movies.

    How can that possibly be squared with the Supreme Court decision in U.S. v. Paramount Pictures, which forbade the vertical integration of the motion-picture industry under anti-monopoly laws?

    The movie studios and streaming services are saying that times are different and it is time to set aside this old, outdated ruling.

    What does it say already if you can only watch a Disney movie on Disney Plus?

  66. 66.

    raven

    @Steve in the ATL: I was lucky enough to know Panic’s manager and got to go backstage and burn one with Popper! The best show I saw there was a toss up between War and Zevon.

  71. 71.

    satby

    Last movie I went to was a TCM sponsored anniversary showing of the restored Casablanca. That was fabulous, and seeing it in a full theater of classic film buffs did make the experience special. But I otherwise hate going to movies and dealing with other people’s rudeness. Other than that one movie, it’s been close to 20 years since I’ve gone to a movie in a theater.

  73. 73.

    randy khan

    I miss going to movies.  I didn’t go often, but the experience is so much different than seeing it on a smaller screen at home.

    Also, check out the credits at the end of that trailer.

  74. 74.

    Tom Q

     

     

     

     
    @raven: ​
    Not sure what’s confusing about this. When I go to the movies, my concentration is unimpeded (especially during afternoon shows, which I typically patronize). At home, I can hear noise from the street…or my cat can jump in my lap…or my phone can ring, or I can hear a text come in. Any or all of these things draw me out of the film, make it less intense an experience.

  76. 76.

    raven

    @Tom Q: It was confusing because I thought the texting distractions you were talking about were in the theater. I find the audience at the theater way more distracting than anything at my home.

  78. 78.

    sab

    @Tom Q: Ever been a lone woman in an afternoon theater? Every creep in town is moving into the seat next to you and grabbing your thigh in the dark. When you leave you are not sure he isn’t following you to the parking lot or worse.

  81. 81.

    debbie

    @sab:

    I lost about 15 minutes of Blue Velvet after what the guy sitting behind me was doing during the ether scene. ? All these years later, I’m still shocked.

  82. 82.

    Ceci n est pas mon nym

    We were fairly regular theater-goers before the pandemic. Perhaps half and half art theaters vs first-run theaters. We were more than once the only people in the theater. That’s a weird experience.

    I think the art theaters were still getting a decent crowd.

    For some things I like the theater experience better than streaming, but I don’t know when we’ll go back to it, if it’s there to go back to. Wouldn’t it be funny if the big chains like AMC went under and houses like the Ritz in Philly and the IFC in New York were the survivors?

  83. 83.

    James E Powell

    I like to go to theaters for the films that need a big screen, sci-fi mostly, but also things like Dunkirk, anything with a lot of special effects. I think I’d have liked Tenet more if I had seen it on a big screen. I expect to feel the same about Dune.

    I saw the original Let It Be movie at the theater and I’d like to see Peter Jackson’s at the theater as well.

  84. 84.

    Brachiator

    @satby:

    Other than that one movie, it’s been close to 20 years since I’ve gone to a movie in a theater.

    Damn. Close to 20 years. I guess the shift away from movie-going has been going on for longer than I realized.

    But I recently watched a Millennial reaction to Jaws on YouTube.  I had forgot that the movie is 46 years old.

  85. 85.

    Nutmeg again

    OMG where is EF Goldman to comment on that lovely slice of Rhode Island?  Obvs, the password is either (a) quahog or (b) Fuckem

  86. 86.

    Ceci n est pas mon nym

    @randy khan: ​
     Also, check out the credits at the end of that trailer.

    I feel like I’m missing half the jokes. But I was noticing one name “Tim Dillon” coming up a lot and figured “I’ll bet that’s a real name, and he’s actually the guy who made it.” Then I noticed the author of the tweet.

  87. 87.

    mrmoshpotato

    @Brachiator:

    But I recently watched a Millennial reaction to Jaws on YouTube.  I had forgot that the movie is 46 years old. 

    How old we talking?  Good reaction?

  88. 88.

    NotMax

    @randy khan

    At home has some definite advantages.

    • Can get comfy in any position desired (or even stand up and stretch)
    • Pause it to dash to the little curmudgeon’s room
    • Rewind if missed a bit of dialogue (or for “Gosh, I’d swear that’s Aunt Minnie and Uncle Hobart siting in the background in that restaurant scene” moments)
    • Breadth of snackage limited only by personal preference and inventory
    • Fell asleep? No problem.
    • No pants required
    ;)

  89. 89.

    sab

    @Tom Q: My husband and I like totally different movies. He likes action and silly pranks. I like drama and historical. We can’t go to movies together because we hate each other’s movies. I can’t go separately because  creepy men in the theater.

  90. 90.

    Brachiator

    Concerts. Theater. Sporting events.

    Similar issues to movie theaters.

    Anyone looking forward to going to music venues again?

    Live theater?

    Football, baseball, etc?

  92. 92.

    geg6

    @Steve in the ATL:

    Almost the same here.  I’ve gone a couple of times to multiplexes to see some of the Star Wars movies with my BIL and a couple more with my niece over the last five years.  But trying to find anything worth seeing is almost impossible if you aren’t a devotee of violent action, comic books or animation.  I am, however, lucky that we have a small non-profit movie venue close by.  My sister and I go there quite often.  Saw Bohemian Rhapsody there and a doc from CNN Films about Linda Ronstadt and a quite a few others there.   It’s very well funded and is very nice.  I’ll go back there any time.

  93. 93.

    moonbat

    I was very happy that Gillian Anderson (aka Dana Scully) won her second Golden Globe award last night. She is a powerful actress in a tiny package.

  94. 94.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @NotMax: yup, all these

    the last movie I saw in the theatre was The Descendants, which google tells me came out in 2011.

  96. 96.

    Tom Q

    @sab: Ah.  I was luckier — my wife (till she passed away a few years ago) generally liked the same sort of movies I did.  Occasionally there’d be a conflict at the extremes — something a bit too arty for her, or too silly for me.  But, by and large, our tastes coincided, and afternoon movie-going was a significant part of our marriage.  Which may be partly why I miss it so much now.

  97. 97.

    evodevo

    @WaterGirl: Yep..I have arthritis in both knees, etc. and 10 hrs after the second shot, they were going ballistic.  Woke me up out of a sound sleep. (Took an ibuprofen the next AM and it went away, but while it lasted it was awful)  Mr.Evodevo has always had indigestion issues, and that’s where it hit him…

  99. 99.

    satby

    @Brachiator: Not quite 20, it turns out. I just checked to be sure, it was Revenge of the Sith in 2005. I went with an ex-BF, and it was an incredibly mediocre experience. Probably because I’m not a Star Wars fan. OTOH, it had been an easy five years before that one since I had been out to a movie. Just not my thing; though I and NotMax share a love of old classic movies.

  100. 100.

    Brachiator

    @mrmoshpotato:

    But I recently watched a Millennial reaction to Jaws on YouTube.  I had forgot that the movie is 46 years old.

    How old we talking?  Good reaction?

    There is a whole YouTube thing of people in their 20s, maybe 30s who claim that they have never seen certain movies before, and who post up reaction videos.

    The range of movies has been Back to the Future, Princess Bride, early Spielberg, The Godfather movies, Alien. Also occasional older films like It’s A Wonderful Life.

    Not a lot of film criticism. But the distancing of time in interesting. One person who watched Ghost only knew who Whoppi Goldberg was. No idea about Patrick Swayze or Demi Moore.

    Usually, the judgments are positive.

    Often the summary reaction is “I had no idea that a movie that was so old could be that good.”

    Practically nothing from the 60s or earlier.  That’s like a Dead Zone.

  101. 101.

    Gvg

    I like quite a few superhero movies. Some movies are better on the big screen. It’s also fun taking a kid to the movies. Other movies I prefer at home in comfort and when the mood strikes. A lot is going to depend on vaccination rates.

    I have been dreaming of a big family vaccination party where all my close relatives including the kids are done and we have a big family shindig with a Christmas tree, Turkey, an Easter egg hunt and Halloween decorations no matter what time of year we are finally all free.

  102. 102.

    satby

    @Brachiator: My last two exchange daughters were complaining about one of their high school teachers making them watch some old B&W movie, and couldn’t believe that one of the best movies ever made was B&W (or that filming in that was an artistic choice since color film had been around since the turn of the last century).

    So I made them sit through Casablanca with me at home. I had to pause it at the beginning to give them some context on WWII, but they ended up loving it.

  103. 103.

    Ceci n est pas mon nym

    @NotMax: George of the Jungle (if it were live action)

    There was in fact a live-action George of the Jungle. Done by Disney I think. It was fun enough.

  104. 104.

    sab

    @Tom Q: I understand. I am so sorry for you

    ETA We have seen few movies we agreed on and it was beyond fun to watch together. But I hated walking out on movies I actually liked. Or at least tolerated. Before him same issue with boyfriends.

  105. 105.

    Old Dan and Little Ann

    People in theaters piss me off for a variety of reasons.  I don’t miss going one bit.

  106. 106.

    Haydnseek

    @Steve in the ATL: One of the best shows I ever saw was Los Lobos playing a wedding reception.  One of my best friends got married and the reception was at the house of his brides parents in Torrance, for all you SoCal jackals.  They played in the driveway in front of their little wooden one car garage.  This is long before they hit it big obviously, but we knew all about them. They were playing the clubs in L.A’s Chinatown and just scuffling for gigs.  They absolutely blew the roof off the whole neighborhood and would have hung out all night if they didn’t have to be in downtown L.A. for a club gig.  Nicest guys on earth too.

  108. 108.

    barbequebob

    I have no idea what that first video, the parody one, is supposed to be about, but all of those outdoor scenes were shot at Coast Guard Beach and Nauset Light Beach, In Eastham, MA (Cape Cod). anyone have idea who is behind it?

  109. 109.

    counterfactual

    @tokyokie: Amazon wasn’t around in 1949, and Disney was a small studio so never was bound by the Paramount decision. In any case, Trump’s Justice Department announced they were abandoning US vs. Paramount as obsolete.

  110. 110.

    gwangung

    @debbie: Yes. I know enough to totally foul it up, but I use Open Broadcast Studio software to mix video input and output it to Youtube, Vimeo etc.

    A friend’s Minneapolis theatre did live shows, every weekend day, mixing live video feeds across the continent, splicing in recorded work, and it was VERY slick.

  111. 111.

    NotMax

    @Old Dan and Little Ann

    Can’t help but wonder if at the same time any of them are watching a different movie on their phone, along the lines of those who listen to another ball game on the radio while attending one live.

    Haven’t set foot in a theater in such a long time so as to know if it’s still true but it used to seem the makers of candies sold in theaters purposely packaged them in the loudest, crinkliest wrapping possible.

  119. 119.

    satby

    @Dorothy A. Winsor: INORITE? I mean, they had the excuse of being teens from other cultures, but it’s a film that just halts me in my tracks to watch whenever it’s on (or used to, when I didn’t stream everything).

    But, I’ve never successfully made it all the way through either The Godfather or Gone With The Wind, so I can’t really judge.*

    * seen most of both films, but in the end I didn’t give a damn.

  121. 121.

    The Thin Black Duke

    @satby: The Godfather left me cold; none of characters were worth the emotional investment. The sequel is another story; the rare movie where the sequel is better.

  122. 122.

    Old Dan and Little Ann

    @NotMax:  I could start listing all the times I’ve had my movie experience ruined but I might start to sound a bit…..odd.   lol…… I just want to sit in absolute piece and quiet and not hear or see a thing except what’s on the screen.

  123. 123.

    debbie

    @satby:

    My nieces and nephews hated black and white films, up until they were 16 or so, then they went nuts over them.

  126. 126.

    MomSense

    @zhena gogolia:

    I saw The King’s Speech and Florence Foster Jennings in a sweet, little theater.  We also saw The White Crow which is one of the best movies I’ve ever seen.  It’s about young Rudolph Nureyev from childhood until his defection.  Even though I knew the story, I was on the edge of my seat.
    The dancing was beautiful.

  128. 128.

    VeniceRiley

    maybe on date nights occasionally. But, Scorsese notwithstanding, I am fine with the quality and sound from a 65″+ and surround sound. And I can make better popcorn.

  129. 129.

    Splitting Image

    @Dorothy A. Winsor:

    I’m always shocked when I find people who haven’t seen Casablanca

    I never watched it until I was close to 40. It and The Godfather movies fell into a category of films that had been parodied and homaged so many times that it felt as though I’d already seen them. Finally bought it and the Godfather trilogy one weekend and binge-watched them all.

  133. 133.

    SoupCatcher

    About the only movies I can imagine going to a theater to see, now, are black and whites.

    When I lived mid-Peninsula in the late nineties, I loved to go to the Stanford Theatre in downtown Palo Alto. Beautiful old renovated interior with an organ that would move up and down that an organist would play between double features. Reasonably priced snacks and comfortable seating. They would do a theme for a month, and they had a relationship with the UCLA Film Archives, so the prints were in amazing condition.

    When the theme was Humphrey Bogart, I think I saw thirty movies in a month.

  134. 134.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @Baud: we’ll include you out

    can we get a non-respite open thread, maybe? I wanna bitch about the Archbishop of New Orleans and chat about the minimum wage news

  137. 137.

    artem1s

    @raven: 

    I gave up on movie theaters when all the bullshit talking and raising hell during the films started

    Same for me. I make an exception for film festivals because they make an effort to police the audience behavior and I don’t have to try to watch a movie thru the glare of someone’s smart phone screen.

  138. 138.

    zhena gogolia

    I think the trailer up top is pretty funny, even though I don’t really understand it. I sent it to one of my students who I think will get it.

  139. 139.

    Brachiator

    @Dorothy A. Winsor: 

    I’m always shocked when I find people who haven’t seen Casablanca

    This doesn’t shock me with respect to younger people today.

    When I was a college student I had never seen Casablanca and a couple of other classics, even though they were available to me. Maybe even on TV. But I was doing other stuff or just didn’t take the time to watch them. And I had possibly heard that it was a great film and doubted that it could really be that good.

    Saw it. Loved it.

    But in the 90s and later, I knew younger people who had never seen a film made before 1977, the year Star Wars came out. Except maybe for Jaws. They just weren’t interested.

    And over the years I’ve known people who hated black and white movies, or who hated silent movies, and just could not watch them.

    To someone today, watching Casablanca would be like someone in say 1980 watching some antique early cinema experiment from 1902.

  140. 140.

    zhena gogolia

    @Brachiator:

    My big shock came in about 2004, when a student was giving an oral report on a story that mentioned Greta Garbo. He was going into elaborate detail about who Greta Garbo was, and the other students were nodding along. I said, “Wait a minute. None of you knows who GRETA GARBO is?” They didn’t.

  141. 141.

    Ken

    When you find out someone hasn’t seen Casablanca, think of it as an opportunity.

    Oh, and when I was searching for that, I found one that’s (lately) very apropos for Balloon Juice.  I guess these things come in cycles…

  144. 144.

    Kayla Rudbek

    The last movie I saw in a theater was the latest Star Wars movie, on Boxing Day with all my in-laws (it was my mother-in-law’s birthday). It was annoying to try to coordinate everyone together (10+ people, one of whom never does anything on time, and about half the group needed to check out the assistive technology). On the other hand, it would also have been difficult to fit everyone around one TV, not to mention bathroom breaks etc.

    And I do also miss the IMAX at the Smithsonian.

    But I’m not going back into a movie theater until we’re vaccinated and we have at least a 60% vaccination rate in the area. And I would definitely double mask.

  145. 145.

    Ceci n est pas mon nym

    @Brachiator: To someone today, watching Casablanca would be like someone in say 1980 watching some antique early cinema experiment from 1902.

    That’s a little depressing. I haven’t watched a lot of stuff in the 50s and aren’t really familiar with a lot of the big stars from that decade. But I have watched a fair amount from the 30s and 40s, especially comedies. And a fair amount of silent stuff too.

    ​I’m surprised that younger people wouldn’t get curious about older stuff, at least stuff that people talk about so much, like Hitchcock for instance. Or the Marx Brothers.

    @Splitting Image: ​  Still have never seen a Godfather movie. Or Pulp Fiction. Or any Alien movies past the first one.​​

  147. 147.

    Steve in the ATL

    @Ken: yeah, that little trend needs to go back to its 1990’s grave. But 142nd will always be a thing!

  148. 148.

    Steve in the ATL

    @Ceci n est pas mon nym: a lot of great movies have come out since the 1950’s. There is no compelling reason to watch the vast, vast majority of those old ones.  Much like there is no reason, compelling or not, to read Silas Marner. 

  154. 154.

    Brachiator

    @zhena gogolia:

    My big shock came in about 2004, when a student was giving an oral report on a story that mentioned Greta Garbo. He was going into elaborate detail about who Greta Garbo was, and the other students were nodding along. I said, “Wait a minute. None of you knows who GRETA GARBO is?” They didn’t.

    That is sad and funny.

    Movies have been around so long now that they are not just pop culture anymore. They are artifacts of cultural history.

    @Ceci n est pas mon nym:

    ​I’m surprised that younger people wouldn’t get curious about older stuff, at least stuff that people talk about so much, like Hitchcock for instance. Or the Marx Brothers.

    The local broadcast TV stations had a lot of old movies all the time. Now many are on dedicated cable channels. I was a member of two college film societies and hit art houses all over Southern California and the Silent Movie Theater.

    Lots of opportunities today, but you have to want to look.

  156. 156.

    raven

    @Steve in the ATL: I have a picture with him taken at the state literacy conference when I was the “success story” speaker. They asked me to speak for 15 minutes and, just before I went on, the state director told me he was in a hurry to leave and to cut it to two minutes. Want to know what I think of that punk-ass peace time jar head?

  158. 158.

    Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)

    @Brachiator:

    But in the 90s and later, I knew younger people who had never seen a film made before 1977, the year Star Wars came out. Except maybe for Jaws. They just weren’t interested.

    And over the years I’ve known people who hated black and white movies, or who hated silent movies, and just could not watch them.

    To someone today, watching Casablanca would be like someone in say 1980 watching some antique early cinema experiment from 1902.

    I can only speak for myself, but I’ve watched a few Marx Brothers and Three Stooges films and they hold up pretty well to this day and are still funny.

    However, I’ve noticed with a lot of older films before a certain period (1960s?) the way they’re written (particularly dialogue) and filmed are very “stodgy” imo, making many of them boring. The way men and women talked in some of them was this unrealistic back and forth banter. All I can think is “real people don’t talk or act like this”. Perhaps it’s also the pacing of movies back then too. And it’s not just B&W films; anything filmed before like 1970 (with a few exceptions) tends to bore me. Of course nowadays with certain movies, the stories feel like they move too fast. The pace most movies had from the 80s through the 2000s was just right for me imo. Don’t get me started on the whole “shaky cam” thing either that’s become popular

  159. 159.

    raven

    @Goku (aka Amerikan Baka): If you ever get a chance

     
    A Decade Under the Influence
     

    The 1970s was an extraordinary time of rebellion, of questioning every accepted idea: political activism, hedonism, protests, the sexual revolution, the women’s movement, the civil rights movement, the music revolution, rage and liberation. Every standard by which we set our social and cultural clocks was either turned inside out or thrown away completely and reinvented. For American cinema, the 1970s was an era during which a new generation of filmmakers created work for a new kind of audience–moviegoers who were hungry for stories that reflected their own experiences and who were turning their backs on aged old studio formulas. As a result, emerging filmmakers influenced by foreign directors such as Godard, Kurosawa and Fellini coupled with the social climate and a struggling studio system, converged to create a new kind of moviemaking. Through their choice of material, filmmakers such as Francis Ford Coppola, Martin Scorsese, Robert Altman, Peter Bogdanovich, William Friedkin, …Written by Sujit R. Varma

  160. 160.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @zhena gogolia: Kinda surprised myself. I know I saw about the last half hour of Queen Christina, and Ninotchka and Grand Hotel have long been on my list, but I’v never seen them.

  161. 161.

    Brachiator

    @Steve in the ATL:

    Much like there is no reason, compelling or not, to read Silas Marner. 

    Got tossed out of high school English because I said this was dull, boring crap.

    To this day, I have no idea why some schools assigned it. The teacher could not explain it either.

  162. 162.

    J R in WV

    @raven: ​

     

    (to say nothing of getting interference if someone calls or texts in the middle of it). ” Huh?

    I dunno how all these people can have nice cellphones and NOT KNOW HOW TO TURN THEM OFF!!!

    Just amazing. I turn my phone ON when I want to call someone,
    or expect someone to call me. Otherwise it is TURNED OFF~!!~

    Last good movie we went to was Ford v Ferrari — before that was Black Panther, also great show. Then came the Trumpian Plague.

  166. 166.

    Brachiator

    @Goku (aka Amerikan Baka): ​

    However, I’ve noticed with a lot of older films before a certain period (1960s?) the way they’re written (particularly dialogue) and filmed are very “stodgy” imo, making many of them boring.

    Yeah, I hear this a lot. Some people can adjust. Others not.

    The way men and women talked in some of them was this unrealistic back and forth banter. All I can think is “real people don’t talk or act like this”. Perhaps it’s also the pacing of movies back then too. And it’s not just B&W films; anything filmed before like 1970 (with a few exceptions) tends to bore me.

    raven’s link is on point. Everything in film is artificial, but in the late 60s and through the 70s, filmmakers wanted a more naturalistic sensibility in movies. And it has continued since.

    A similar thing can be seen in the transition from silent film to talkies. The way that actors emoted looked phony when sound came around.

    French New Wave directors also rebelled big time against the perceived stodginess of earlier films. Some of these directors started out as film critics. The critics were challenged to make better films. And they did. And changed French and world cinema.

    ETA: But try the Howard Hawks His Girl Friday. Banter, but the overlapping dialog was outrageous at the time.

  167. 167.

    Miss Bianca

    Well, as someone who actually *works* in the theater industry, I sure as hell *hope* some of all y’all return to the theater someday!

    I have no idea what our business model will actually look like, mind – not sure how many big Hollywood studios are going to bother premiering all their new movies in the theaters. Maybe we’ll have to do more live theater. Or show classic movies. Or rent the theater out to people who want private viewings – or to play video games – on the big screen.

  171. 171.

    Miss Bianca

    @The Thin Black Duke: Funny…I just saw both Godfather I and II for the first time recently, and I definitely thought the first one was the better movie. Liked ’em both well enough, but decided I really didn’t need to sit through Godfather III.

    @MomSense: I just saw a trailer for The White Crow and I thought it looked pretty cool!

  176. 176.

    Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)

    @Brachiator:

    Everything in film is artificial, but in the late 60s and through the 70s, filmmakers wanted a more naturalistic sensibility in movies. And it has continued since.

    Yeah, that’s around the time I’ve noticed people acting more like real people in movies for sure. Television too.

    ETA: But try the Howard Hawks His Girl Friday. Banter, but the overlapping dialog was outrageous at the time.

    I might just do that

  177. 177.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @Miss Bianca: I love the setting of the first Godfather, NYC in the late ’40s, the cars, the street scenes, and my favorite part of GF2 is the DeNiro part, NYC at the turn of the century. Coppola had to fight like hell to get the studio to agree to the expense of creating that atmosphere in GF 1. They wanted him to contemporize it.

  179. 179.

    Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)

    @NotMax:

    Looked him up. Name sounded familiar:

    Sturges took the screwball comedy format of the 1930s to another level, writing dialogue that, heard today, is often surprisingly naturalistic, mature, and ahead of its time, despite the farcical situations. It is not uncommon for a Sturges character to deliver an exquisitely turned phrase and take an elaborate pratfall within the same scene.

    Hmm, sounds cool! I’ll check his movies out when I can

  180. 180.

    Brachiator

    @Miss Bianca:

    Or rent the theater out to people who want private viewings – or to play video games – on the big screen.

    Oh yeah, this is a thing. From BBC News

    Eui Jeong Lee and three of her friends sit in an otherwise empty 200-seat cinema auditorium and play a video game on the giant screen.

    As Ms Lee blasts her gaming opponents with her wireless controller, the sound whips loudly around the dark room from the numerous cinema speakers.

    “The sound quality is particularly amazing,” says the 25-year-old student.

    “The sound of the gunshots is just so vivid, and when something flew directly at me from the screen I even screamed.”

    Ms Lee and her mates had hired the screen for two hours at a branch of South Korea’s largest cinema chain, CGV.

     

  182. 182.

    debbie

    @NotMax: 

    I loved the back and forth of those dialogues. Imagine speaking that quickly without stumbling over words, losing the pacing, or gasping for breath!

  183. 183.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @NotMax: I’d start with The Lady Eve, not just Stanwyck and Fonda, but Charles Coburn and Eugene Pallette!

Comments are closed.